If you are the type that likes a spooky story or wants your hair to stand on end, you may want to have a look at World Horror Stories. The author here asks when you log in if you are ready for the scariest stories, photos, and videos ever, and if you want to continue through the blog, prepare yourself. This blog is a collection of ghost stories, and gruesome things happening in the world, and is definitely not for the young OR the faint of heart. If you want to see what I am talking about, check out some of the most recent Bloggeries: Mermaid II, Flying Creature, Karaoke Room, Unknown Figure Behind a Girl, White Ghost Figure in the House, Parking Lot, Tour Turns to Horror, Beach, and Audition. Each Bloggerie is a recollection of a story or an event that will make your hair stand on end. Each post is accompanied by either a relevant picture or a video, and while I was in the middle of a review, one of the spooky ghost videos actually shut my computer down. So, I don’t know if someone was mad at me, or if my machine is just cranky today, however….
Navigation on this site is a little busy, but if you enjoy the content you will barely notice the navigation. Posts are centralized with both a left and right navigation system. The posts are centered on a burgundy background with yellow text and the navigation bars are in spooky black. The left navigation bar contains a PayPal button, ads, a ghostly poll, and results from recent blog polls. Each post contains relevant pictures and videos as well as a dig bookmark along with a reader voting system for each post. I like how this is done as it really shows the readers and the author as well, who is liking what. In the right navigation bar you can submit your own ghost story, read any of the Most Popular Posts, or visit any of the Categories. Categories include Announcements, Asian, Type of Spirit, Unexplained, and Western. You will also find a slew of blog links and widgets for the blog.
I am giving this one a 3/5 for a few reasons. The blog scores well on content and uniqueness, but lacks some things in other categories. The appearance mark would be improved if some AdSense was removed or at least tamed. The blog is very busy with advertising and it really distracts from the content. I liked how the AdSense was formatted to blend with the blog, but there is just too much advertising. For navigation, if some advertising was removed there would be room for an archive menu as well as a recent posts menu, both of which are lacking from the blog and really help readers with navigation. Activity score was also a little bit low, with posts coming in about once a week. Again, this blog is a very unique concept and it would do well with some appearance changes and more frequent bloggeries. The blog also clearly has a good following, which again could be even better with some of these changes. I enjoyed reading this topic and viewing the videos, and could definitely be persuaded to return with just a few tweaks here and there. I think like-minded others who enjoy a good ghost story would agree.
-Chrissie