Month: April 2002

The face of a girl looks at me as I arrive, almost as if she’s noting

the arrival of this stranger as I pass by on my way to the content of

the blog. Looks like it’s cold here! A nicely laid out blog at first

sight, though the sidebar doesn’t seem too clear. Quite what the bit

of text at the top of the page means, I’m not too sure. But it does

seem, from first impressions, that the author of this blog is into

creative writing.

Reading the entries on the current page of the blog, there’s no doubt

that Olga, the author, is heavily into the sort of spiritual stuff

that brings healing crystals and ‘ethnic’ clothing and jewelry to

mind, not to mention auras. Her ‘about me’ page confirms that she

believes in psychics, reincarnation, healing, and so on. She is also

heavily into creative arts generally. I am not surprised to find she

has chosen to live in Los Angeles. I feel I could just assume her to

match the stereotype I have in my head completely.

After dipping into the archives a little, this would seem to be a

personal blog with the standard ingredients. Except everything seems

to be written in the context of Olga’s nature religion. Whether it’s

thoughts on something that happened that day, or expressions of how

she feels about her work, it all seems to be from that particular

perspective, with plenty of jargon.

There is more to the site, including a poetry section and what looks

like an extensive portfolio featuring web design and art.

Unfortunately, Macromedia Flash is required for some parts of the

site, including the portfolio, and what I expect to be the main page

of the site. Consequently, this site will not be completely open and

accessible to everyone. But generally, the design is okay, and

clearly of the artistic kind. And, if you haven’t already guessed,

her nature religion pervades pretty much everything.

It is difficult to know quite how to rate this blog, as the heavy use

of religious jargon and concepts could easily reduce the content’s

accessibility to many people. Then again, it is a writing style that

is true (I trust) to the author’s beliefs and perspective, and this

is, indeed, a personal blog. While many will be put off by the

strongly religious nature of Olga’s writing, it does seem to be

reasonably standard stuff.

p r o t o t y p e 2 6

The Lardpony web site is centred around the weblog, and the most recent post is on the front page. Everything else you need is also right there in front of you just where you want it, so lets go in and have a look.

This weblog has been in existence for about three years in different places, its been here for about a year and this is the content that I concentrated on. Thomas, the writer has a very easy conversational style of writing and can be very witty. He is a student, and this site is centred on the stereotypical student lifestyle of drinking, music, junk food and barely making your deadlines. Its not a diary weblog in the truest sense of the word, he just spills onto the page whatever is in his head, and this makes it interesting. 2001 was definitely the best year for this blog, and if it was based on that alone it would have scored higher. The posts seem to have become a chore over the last few months, and I am sure this has a lot to do with increased student responsibilities. This blog has survived a long time and I am convinced the content will be back to its original best at some point in the future.

Lardpony uses a mauve frame and a centred white page that holds the content of the blog. All the other places within the site are linked from the main page, and this makes it a very easy site to navigate. Posts are archived monthly and are easy to find. All the links work fine, although a few images are missing from the older archives. The comments option is one that I like, and its used here to its fullest extent. In short, its original and well laid out.

All things considered I like this blog. I like the wry sense of humour which is typically English, and has a tendency to be profane on occasion. I havent got a problem with so-called bad language, but some people have, and for this reason the site must be for over eighteens only. Check out this blog if you are a student, or if you have a good hour to kill. I give it a respectable 3.5

Lardpony

“Screw what the world thinks, be confident.” This motto is something more people should live by and is how this writer tries to live. Chel, pronounced “Shell” is a twenty-something woman from Florida who has got to be one of the most inspirational bloggers I’ve seen online. Yes, people share with the world their lives, the happy times and the sad times, but from reading this site it gave me a clearer vision on what it’s like for a person’s life is like when dealing with health problems their whole life.

The site has a nice layout that can be viewed in weblog format or just by post at a time. Even before I began reading the blog, the site gave off a sense of spirituality and peacefulness, which I wouldn’t expect from the context of a site whose context is about one person’s everyday struggles with her health.

Chel mainly shares with her readers her life and updates about her health issues. Her main health problems are depression and Spina Bifida. In addition, she writes about what she’s done that day, her cats and boyfriend. What makes her site strong is just from reading through her archives you get a strong sense of who she is.

There’s so much more to this site and is great if you’d like to read something more on a intimate level and learn about how depression and/or Spina Bifida changes a person’s life. This site is a definite 5.
Bliss

Welcome to Trendy To The Max, a site about every single possible detail of Tina’s 18-year-old life. Well make that everything about her day and nothing really much about the girl herself, as I searched through the site trying desperately to find out a little about this teenager before I started reading the blog. Obviously not trying to give too much away about herself (which I find strange in sites where they talk religiously about their day) all I know is that she’s 18 and from Missouri, and maybe that’s all I really need to know?



The site layout isn’t too bad, very simple, and easy to read though I found the green background with orange writing a little sore on the eyes after 10 minutes or so. The blog is an endless stream of entries, 3, 4 even 5 entries per day which means a week can take up a fair amount of room thus the site ended up being rather large on the content side of things. Trendy To The Max is however archived weekly, so I can’t really make too much of an issue out of this, but perhaps this should be changed to bi-weekly to help keep the size of the blog to a more readable limit. Also capital letters, why does it seem like they don’t exist on some sites? Is this fashionable? I find it terribly annoying.



The blog itself is a tad confusing, perhaps you need to be a long time reader to follow it, but its almost like its too personal, as names crop up, not to mention odd comments which have absolutely no meaning if your a first time reader like myself. Be that as it may, she does make for some brief areas of interesting reading and every now and then after reading a blog I shake my head with agreement.



Overall I can’t help but feel more could be added to this site. A bio, some links, and perhaps a little less green wouldn’t go astray. I don’t feel compelled to want to go back and read it again, its like entering a movie that’s half finished, you really can’t get into it without knowing how it started and quite frankly I quickly got bored.

trendy to the max

Scott Pinto’s Ego must really be
grossly oversized if he expects
anyone to return to his site more
than once. I tried in vain to find
something of interest. A glimmer of
wit in the N.A.Q. (never asked
questions) did give me hope, but
alas it was unfounded. Even the
“funnies” section isn’t.

The design isn’t so bad as to be
atrocious, but it’s pretty darn ugly all
the same. And Scott, if you’re such a
kickass web developer, would it be
too much trouble to set up your
tagboard so it doesn’t scroll
horizontally?

I wouldn’t be so presumptuous as to
judge a man by his blog, but don’t
bother stroking Scott’s ego by visiting
his. To be blunt, it’s just plain dull.Scott Pinto’s Ego