Review 2231

As The Frozen South really does look everything like a personal blog to me, I have re-categorized it under ‘Personal’ instead of the original ‘Entertainment’.

Not that The Frozen Guy doesn’t provide entertainment; he does. He has as ‘entertaining’ and dramatic a history of love as the average person can have, and because he shares with his readers the details, unashamed, it makes very good reading. Of course I had to put it under ‘Personal’.

Colorful love life aside, The Frozen Guy is an able writer. Almost all of his posts are short in length (brevity makes easy reading) but packed with interesting content. Another unexpected plus point of The Frozen South is the comments between The Frozen Guy and regular readers. Amidst the predictable warm support and encouragement, there are personal stories shared by the readers in response to The Frozen Guy’s posts. Of course, the best ones are the ones that come after the posts about his love life.

As for the layout, there is really nothing to pick or praise – a blogspot page with clean lines and a white background.

The Frozen South is undeniably a Personal blog, written by a sensitive guy who has a knack of giving readers what they want. Head over for a look. You might find yourself sympathizing with his predicaments and sharing your own.

The Frozen South

Review 2228

Welcome to Google Village. With a name like this one, we know what to expect – Google, Google, and more Google. Mustering all my strength, I dive into the words, Dr. Elwyn Jenkins distributes so freely on his site – and boy, are there many.

After overcoming the first hurdle – this site does not render well in Safari – I am faced with the task of reading a lot of content. But wait, what is that? Comics! “Cool”, I think, “something to look at while I read”. But, alas, those comics are just about the unfunniest thing I’ve seen in ages. Speaking about unfunny, it’s a word. Trust me, it’s on Google, I checked.

Well. With the comic route being a no-go, I’ll have to read the texts. Now, let me let you in on a little history of mine. I actually wrote and successfully defended a doctoral thesis, and long sentences, as well as complicated conclusions are my specialty. This man, however, managed to make even me cringe in non-understanding pain. I might be completely wrong here, but Dr. Jenkins seems to be a non-native English speaker (nothing wrong here, I am neither), and some of his sentences read like those you get when you use Google Translation services.

Want a sample? Here you go:
“Google[tm] can be considered to be a text, albeit in the electronic domain, similar to a text such as a novel, an encyclopedia, or other large text. It is of the genre of large text that are constructed using a database. In the world of electronic language, there are several different types of database texts, catalogues, search engine listings, dictionaries, and flight schedules, for example. In understanding the use and application of each of these texts, we need to know a number of things about how the texts are created, how they are updated, what is contained in them, so that we might have some idea of their usefulness, application and usability for specific purposes.”

Here’s what I could glean: this website focuses on a very narrow topic, has a good deal of infatuation with the PageRank system, and seems to aim at marketers trying to understand and harness the power of Google. According to Dr. Jenkins, Google in itself is a text – not unlike prose or a good book – which can be used to reflect a large part of the web as lecture. Whow, heavy stuff, that.

Who will be profiting from Google Village? The marketer, wanting to know more about how to use and improve Google’s powers, a small number of individuals with some kind of strong attraction to Google (be it positive or negative), and Dr. Jenkins’ peers, I guess.Google Village

Review 2246

Violating my own vows, I will start this review off with a look at design and layout. Not because its captivating presence, but because it’s easy to do. A standard Blogger template, listlessly adapted to sport two links and the obligatory ‘send me email’ line surrounds the content this author offers. I’d love to tell you more about him or her, but I searched in vain for any explanatory page with some background on it.

While I was at it, I started at entry one, posted just about half a year ago, and worked my way forward. Most entries are prosaic, lyrical, entries, none of which I could catch attempting to rhyme or make sense in the analytical meaning of the word. That is, I guess, what art is all about – not everyone gets it. I, and the people I showed Realysis to, are part of the crowd that simply did not get it.

The individual postings remind me of the drug and alcohol induced prose, some of my college roommates produced on a semi-regular basis. Don’t get me wrong, though – most of the great artists we study in school and admire in our homes, wrote and painted under the influence.

This particular site you’ll have to experience yourself. Click a random archived entry and you will either love the author’s style or feel nothing at all. Graphical design, content presentation, and archive management are Blogger standard, comments or RSS feeds are most likely somewhere near the author’s “About me” page.

Verdict: I’m sure this weblog has its fan base, its usefulness for broader consumption, however, is questionable.Realysis

Review 2249

What’s GI Party, you ask? Well, let’s quote the people who run it. GI Party, according to Keith Morris one of the brains behind it, is a “website dedicated to offering insight into a military world through blogging”, and offers the ability “to publish entries to their own personal journals hosted on GiP so as to allow friends and family to keep up with the lives of those in the military”. Going on, Keith hopes, “/c/ivilians who might be considering a life of service could also come here to get a variety of perspectives on life in the military”, a surely honorable task.

GI Party currently hosts about two dozen blogs, each of which is maintained by a member of one armed force or another. Most recent blog entries are also reflected on GIParty’s front page, a quick first glance offers ten postings in four days, most of which are blog-the-news two-liners and in-house advertising for TroopTrax, a project aiming to send music to our brethren in arms in Kuwait.

Before I take you on a dive into the guts of GIParty, a quick glance at graphical and typographical execution seems justified. Graphically, this is certainly a good blog, its layout is fresh, the content nicely ordered, and most pages look equally good under Safari (that’s the KHTML engine), Mozilla/Gecko and Internet Explorer. Overall, a not too graphics heavy site, with well placed specks of color and imagery sprinkled throughout. Having two dozen bloggers under one standardized interface warrants some kind of “about this blogger” page, and sure enough, each individual blog sports a short description of the serviceperson in charge at the top of each entry. Nice one, there. Navigational elements are severely lacking, however. From each individual entry, visitors are only able to either jump to the bloggers archive page, his or her most current entry and the blogs front page. A ‘next’ and ‘previous’ entry navigation element would do wonders to improve the otherwise clunky site layout.

On to the content, shall we? Of course it should come as no surprise to find most blog authors leaning slightly right of the political center, and fairly opinionated when it comes to governmental and military affairs. Sgt. Mac, a 54 year old former Air Policeman, offers stories from the past as well as his take on current affairs, most of which are lengthy, well written, pieces. His blog I enjoyed, reading quite a chunk of his archived stories, until the ever-nagging cat of mine started reminding me to feed and pet him. Returning from my parental duties, I checked out Tina’s blog. Shorter, mostly egocentered, entries tell stories about her current life, the kind of blog exactly aimed towards the “friends and family”, GIParty’s mission statement mentions above.

Of the 24 bloggers, let me mention a last one by name. A long time ago, I met a certain SPC Schwarz, who’d later entertain millions of web surfers with his “213 things, Skippy can’t do” list. Robert Brewington, a relatively new addition to GIParty’s roster, attempts and mostly succeeds in offering is own ‘Things I can’t do’ list. This entry alone is worth the visit, dear reader.

It specialized focus aside, this blog is nothing out of the ordinary, however. Clunky navigation and the lack of good original content in most postings make it hard to recommend it as a steady read, the absence of RSS feeds add to this state considerably. Considering entries such as the collected memories of Sgt. Max, or Robert’s “Can’t Do” list, GIParty is worth a visit or two, though.GI Party

Review 2202

“Writing Daze,” the name of this journal, may just have left me in a sort of daze … I guess … but what does daze mean exactly? Well, Webster defines ‘daze’ in this way: “To stun, as with a heavy blow or shock; stupefy.” I think the name of this journal should honestly be re-thought as there really isn’t anything mind-blowing or shocking about the writing found here. I wasn’t shocked, I wasn’t stunned — I may have been stupefied, but that was just a byproduct of gazing (not to be mistaken with dazing) at these rather boring words for too long.

To be fair, I must admit that the writing here isn’t horrible — it’s just not very interesting. The author is very literal and dreadfully dry.

I am a fan of creative writing — just as I’m a fan of abstract art. There’s nothing abstract or creative about these writings … the entries are simplistic, and do not even scratch the surface of complexity. She’s everyday … And I honestly think that the author finds solace in simplicity; it’s a comfort-zone. Staying true to my above statement, I’m drawn to sites and web logs which have attractive or catchy designs. This web log had neither. The design does reflect the writing however, in that it’s boring. I believe, in fact, that this is a template — and not even a good one.

Constructively, I’d ask that this author step out of this monotonous comfort-zone and find depth within herself. It’s not an easy task to reflect and/or go against the ego … but it’s important, especially when writing in a journal which serves the purpose of self-discovery. This journal was rated the way it was because it lacks too much to be considered with the good one’s. However, and you can call me a romantic, I think this site and journal could greatly improve — with insight and a whole lot of boundary breakin’.Writing Daze