chrissie

If you would like to take a few minutes to read about a different culture and industry, then I urge you to have a look at the Tessellar Blog. Here you will find the author Mazlin Ghazali writing from Kuala Lumpur in Malaysa about houses and neighborhoods around the world. He is curious about people and places and interested in finding out how to create better homes for more people. You can never read enough about improving the lives of others in this world, and I find this site a fascinating difference from some of the other blogs I have seen. He offers a link to his alternative site: http://www.tslr.info where you can find more information on Tessellation planning if you are interested. If not, have a look at some of his recent posts to see what he is talking about: Growing up in a Xhosa Village, The Yanomamo: ‘shabono’ and ‘waiteri’, Communist condo, Building the Iban Longhouse, Hakka Clan Houses, Roots, Everybody Needs a Home, Slum-Like Tokyo, Are Architects living on Past Glory?, and Unlikely homes.

The blog is about as standard as it gets for a blog making it very easy to navigate. Posts are right marginalized with black text on white background and orange header as borders. The posts contain a series of relevant pictures in each post which are all very well done and appropriate in both size and quantity. They also lend true flavor to every post, and in a blog like this they are critical elements. There is a left navigation system where you will find favorite blogs, a blog comments and discussions menu, pictures, squidoo lens, copyright information, and a blog archive. At first glance, it seems that the recent posts menu is missing from the blog, but if you scroll through the top navigation system you will find a recent posts menu on every link in that menu. In the top menu, you can find the links to the blog, Home, Theory, Research, Practice, School, Library, and an FAQ’s page. These seem to be a categories menu of sorts for the blog as they are all located on the blogspot domain.

I will give this one a 3.3 for now, it is fairly new so I would expect in a few months time it would probably get a higher mark. The blog scores well for uniqueness, appearance, and content. Navigation will bring the mark down a little as the search for the recent posts menu threw me off a little, but if this menu is placed on the main page in the left navigation bar I can’t see it being a continual issue. The blog’s discussion menu in the left navigation bar shows that it also has a nice readership already, which is great to see in such a young blog. Activity is a little sparse, with 7 posts in June and 16 in July. The improvement in July is a good indicator of the blog’s growth, so as mentioned I would expect to see more activity as the blog goes on. The author is clearly passionate about this work, and writes beautifully about it. The content is informative and well researched, and if it stays at this level, I anticipate this blog doing very well on content alone. Overall I think this is a great blog that many will find informative, but being only a couple of months old, it is difficult to say much more than that. However, if the topic interests you, bookmark it and keep an eye on it. This one should do very well down the line.

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– Chrissie

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If you are a blogger, and I mean really, if you are reading this chances are good, then you definitely want to visit Blisslogs.  Blisslogs is a little place where you can pick up some blogging tips and learn from the author’s blogging experiences. It did not take me long to really like this blog, or in fact bookmark it. That being said, bloggers need to take note of this site if they want to improve, promote, or start their own blog. The author is all about helping to help you, and is even willing to provide you your own domain through blisslogs as well as some free blogging software. Further, he will not just help you build a blog, but help you work on monetizing that blog for a little extra side income. Have a look at any of his recent posts to see what I am talking about. Here you will find Goo Goo for Google Monday – Google Talk, BlissLogs is a Winner, Improve your Google PageRank in 4 Easy Steps, WordPress Wednesday – Timestamp your Posts, The Face Behind BlissLogs, Market and Analyze your Site for only $5, John Cow Contest, Blog Contests, Create your Blog Posts with a Free Editor, and many more.

One of the first things I noticed that I love about this blog is that within each post you will find a popularity ranking (of the post), a date and author stamp, tags, Digg and Email links, and then a section on Related Posts. I think the popularity rating is a great tool for both the reader and the author in terms of knowing what to write about. It also helps the reader determine the success of a particular post. I also like the Related Posts links. I find this really increases the readability of the blog, so that users spend less time on a blog searching for what they want to read about. I do not see this often on blogs, so needless to say, I was impressed.

Navigation on this site is so easy, it will not take you long to find what you are looking for. Posts are left marginalized with black text on white background. There is a top, right, and bottom navigation bar. In the top bar you can hit the Home link, read the About Me page, and Contact the author. In the right navigation bar you will find a Most Popular Posts Menu, Categories Menu, Recent Posts Menu, Archives, and the Blogroll. In the bottom navigation system you will find very similar menus, recent posts, archives, and etc. I am not seeing any advertising on the blog, so I am not too sure if this one is being monetized, or is one that is ‘all about the love’ of blogging.

I am going with a 5 for this one, which comes rare but deserved. The fact that I spent more time wandering and reading and bookmarking and taking notes (for my own blog) than reviewing was a pretty powerful indication to me that this blog is worth a subscription and bookmark for any blogger. The blog is chock full of information. The content is spectacularly written and extremely user friendly. And the blogger is really all about helping you succeed, you can’t ask for much better. On all accounts of activity, uniqueness, content, navigation, and appearance, it scores beautifully. The only suggestion I would make is the addition of some pictures here and there. I say this because I know what Internet readers are like, and visual is important and ties in well with good content. But as I have already mentioned, the content is fantastic, and the blog is extremely readable and very user friendly. You really need to check it out for yourself.

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– Chrissie

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If you are looking for another source of information to meet your online dating needs, you may want to check out E-Chat Host . This is a blog dedicated to online dating tips as well as the latest news and reviews in the world of online dating. There is little to say about the author as this blog does not contain an about me page, but you can guage the effectiveness of the tips yourself by having a look at some of the recent posts: Masterseek – New Business Search Engine, Mommy Makeover, Earn for Blogging, Kissing tips for First Timers, and 46 Facts about Women. Some of the tips are tongue in cheek, no pun intended, so take them with a grain of salt. And if there is something missing here that you would like to see in the world of online dating, the author does have a section where you can ask questions.

Before I say much about navigation, I should mention this is another site best viewed with Mozilla Firefox as opposed to Internet Explorer. You will see some funky formatting through IE that is not there through Firefox. The posts themselves are left marginalized and the blog contains two right navigation bars. Posts are standard black text on white background, and they do come with relevant pictures, but I am wondering if the pictures are ad content. The right navigation bar contains a menu for latest articles or recent posts, but it is empty, and though I see recent posts, I am not too sure why that hasn’t been updated. The navigation bars also contain a list of other dating sites, advertising upon advertising, a links list, and if you scroll right to the bottom you will find a very perfunctory about me page. The archive menu is found in the right navigation bars as well. Here you will find 81 posts through all of 2007. I do notice the frequency of activity picking up however with currently what appears to be very close to daily posting.

This site is getting a 2.1 from me, far too busy with the advertising. If the site was proficient in other areas, the advertising would not take away from the overall review as much. In fact, there seems to be more advertising than content which definitely takes from the appeal of the blog. The content also seems to be lacking originality as almost every site has the source listed for it, so I am not sure if the blogger is actually even blogging, or simply passing on information from other sources. The about me page also is practically nonexistent other than stating there in fact IS an about me page. Also, the obvious issue with the latest article menu can not go unnoticed. Again, for things like this it is better to put nothing at all rather than advertise a lack of content. I am not an online dater, but if I ever were one, I certainly wouldn’t remember this site unless some serious changes had been made to it.

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– Chrissie

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