Reviews

If you are a car aficionado and are looking for a new blog that will feed your love for engines, you may want to check out Babez a blog that offers car news, pictures, and wallpapers for all of the pretty vehicles of the world. This blog started in December 200 and was initially intended to be a support page for the luxury car magazine Classic Driver. But it turned into a blog presenting car news from all over the world on both classic and luxury vehicles. This blog publishes magazine articles from official car manufacturer news sources and with that offers the car lovers high-quality pictures with each of its reviews. You can check out some of its reviews by looking at any of its recent bloggeries: BF Performance GT 660, BF Performance GT 540, Audi Metroproject, Hamann Porsche Cayenne Cyclone, Hamann BMW X5 Flash, Hamann Lamborghini Gallardo Victory, Hamann Thunder, Toyota IQ, and BMW 1 Series tii.

I found navigation on this blog very difficult. In fact the further I went into the blog it seemed it was more a site for advertising than anything else. The blog starts off with advertising located even within the header. Posts are centralized with navigation bars on either side. In the left navigation bar you will find nothing but advertising banners or AdSense if you move within content of the blog. In the right navigation bar you will find a feed subscription and a top car links menu. The footer is somewhat difficult to navigate, or understand, I am not really certain what the links are in the footer. Missing from the blog navigation system are elements that make a blog look like a blog – Recent Posts Menu, Categories Menu, or even a blog roll. There is a large number of posts on the opening page and each post contains a link to take you to more pictures a full review of the vehicle being highlighted. This is one element of the blog that will appeal to the readers is the pictoral content. Anyone that has an interest in looking at beautiful cars will not be disappointed with this blog as it contains several pictures accompanied with every post.

That being said I can only go with a 2/5 on this blog, as its wealth of pictures is the only appealing thing I found with this site. The activity scores however are poor with total lack of regular and frequent posting. I mean on the front page I’m seeing posts that are a year old! As mentioned, the blog is very difficult to navigate due to its extreme presence of advertising. This also affects the appearance mark for the blog. The content does not score well as the content is not actually authored by the blog owner, each post contains a note saying ‘text and pictures courtesy of…”. Overall the blog needs to be neatened up a little bit with some of the advertising being more efficiently formatted. I also think some original content from the author would do this blog a world of good. If however one is inclined to only view pictures of pretty cars, this blog will serve you well, thought it will take you some time to get through the advertising to reach the meat of the vehicle pictures. If this blog were to get a make over and started posting it could be good as it’s already an older established blog.

-Chrissie

Well even though summer is over, it is never too late to start planning that next vacation, particularly when you add a brew of children to the mix. If you have ever wondered how to plan that perfect family vacation, you may want to check out the Vacationing with Kids blog. Here you will meet Joanne, the author of this blog, who loves to travel with her family but notes that traveling with children presents its own set of challenges. The blog discusses affordable family vacation spots, how to deal with it when one of the brew gets ill, vacation safety, and much more. The blog also has a very personal tone to it so you will get to know Joanne and her family a little bit more, even when they are not in vacation mode. To get some new vacation ideas, check out any of Joanne’s recent bloggeries: Pot Luck, School, Wild Girls, Slumber Party Time, Busy Times, Summer’s Almost Over Bash, My Feet!, Our Pool, Fun Inexpenseive Outings, Almost School Time, and Going to School.

The blog is very easy to navigate, bloggeries are right marginalized and there is a very handy left navigation system. Posts are black text on grayish blue background and links are highlighted in orange. In the left navigation system you will find the about page, family blog link, subscription links, archives going back to November 2006, links menu, business links menu, recommended reading and an extensive categories menu. The categories menu contains all sorts of great vacation ideas such as Affordable Vacations, Disney Planning, Family Vacation Ideas, Food for Vacation, Horseback Riding Fun, MUST HAVE TIPS, Sick Kids on Vacation, Ski Vacation Fun, and Vacation Safety. I don’t see any pictures associated with the bloggeries, and it would be my first recommendation. Otherwise however you will find navigation extremely simple with this blog.

I will go with a 3/5 for this blog. I think the blog needs some ‘oomph’ when it comes to appearance issues. For a vacation blog I think pictures would really appeal to the readership and give more voice to the places Joanne writes about. I also think the AdSense should be incorporated a little differently as seeing it in the middle of some posts is extremely distracting. The blog scores well on content however, the true personal voice to the writing style is definitely appealing in this kind of blog. I also think the niche is unique enough to appeal to a wide demographic – parents! Activity scores are a little low with posts coming in every few days to a week in between, and this blog may fare a little better if it had some new content on a regular basis.

-Chrissie

If you are looking for a personal blog that offers a little tongue in cheek on a whole lot of everything, you may find the Pressing the Flesh Blog a breath of fresh air. This blog offers a running commentary on politics, punditry, pop culture, and propaganada – all sprinkled with a touch of Flesh, which apparently, is suitable for pressing. Not sure exactly what this means, but you will find this blog is definitely of the personal variety, with a very rich personal voice. The blogger, or flesh presser, is a 251 ‘year’ old Pisces male working in the theater industry. You can get a flavor of his most recently pressed flesh through the following bloggeries: Wise words from Molly Ivins, A list of movies I’ll be watching for free, Now I’ll NEVER leave my computer, Hillary can’t win, Obama’s response, Heir to the Hair, Are you experienced? PTF Hearts Russ Feingold, Back from my Retreat, and a Christian Embarrassment. If you can not guess yet, the blog is a political blog with a fresh opinion, and offers the definition of “pressing the flesh” as the shaking of hands and mingling with many people, especially when campaigning for political office, a place for progressives, politics, punditry, propaganda, pop culture, and a palace for those with appoint of view. The author offers a place here where even in the most unsatisfactory exchange, something is exchanged. Now do you get it? You really have to see it for yourself to get the full feel.

Navigation on this blog is fairly straightforward though not the easiest on the eyes. BLoggeries are white text on black background which offers a nice backdrop for the many relevant pictures and videos to stand out. Bloggeries are left marginalized with a right navigation system. In the right navigation bar you will find the About page; ads; Recent Posts menu noted as “Previously Pressed”; and assorted menus for fellow bloggers, ‘ptfners’, muckrakers, and etc. You will also find here the archives menu noted as “Remember When”, search menu for the blog, video clips menu, sponsors menu, and amazons ads. Almost every post contains a relevant picture or video that adds spice to the blog as well. I am not seeing any categories menu at this point, which may help organize the blog a little bit more given its eclectic nature.

I am going to offer this a 2.3/5 for now, as the blog is currently losing marks for all criteria. The appearance really needs some work, I would suggest changing the black background. This makes the pictures stand out and almost take over the blog. With the pictures standing out, the ads are screaming as well.For some blogs I have seen this work, but for this particular one I find it very distracting from the actual content of the blog which is very well written. Because the content is well done, I would suggest more frequent posting as to date, the bloggeries are ranging from every few days to a couple of weeks in between. This is an interesting and fun blog and I think the readers AND the author would benefit from seeing the results of more frequent posting. Navigation marks are straightforward but again I would suggest changing the colors just to make the ads blend in more and navigation within the menus a little easier. Otherwise overall I think this could be a very fun and popular blog if the author spent a little more time with it and made some appearance changes.

-Chrissie

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