The Weblog Review

When I first came across this Journal/site a couple of months ago I thought it was too personal to be a weblog. Since then I have changed my outlook of this site after reading through.

This weblog is about a tragedy that happened in the author’s family and how it has made a great impact in her life and in the community near her place. I am not getting into any details here about it here. However, to many people this weblog/journal has become a place where one can share similar experiences. The amount of emotional support shared between many of the readers and author is quite fascinating. Some of the posts look very researched and with documents to support both sides of any argument.

The design is very good. It has been designed professionally with great taste and has subtle inference to what the site it is about. Hence, the design suits the journal quite perfectly.

In short, this is a well written and well designed site. As a blog/journal it is updated frequently and well maintained.2 With Spirit

The Blondelibrarian blog is written by Renee, an American living in Germany. After searching the archives by category, it is still a little sketchy as to whether or not she is a librarian but I did confirm that she was in fact blonde.

Renee updates quite often and the posts are very descriptive, well written and detailed. She has a unique way of looking at things which comes across in her blog as she somehow manages to write about ordinary events such as the demise of the cat’s toy mouse (RIP) and make it interesting and funny. She writes about a wide range of topics, such as reviews on books she reads, living in Germany, and ‘cat blogging’ just to name a few.

The layout of the blog was an easy to navigate two column layout with the blog and a sidebar with archives, navigation and blogroll. The design had a nice header graphic featuring a blonde of course. The background color of the blog was black and the font was purple, an ‘interesting’ combination. While you could read the font on the blog page, on the sidebar, where the font was smaller, it was harder to read.

What I like most about this blog was the well written blog entries. What I liked the least was the choice of background and colors. That might be a personal thing though, so I’ll also say that the navigation section could be better organized. I had to read and reread it a few times before I figured out that the links to other parts of the blog were under the about me section.

Overall, I liked this blog, but I thought that the blog needs to be redesigned to make the entries stand out more.Culture Shock and the blondelibrarian

The title seemed pretty straightforward to me. When I read it, I assumed that the blog was about a writer who blogs.

And I was right! Yay to me.

It seems to me, though, that the blog isn’t really all that much of a creative writing one. The entries are mostly about the life of the author, who is aptly named “easywriter”. But what is different, in my opinion, is the style. Other people’s personal blogs are of course, about their personal life. But only a few can match the way this blog can hold on to the attention of a reader.
Writer’s Blog

Okay, a writing weblog, now this could go two ways, I thought. One, I could be extremely impressed or I could end up reading angsty, rhyming poetry about how someone hates their parents. Lucky for me, “Writer’s Blog” fell into the first category.

“Writer’s Blog” is just what it says: it is the writings of one Easywriter. While she does blog about her life, the truly beautiful and capturing entries are the surrealistic ones, that sound like poetry, and tell about random occurances, thoughts, or sights. “Easywriter” is aptly named; she has an easy-flowing writing style, it reminded me of reading someone’s diary or personal anecdote; filled with inner thoughts. This style only made her entries more interesting to read.

The entries usually aren’t very long, but there are so many of them! Sometimes Easywriter will add an entry a few times a day, so there’s plenty of reading, which makes up for the fact that the weblog is only a few months old.

The design is plain, just a mustard-colored background and text. While it was a little disappointing that it was so plain, it did work for “Writer’s Blog,” simply because then the writing was the focus. And the template was crisp, clear, and easy on the eyes with the text large and easily readable.

I enjoyed this weblog immensely, and you can be sure that I’m going to be back again and again.Writer’s Blog

Here we have a blogger site, with a non-standard template based on a black background, and a nice banner at the top showing a sunrise or a sunset – one of those times, you know, when there’s the ground, and the sun behind the ground, and the clouds.

This is a personal weblog, so right off I’m thinking maybe I’d better leave it for somebody else to review otherwise pretty soon somebody is going to be cursing and swearing and looking to give somebody else a negative rating. But I will put aside my petty prejudices and give this blog a fair trial, followed by a first class hanging (What movie is that from anyway?).

So, the author is Hicham MAGED, he is from Egypt, and a devout Muslim. This weblog is about his life, and his religion, but not necessarily in that order. There is commentary on current events and how they relate to ALLAAH(swt), and invitations to attend what appear to be religious conferences. Clearly the author feels very strongly about his religious beliefs which is cool, you know, if you’re into that kind of thing. Having said all of that, recent posts also include topics such as Firefox, computer games, and Blogger templates, so it’s not all religion and ME ME ME here.

In an early post he quotes Arnold Schwarzenegger, and that kinda cracked me up – the devoutly religious purveyor of peace and goodwill to all mankind quoting the politician, ex-actor, purveyor of violence and mayhem. But let’s not read too much into that.

So what about the look and feel? Here is where I fall in a screaming heap every time, because I know as much about design as Jim Carrey knows about comedy(ie nothing whatsoever). As already mentioned it is black with a non-standard blogger template. The sidebar is grey, the text a kind of light blue that probably has a name I’m unaware of, and basically it works for me.

He uses Flash in the sidebar, which doesn’t bother me because I have Flashblock, and Realplayer, which doesn’t bother me because I don’t have Realplayer installed. Also in the sidebar are a calendar showing Hijri and Gregorian dates, a moon phase indicator, a poll (how did you reach my blogspot?), a weather forecast that I found unreadable, and links, links and more links. It sounds kind of busy, but none of it is too intrusive.

So, in summary, this is a personal/religious weblog, looks ok, and that’s about all I can say. Who should read it? I don’t know. Certainly not me. Will a Muslim identify and enjoy? I don’t know, ask a Muslim. Maybe you’re interested in other cultures, and the people who live in them. Well go for it, but there are probably better resources.NULL