‘Thought Process’ Needs To Process Few Thoughts – Blog Review

The only thing that would attract me to the site is the number of puzzles and brain teasers in this blog Thought Process – Good To Know It, but the fact that it is very poorly maintained restricts me from coming on to this piece of collection again. It has the looks of temple of knowledge in ruins. Started in April 2007, the blog offers a lot of puzzles, numerical teasers and internet forwards. This author Sunil Kumar from Delhi is an inspiring person, which is depicted by his other creations, but this blog doesn’t recieve justice from him. The blog seems more to the fact that it is made for the sole purpose of making money. Well, nothing wrong with making money from the blog, but it needs to be entertaining as well. The blog does nothing.

The navigation of the blog is poorly maintained by the numerous ads below the header and on the side panel. The theme is not so attractive but fulfills its purpose. Dark coloured blog entries on the bland white theme it is. The labels are neatly arranged and look very relevant and precise. It has now increasingly become a trend to route for having redundant content from the web on your blog and this blogs follows the same. The author regularly updates the blog, and has a lot of entries in the past few months but very few unique entries. I give the blog 2.5/5. It lost most of its points in its content and its appearance. I would offer a few suggestions to the author of the blog:

  • the blog needs to be attractive. Looks do matter in blogging, ‘people see more, think less’.
  • make it easy for people to navigate through your blog by using themes with better navigation and placing ads only at appropriate places.
  • do not post internet forwards on the blogs, people do not prefer to see the same things on the blog, which they see in their inbox

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24X7 Interesting Facts – Blog Review

A good collection of facts included in this interesting blog, 24X7interestingfacts. The author of the blog is a computer science engineering student. The facts in the blog are interesting but not so unique. The blog has a lot of entries taken from different sources. But, I would apprecite the time from the young author to collect the facts and put it in a single place. It usually has information about gadgets and technical perspective. There are a few entries which are genuinely unique and useful like ‘Opening multiple Yahoo Messenger’.

The navigation of the blog is fairly simple and easy to navigate. The blog entries are in different colours on the black background left marginalised. The links, archive and feeds are on the left side. The blog has pictures with each entry, making the blog attractive. It also has a few games and chat box on the left panel to add fun to the blog. The author has good knowledge of internet and uses it to perfection in his blog. The blog was started in October 2007, but already has 75 entries to its credit. The author regularly updates the blogs. I would not mind giving a 4/5 for this blog, only because of the effort put in the blog to make is attractive and regularly updated. I would offer a few suggestions to the author of the blog:

  • the blog has a lot of entries from other sources, try to be unique.
  • have a unique style of writing to attract visitors, remember in blogs ‘content gets, but writing begets’

Last words, if uniquely maintained, as a techie I would be a frequent visitor of this blog.

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Blog Definitions: Common Terms of the Blogosphere

BLOGGING – THE WHAT

These are probably the simplest terms to understand. To garner a full grasp of the terms you should start at the beginning.

Bloggeries: The term used to refer to the posts within a blog. You write bloggeries and post them on your blog. Also commonly called posts or entries.

Blogosphere: The blogging community at large. It is the internets version of a biosphere. (No I am not referring to that movie with Paulie Shore)

Weblog: A journal or sorts or a diary. Dated and filled with stories, events, opinions and other such things.

Blogging: The act thereof.

Blog: Literally a shorter version of a web log. A teaser.

Blogger: A blogger is the term used to describe the person who is actually writing the blog.

BLOGGING – THE HOW

Photoblogging: Pretty straight forward. These are blogs that utilize photos and images to convey a story or intent.

Podcasting: Blogging’s audio cousin; very similar to a blog but in audio format.

Mobblogging: Mobile phone blogging.

Vlogging: The use of video instead of text to blog.

Audioblogging: Think of vlogging but with MP3’s.

Autocasting: This goes hand in hand with podcasting making the task automated.

Blogcasting: The combining of the blog and pod cast into a single web site.

Blogging: can be fun but it can also be very daunting. There are software programs and sites which make this a less annoying and aggravating task.

Blogger: Google has created this free platform to simplify blogging activity.

Blogspot: A web host that specifically hosts blogs. Typical addresses would be blog.blogspot.com and the like.

Livejournal: Livejournal, like MySpace, is a free site where people meet to talk and write blogs.

Movable Type: Paid tool.

Typepad: Another paid tool.

WordPress.org: You can upload to this site easily. Customizing and upgrading your blogs are easy.

WordPress.com: Another free host site.

Radio Userland: Publishing software for bloggers.

BLOGGING – THE GUTS

The innards of a blog are important. What are the things that the majority of blogs consist of? This is where it starts getting technical. Some of these terms will seem familiar to you as some are common place within the confines of the internet or computers in general.

Header: Also the title. Found at the top most portion of the website. A lot of keywords get hidden here as a lot of search engines go from top to bottom and they don’t see as we do so any text that is placed at the top of the site that is the same color as the background will be read and used to generate positioning.

Footer: Typically the very last thing on the web page and will typically list the same things as the header.

Index: The first page we see of any site is the index.

Navbar: Also sometimes called a sidebar. These can be positioned left or right of the main pages contents. This is where the categories and subjects are listed.

Post(s): Also known as entry. These are the individual entries of a blog.

Comments: Readers are able to post comments to a blog, adding onto the popularity and keyword base.

Ping: A standard net term short for Packet Internet Grouper that is used to track IP addresses as well as to notify automatic services of updates.

Trackback: A ping is sent to another blog thru a trackback system to alert a blogger to the mentioning of their blog. This is also sometimes known as a pingback.

Tags: Placing of keywords as a way to collect similar posts.

Tag Cloud: The display of keywords.

Captcha: Completely Automated Public Turing Test to Tell Computers and Humans Apart. Captcha�s are small image boxes containing letters, number or words that you have to re-type in order to verify you are a human.

Link: An access point to specific articles.

Blogroll: Links to other blogs and the nav or sidebar.

Sideblog: A mini blog or blurb on the sidebar.

Template: A generic web site where you just have to fill in the information and post.

Blogthis: An added function that allows a blogger to add to an entry.

Plugins: Mini files you download to your computer that works with your browser to give you added features.

Dashboard: Like that of a car it is where your controls are. Editing and moving files etc.

Archives: Like those found in your library but for the internet. It’s a collection of all things blog related and placed in reverse order by date.

Post Summaries: An expandable teaser of a larger blog.

Continue: Also referred to as a jump this is a link to continue on to another section of a blog in order to save space and load times.

FTP: File Transfer Protocol. It is also a type of program. All used to upload content.

BLOGGING – THE FEEDING

In order get your information out to the general public you need to make it so that it can be seen by them. This is called feeding or web feeds. This is how a blog is seen by a user.

Web Feed: Subscriptions. Typically you join a site to read a blog.

RSS: A series of web feeds for syndication purposes.

XML: A sort of HTML but meaning Extensible Markup Language making it a more advanced form of what we know to be HTML. It is usually used to help syndicate a site.

Photofeed: A feed like the others but using images.

OPML: This is an XML format specifically used for outlines. You can easily import multiple subscriptions.

ATOM: Very blog specific feed and most blogs are of this type.

BLOGGER – WHO

There are as many kinds of blogs as there are bloggers. Bloggers usually fit into one subset of the culture as a whole.

Problogger: Someone who spends hours a day just posting blogs. They’re paid and usually work for ad companies.

Blognoscenti: Or blog snob. Someone who is incredibly knowledgeable about blogs and their inner workings.

Blogebrity: Someone who everyone else knows. Could be a real celebrity who blogs or someone who’s a pro who everyone knows to blog.

Blogerati: The paparazzi of blogging.

Commentariat: This is someone who leaves comments to blogs on a regular basis.

Dooced: Getting dooced or to dooce. This is someone who was fired for blogging excessively during work hours.

Blogther: Someone else who blogs.

A-List: Another type of Blogebrity.

Blogstar: Popular blogger.

BLOGGING – THE HABIT

Bloggers have their own idiosyncrasies while blogging. The method in which an individual blogs helps set them apart.

Metablogging: Blogs and articles about blogging.

Blogstipation: Blog block.

Blogathy: The act of loathing blogging and thusly taking a break from it.

Blogopotamus: A rambling blog that continues, seemingly without end.

Blogorrhea: Someone who posts often and usually has been dooced.

Bleg: A self pandering blog to beg.

Hitnosis: The act of repeatedly refreshing your blog to see if anything has changed.

Blogroach: Someone who enjoys flaming a blogger.

Blogaholic: A person who can’t enough writing or reading blogs.

Blogorific: A word used to describe a blog as terrific.

Blogvert: The act of advertising within a blog.

Blogger Bash: A party where bloggers get together online and comment back and forth in real time.

Blogathon: Blogging every thirty minutes for an entire day.

Blogsnob: Someone who refuses to comment to someone who is not a friend.

Blogostorm: Controversy drives revenue. This can also be known as a Blog Swarm.

Doppelblog: Copying some other bloggers work and reposting as your own.

BLOGGING – TYPES

For every type of blogger and blog there is a certain niche of where that particular item will fit. Professional bloggers wouldn’t do dark posts, for example as they want to be seen.

The types of blogs you post define, sometimes, who you are in the blogosphere. And that determines your strengths and weaknesses.

Celebriblog: A blog that is run by a celebrity.

Kittyblogger: This is someone who spends time writing about their cats.

Celeblog: The act of blogging about celebrities.

Group Blog: Multiple contributions to multiple blogs.

Event Blog: Blogs used to talk about one event on one date.

Clog Blog: The Dutch do a tremendous amount of blogging and this term is used to set them apart from others.

Movlogs: Video blogs on the mobile.

Metablog: The act of writing blogs about blogging.

CEOBlog: A blog that is run by a corporate executive.

Splog: Spreading spam through blogs.

Tech Blog: Blogs about technical items.

Anonoblog: These are blogs where the poster remains anonymous.

Plog: A blog about a project.

Milblog: Blogging by our men and women in the military.

Blawg: Usually written by lawyers these blogs cover topics of law.

Edublog: Educating the masses using blogs.

Shockblog: The Stern version of blogging.

Progblog: Something that is written in a progressive manner.

Dark Blog: A blog that is private.

Photocast: Photoblogging that updates as soon as you add new photos to it.

As many definitions and translations as listed here there are many, many more but these are enough to keep you from guessing and to make your forward into blogging all that much better.

I Am In For This – Blog Review

If you are looking for a blog to read pure thoughts of unaltered person, I would recommend I’m in. This blog is about random thoughts of a young boy from Trissur blogging from Delhi. Arunkumar seem to be a lot grown than his age. For his entry Evolution and ‘The Disguised Pill of Experience’!!!, I just loved his writing and the pencil drawings are absolute bliss. The blog entries have a philosophical touch and left me stranded alone in my thoughts. I guess there is more to this blog than can be seen. Although the blog doesn’t cover any specific topic, but the content is interesting and appealing, especially if you are philosophical in your thought process.

The blog is fairly simple to navigate and offers a clean well-organized design. The blog entries are left marginalised in a darker shade of grey in a white background. The blog archive, labels and links are in the left panel. The entries are not labelled accordingly. Labels like ‘move on’, ‘it all started’ doesn’t make much sense to the readers. The activity on this blog is not regular but seems to be improving over a past few days. I would go ahead and give 3.5/5 for this blog. I would offer a few suggestions to the author of the blog:

  • a more appealing name to the blog.
  • more accurate and relevant labels are required for the blog entries.
  • the hit counter can be removed until a good number of hits are seen in the counter.
  • the writing is interesting, and is what can get users back to the blog, so write regularly.

Last words, I am impressed by the thoughts of this young blogger.

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