Category: Uncategorized

I had the sinking suspicion that I had visited this site at some point in time. Maybe it’s just because the word “precocious” is so popular for website titles/names. If I had visited in the past, I certainly don’t recognize it at all now. I would almost call it refreshing if I hadn’t already seen thousands of black & white no tables sites before.

The writing itself comes from the heart. She says what she thinks, feels, and believes. This is a Good Thing(tm). She allows us to see her life in its entirety: good and bad. She’s been to hell and back and still managed to keep her sense of humor. Like they say, “What doesn’t kill you, only makes you stronger.” Aside from her personal life, she talks a little about web design/programming, role playing and a few other interests. Not much useless personality quiz/Friday Five type fluff here (also a Good Thing), she has more important things to say than that.

There were a lot of problems with her site design. The author goes through the effort of making her site XHTML validated, but does not check her CSS. Some of it appears to be proprietary of Internet Explorer, which was the only browser I had that could display the site properly. Because of this, some of her black journal text overlapped a dark background image in Opera, since it doesn’t support the proprietary code that makes background image transparent. I tried to load the site in Netscape 6.0, but all it did was crash miserably. Every. Single. Time. Netscape 4.76 handles the layout better than expected, except where the calendar and a few of the images appear right behind the journal text in some spots, making it difficult to read.

I enjoyed reading her entries and I recommend this site if you enjoy reading what’s on the inside of a real person. I found that the more I dug through her archives, the more I liked and respected her, despite the design/layout issues.

Precocious.org

There’s a lot to this site, all of which can be navigated through with the menu box along the side of the weblog frame. I was able to learn a great deal about Scott just by checking out those available links.

The site layout works well in any screen resolution, and all the links in the menu box to the side opened up in the center frame just as they were should. Sometimes the gray text was a bit hard to read on the slightly lighter gray background, but overall, Scott does a good job with it.

The archived section is set up rather uniquely. You can personally decide which way you’d like to go through the archives of the site, which would be very convenient if you were looking for something in particular that dealt with a specific subject matter.




I stereotype very badly when it comes to reading weblogs that belong to anyone under the age of 18. I only stereotype from having had dreadful experiences with those types of weblogs. Scott and the entire Psypheria site proved my stereotyping to be dead wrong in this case.




I like Scott’s satirical nature when discussing worldly events. He obviously follows the news somewhat, and has intelligent thoughts and opinions that he wants to share. Scott’s a Dilbert fan, and frequently shares Dilbert cartoons with his readers.




There was an issue I read in the archives of the site about Scott supposedly “dumbing things down” for his readers, or to not appear so intelligent to the outside world. But just as Scott’s response to the issue says: “If you don’t like my ideas, or how I write, stop reading.




This is a good weblog to read. You learn a ton about the author just through reading the journal entries, and that makes readers (myself included) want to come back and read more.
PsyBlog

Most of the time entrance, or splash, pages tend to be an annoyance (at least to this surfer). In the instance of Ten-Fifteen, Jeremiah McVay has utilized a simple well positioned splash page to set the mood for the rest of the Site.



Upon entering the blog one is struck by the contrast of the vibrant photos against the steel blue background of a well laid out page. The photos of the ocean lapping upon soft sands were enough to make this viewer envious, being stuck in dark confines surrounded by glowing monitors.



Though an attractive Site, I was disappointed when attempting to use the “Features” drop-down only to find that it didn’t function. Further disappointment was to come when switching to the image links in the upper left-hand section of the page, those too, alas, provided an “Error on page” message.



The only way that one may view the photographs is by browsing through the “Archives” drop-down, many of which are well worth the view, though there is a degree of frustration having been teased with the potential of viewing the photos by category instead of by event.



Ten-Fifteen, once one manages to overcome any frustration at the non-functioning technical aspects, is worth visiting for to view some of the entertaining and interesting images with which Jeremiah provides his visitors.


TEN15

This site follows a classic “splash page to menu” design, and has a nice and clean look. The design is laid out nicely, flash is used appropriately, and the site, overall, is very attractive. Themes (hot chocolate) are used well throughout, as well. The problem?

This site has no “Blog” element to it as of writing. I looked through all the links and found nothing in the way of a Weblog at all. The closest you get is the “News” section. The News section does have a layout suggesting that it uses a Weblog engine (such as Blogger, Greymatter, etc), but it is simply used for news concerning the site and it’s subject, author Garrett Diamond. Unless the content of this section changes, this site contains no Weblog whatsoever. If the author of the site has decided to begin a Weblog, then this very well might be a site with a much, much higher rating. However, as it is now, I can not give a non-Weblog site a high rating on a Weblog review.

Having said that, the site itself is wonderful. There are links to music, poetry, video, artwork, and more concerning the author the site is about. And, like I said in the opening paragraph, it is well laid out and designed. So, if you enjoy eclectic writing, music, and so forth then check out this site. However, if you go here to see a Weblog, you best try something else.HOTCHOCOLATE.TV

On Writing This Review:
I couldn’t think of a better way to start it, then by taking a page out of this weblog, Life-Log Perpetual. Each entry starts out with On Such and Such a topic, which is actually some what useful. And though I read every post on this site, the posts that had titles that interested me more were read for better detail.

Chris posts about a variety of topics. He is still searching for his focus is my guess since the site just opened early October. He posts a question about weblogs of if weblogs need a certain amount of focus to hold a reader’s attention. To which the answer is: it depends on who the reader is. But Chris’s lack of a specific focus is not a bad thing. Everyday, hundreds of new weblogs are started, and most do not have a good beginning. However, Life-Log Perpetual is good in its infancy.

The posts themselves read almost like a good book. He tends to write in vague terms, but at the same time give a lot of detail. Its like when reading a 400 page novel, you know the book could have been written in 35 pages, but those other 365 pages are all the detail that makes it so much better.

The design of the site is a blogger template. And it is my least favorite. Why is it my least favorite? I don’t know. I just don’t like it. Too many people use it, and it seems to big and bulky for a site. However, to Chris’s credit, he did customize it a little with adding some images. This makes it a little easier to bear, but still, this reviewer still does not like the template.

Very few weblogs have actually gotten my attention since creating TWR. Even fewer have kept it. I hope that Life-Log Perpetual will be able to keep my attention, as it has definitely gotten my attention.
Irrelevant Press