Category: Uncategorized

The initial impression was that there was something amiss with the blog. On closer inspection I found that the links and everything else was at the top of the blog, with the actual entry’s were down the bottom.

I’m not sure if this is a template fault or not, the author might want to check it.

My impressions were that this might be an interesting blog. The title “A poet. Now a blogger.” left me with the sense that this might be a writers blog with lots of poems. There was only one poem translation on the blog itself, a few quizzes and some other links. I was expecting more poems and less quizzes.

The blog itself is a fairly new blog, was only started in July 2004. The design is a blogger template, like many other blogger templates.

I was a bit disappointed with the lack of writing material in the blog. The blog may develop over time into something else, or it may not. It’s more a personal blog that doesn’t really tell you much about the author, there is no “about” page or any little blurb about her writing or her life.

I hope that this blog does choose and path and hopefully develop. It has much potential.Pattern Recognition

I thought of the insurance company when I read the title “Progressive Ink!” That didn’t really make much sense especially since I kinda figured that this was not a marketing blog by Progressive. But enough of that.

I liked the layout a lot. It was simple and the fact that the different shades of gray was the background and everything looked so nice in its simplicity scored points from me.

The entries come through when the subtitle promised “Interactive Notes Re: God, Life, Philosophy, Science, Religion and Politics. All I can say is that most of them are rants about what the author thought. Like some rants, the entries here were funny and witty and sometimes even to the point of being lighthearted.

Overall, I suggest that everyone stop by at least once and read through the author’s wit.Progressive Ink!

“It’s a dogs life” could well have been one of two things, a dog owning obsessive or someone who genuinely believes it really is a dogs life. Thankfully, it was the latter, although I was a little disturbed initially by the warning at the top o the right hand column “Warning-This Blog May Contain Adult Oriented Material”. After a brief read of the about me page, which formed a basis for what was to come, I ventured into the archives. I was fairly impressed.

I found the first entry gave me a better feel for the author than the profile, in one paragraph he managed to capture why I started blogging, and from that moment on I was very interested in what he had to say. It was what I expected, very personal. Its very much a log of day to day activities, with a few thoughts thrown in for good measure. There were the odd entry which was, shall we say, very adult orientated, but they didn’t bother me. They didn’t necessarily interest me that much either. But, on balance most of the entries were interesting, and written well with just a little wit. It didn’t necessarily touch depths I expected after reading the first post, but it didn’t disappoint either.

The design certainly fits both the author and its content, and the banner was a bright and colourful edition to the otherwise black and grey design. I’m not a great fan of light text on a black background because I find it hard on the eyes, thankfully this colour combination merely affected the side column.

A few links of interest aside, there are no real surprises on this weblog. There are some links to blogger templates, which may interest to other blogger blogspot users for example.

“It’s a dogs like” is precisely what I expected it to be, a personal web journal detailing the everyday excursions in the life of its author. From its first post I had expected a little more, something inspired by his own statement “I always feel like I am behind a fence, peering out at the world, restricted by the collective weight of friends and family protocol can be crushing” for example. If personal blogs are what you love, chances are you may enjoy this site. It probably won’t knock you back with its depth, but it may well interest you enough to keep coming back for me. A promising 4.it’s a dog’s life

I wasn’t quite sure what to think when I first arrived at “Mondo Irlando”. I was hit full face by the colour scheme, and large garish handwritten graphics. Judging from the first page I could only assume that I had arrived at a review site, of films, music, and erm other things. It did not appear to be a weblog in the traditional sense, in that the first page at least was not organised chronologically. Then, of course, I discovered the Duke’s Journals.

Overall I found the site a little frustrating to navigate. I read film and music reviews, the journal, and something referred to as the articles. Its easy to access yes, but there is no organisation chronologically, and the overuse of graphical links was all too distracting. Much to my surprise I found the content largely well written, albeit more than a little offensive on occasion. I found he lost a great deal of my respect when he resorted to obscenities.

I found navigating the site a little frustrating. There was an article archive, and a review archive, but no journal archive from what I could see. There were no additional facilities there for readers to interact directly about specific posts, merely a guest book. I feel the site would benefit from the addition of some sort of comments facility, unless of course the author does not wish to promote reader response. There is a lot to see here – MP3 digest, and Mondo radio show I am sure will appeal to a lot of people in particular.

The design overall did absolutely nothing for me. It was black and red, with large handwritten graphics as headings and links. The graphics especially I found detracted from the content. I also found I developed eye strain after a solid hour of reading through the archives. Improvements in the site design would do nothing but benefit the site. I can appreciate that content matters above all else, but when a design detracts from content that is largely brilliant then a serious rethink is required.

Mondo Irlando has a great deal of appeal, just not for me. Its an interesting, and extremely well written review site. Its intended, I think, for a mature audience. I can see it appealing to film lovers and music buffs who would appreciate his honest and open style, and with improvements in the design and its navigation I can see real possibilities for this site in the future

Mondo Irlando

When first reviewing background noise, I was daunted by the fact that the blog’s archives went back for over two years. In hindsight, blogspot’s system of archiving posts on a monthly basis, coupled with the author’s knack for keeping his entries short, meant that reading two and a half years of Richard’s random musings was surprisingly effortless.

Background Noise is definitely one of the more eclectic personal weblogs out there – the brevity of most entries probably exacerbates this a little; one entry details Richard’s aversion for razors, while the next details his difficulties learning mandarin. Some days, even the entries seem fairly haphazardly put together, as seen in this entry about Dolly the Sheep and how people should pronounce the word ‘issues’. Nonetheless, the entries are consistently concise and well-written, however, which is always a plus. I particularly liked his entry on pandas.

While the site layout is by no means breath-taking, it doesn’t offend any aesthetic sensibilities either. Here again, we see the benefit of short entries – the front page to this blog seems a lot less cluttered than other blogs, if only because of the fact that it simply holds less content. I must emphasize, however, that this is by no means a bad thing, since brevity is really an undervalued commodity in blogging. Richard’s extensive archives also provide for a depth of additional reading material.

All in all, while this site is eclectic in its content, it’s also consistent in its output – Richard is a fairly frequent blogger, and he seems to churn out his entries at a fairly constant rate. The links featured on this site are similarly eclectic, but most manage to be reasonably entertaining. Thus, all in all, background noise is probably worth a visit. Or maybe even two.
Background Noise