The Importance of Blog Design 11/08/2005 I don't know about you, but the look of a blog is an important part of my decision to read it or not. There are some that are so ugly that I can't bear to stay on the page long enough to read it. As an instance of this, have a look at Blogebrity's Top Blogs Lists (I can point to Blogebrity because it isn't a blog and, besides, it has a PR of 7 and doesn't need my approval). That shocking pink on a black background is so vile that I cannot bring myself to stay on the page for more than a few seconds, even though I would really like to browse those lists to see what all the fuss is about.In contrast, go to CSS Zen Garden and click down the list of designs in the sidebar on the right. None of them are blogs but they demonstrate how a beautiful design welcomes one to a page and encourages one to stay to read (note too that the text does not change - the designs are there to show how easily the look of a page can be changed radically by the use of Cascading Style Sheets [CSS]). If you dig around in Zen Garden's archives, you will find some of the most beautiful web pages ever created.The point is that the better the design of your blog, the better its chances of being read. Of course, tastes vary and so it is best to go for the simple and straightforward look; garish and complex are not good options. This fits with our concern about speed of loading, too. Blog design, like all web page development, is a compromise between looks and function but, generally speaking, the old car design adage works here: what looks good, is good.I had reason to consider this matter of design when I was given the task of creating the Writers Blog Alliance blog recently (more to the point, it concentrated my mind on how to persuade more qualified people than myself to do the actual work - my thanks to Mad and Quills for the work they've done so far). When WBA began to run into problems with its chosen solution for main site and decided it needed to cut loose and start again, my thoughts turned to a man named Joshua Estell.It was through my son, Mad, that I first met Josh. They were regulars in the web development chatrooms and Mad suggested to him that he have a look at my blog. Since then, Josh has become a frequent commenter (I would prefer to say "contributor and occasional tech help") to the Gone Away blog. I learned that, not only was Josh the owner of a very well designed blog, Hinkybox, he was also a contributor to the creation of Wheatblog, an open source (meaning free and completely ad-less) blogging solution. Suddenly, things began to come together.I approached Josh with a view to assisting us in the construction of the new WBA website and blog and he responded with enthusiasm, agreeing to work on both. It will take a while but I am confident now that WBA will have an efficient and good looking site that does everything we want it to.Hinkybox is a model of good blog design. Note how the layout is simple and unobtrusive yet contains a wealth of information. That sidebar is worth a good read for a start! The buttons and icons are unfussy and elegant. The header is tasteful and attractive; and I have just noticed that, if you run the pointer over the moon in the header's bottom right corner, it turns out to be an indicator of the phases of the moon. Most importantly, the text is easy to read and one is not subject to constant distraction by obtrusive graphics or gizmos. On such subtle details are great blogs and websites built!So I am pleased and honored indeed that we have Josh on our side. The unfortunate hiccup of WBA's first site (well, it was announced as a beta) will soon be behind us and we can look forward to much better things. Thanks Josh!
Clive
Mad Yep, as I've long been aware Josh is "da mang"... Date Added: 11/08/2005
Gone Away That he certainly is! Date Added: 11/08/2005
Deborah I look forward to seeing the new implementation of WBA. ;) Date Added: 11/08/2005
Gone Away Josh sent me the URL of the temporary space on his server where he'll be working on it, Deborah, so that we can see how he's getting on. I'll send you the address by email. :) Date Added: 11/08/2005
Deborah He's doing a fabulous job. :) Date Added: 11/08/2005
Gone Away As Mad said, Josh is "the man" (can't imagine why these young uns have to misspell that...)! Date Added: 11/08/2005
Deborah I have no idea, lol. We're just not as hip as we used to be. :D Date Added: 11/08/2005
Josh Thanks for the nice article, Clive. I'm honored to be asked! I hope you like the look so far. As far as being "da mang"... well, yeah, that sounds about right. :P Date Added: 11/08/2005
Quills I wanna SEE! Date Added: 11/08/2005
Yzabel Alright, now I can't wait to see the new look of WBA. When is this implemented... tomorrow? ;) This said, to be back to the original topic at hand--design is indeed important on a blog, and not necessarily the easiest thing to conceive, even if one has worked on regular websites before. Sometimes I have the feeling that I should choose a simpler design for my blog, too. Well, I should make one myself, period. I just need to learn more about WP themes first, I suppose. I'm getting wary of every little bit of an image file, these days, in fear of seeing it slow down the loading time... Date Added: 11/08/2005
Josh Loading time is really a relative thing. I know a few designers who really go nutty about low-impact design, thinking, as Yzabel said, that any image file will prohibitively increase loading time for the dial-uppers among us. Though I admit to a frequent snootiness over my 7Mbps cable connection, I remember the days of dial-up well, and there is a certain resignation and sluggishness that a dialup user contends with, no matter where they surf. There are ridiculous sites, whose developers should be slapped abou the ears (I'm looking at you, about.com), and my site is in some senses a pixel-vain monstrosity, but if you keep it within reason, I think you'll be fine. Date Added: 11/08/2005
John (SYNTAGMA) Great news that it's all sorted. We should keep the energy going into the current template though so as not to lose the impetus of the launch. If folk out there think WBA is a lost cause, they won't come back. The current implementation is not perfect, but it's not a dead loss either. And good luck to Josh. I'm looking forward to the new WBA. Date Added: 11/08/2005
Kurt I can definitely see the importance of design, just in which blogs I end up coming back to regularly; although I'm still searching for a theme for my main site, my themed RPG blog has a theme that I quite like. Still populating it with the first week's worth of content, though, so I can't say how readers react to it yet. Date Added: 11/08/2005
Gone Away It looks great, Josh, just as Deborah said. But you know I've always liked that "classic Hinky design" look. :D Date Added: 11/08/2005
Gone Away I've been wondering if we could let all the WBA members see the development site, Quills. I'll have to ask Josh about it - not sure how he'd feel, having to work with so many people peering over his shoulder... ;) Date Added: 11/08/2005
Gone Away Implementation date remains to be seen, Yzabel. I don't want to put any pressure on Josh and, as John says, the Xoop site functions well enough for us in the meantime. Let's give Josh the time to put us a really good site together before we move in - you know what a hassle it is to move into a house while the builders are still adding the last touches! ;) Graphics can add so much to the look of a page that I'd say they are worth any slight increase in loading time (assuming that you optimize them within reason). Date Added: 11/08/2005
Gone Away Had a look at that About.com site, Josh. I've seen much worse than that! :D Date Added: 11/08/2005
Gone Away Agreed with all you say, John - no reason to panic and run screaming from the old place yet. Date Added: 11/08/2005
Gone Away Your RPG site looks pretty good to me, Kurt. I must admit I was expecting the usual graphic-laden RPG page with lots of blood and gore - your solution is an excellent alternative to that kind of thing. Date Added: 11/08/2005
Andrew Kaufmann Great choice in getting Josh to help -- I love his designs. Let me know if you need anything out of me. Kurt -- nice site! I was kind of expecting cookie-cutter RPG site, too, but that looks great. Too bad google won't let you use the same shade of gray that you use in the sidebar... Date Added: 11/08/2005
Gone Away Thanks, Andrew; will give you a shout if you're needed! Date Added: 11/08/2005
Kurt Thanks for the feedback on Rumblings of Darkness. Google will allow me to change that shade, but I've been too busy restoring my hacked wiki to normalcy to have time to poke at a sandboxed site. I'll probably get around to it tonight or tomorrow, along with the next update to the story. And yeah, I wanted to avoid the typical cliche-ridden RPG site. It's meant to be read on a regular basis with daily updates, not admired once and passed by; I think the distinction is one a lot of novice webmasters miss. I'd like people to anticipate what I'm writing and read it with the appropriate moods, not feel vaguely sick before they're done with the headline. Date Added: 11/08/2005
Gone Away .oO(I love listening to web designers talk to each other - some of it is meaningless to me but I gain understanding of how they think and work...) Date Added: 11/08/2005
Actressdancer I vaguely remember a comment on the previous post about being done with the self assesment and actually blogging a bit ;). ....Then again, my current state as "brain cell sharer" may be getting the best of me. (please take pity on those of us poor artsy types who are *sniff* confined to the limitations of a pre-fab blog design) Date Added: 11/08/2005
Gone Away You are quite right, Actress; several posts ago I thought and said that I would be able to get back to "business as usual" in the blog. But my brain has outsmarted me - it refuses to think about anything other than blogging at the moment and I am left with none of the usual subjects to post about. Surely I must be reaching the end of this blog fixation by now! As for ready-made blog templates, most of them are quite useable; it's what people add on to them that can cause a problem... Date Added: 11/08/2005
Josh You can go ahead and drop that URL, Gone, but I can't guarantee it will always be pretty. :) Date Added: 12/08/2005
Gone Away Thanks, Josh. I'll get Deborah to distribute it by email. It'll be very interesting to see how you work towards completion, methinks! Date Added: 12/08/2005
keeefer Joshs sites ahve all imnpressed me so far, i reckon your onto a winner. Its definatley time to move on though im bored of reading blogs about blogging and writers writing about writing its high time they started to do a little of the things they are enthusing about 4/10 must try harder Date Added: 12/08/2005
keeefer Ignore the poor spelling in the last post, i think the wifes dyslexia is rubbing off on me. If it doesnt stop im taking it to the vets Date Added: 12/08/2005
Gone Away I hear ya, Keef, and you are right. I was thinking just the same only this morning (just before I sat down to write this post). Can't afford to lose the old gang - will get to it right away and produce something more like me, I promise! .oO(Shouldn't that be slydecksiah?) Date Added: 12/08/2005
keeefer what have you got against slovakians? Date Added: 12/08/2005
Gone Away Sorry, did you say Slovenians? Date Added: 12/08/2005
keeefer No thanks i m trying to kick the habit .oO(I wonder how many wars were started through dyslexia???.....probably not many but it may be why the Scots have Hadrians wall, just a completely misunderstood missive) Date Added: 12/08/2005
Gone Away And will Hadrian ever ask for it back? Date Added: 12/08/2005
Mad Hear about the dyslexic satanist? He summoned Santa and all his onions. :p Date Added: 12/08/2005
keeefer lol what are you doing up? Date Added: 12/08/2005
Gone Away Had a quick Messenger convo with him, Keef - he's gone to bed now. ;) Date Added: 12/08/2005
keeefer I remember those 'working' from home days Date Added: 12/08/2005
Gone Away He's pretty good at it actually, Keef. Always there in the mornings and too busy to speak much to his poor old dad... ;) Date Added: 12/08/2005
Stuart I think that the balance between design and content is important. I go to blogs for information and as long as the information is set out in a readable fashion I'll stay and read - unless the design is so bad I run screaming for the back button. But then that might be just because I'm a male - a recent study has shown that different designs tend to appeal to males more than females. Date Added: 12/08/2005
Gone Away Good point, Stuart. Maybe I was afraid to mention that for fear that I'd be mobbed by angry females. ;) But it is noticeably true that female blogs tend to go for rather different designs from males. Is there a happy medium between the two that both can bear? Date Added: 12/08/2005
Stuart I'm sure there is a happy medium Clive. I just wish I had the ability to achieve it :) Date Added: 12/08/2005
Stuart And I forgot to add that your blog design is interesting Clive - nice colours (female) and regimented white lines (male) :) Date Added: 12/08/2005
Gone Away As do we all, Stuart, as do we all. :D Date Added: 12/08/2005
Gone Away Thanks, Stuart. Mad will be pleased that his efforts have been recognized. :) Date Added: 12/08/2005
keeefer I try to get mobbed by angry females whenever possible. Except, of course, in Katmandu where im banned from practising the art Date Added: 12/08/2005
Gone Away Picture the scene: Katmandu, high in the foothills of the Himalayas, a busy street, and through the crowd of market sellers and customers comes running a ragged figure, yes, our hero, Keef, pursued closely by a horde of angry females brandishing josh sticks and followed by an irate group of Nepalese policemen brandishing.... well, just brandishing, and intent on the arrest of "the foreign devil" who dares to be mobbed by angry females... :D Date Added: 12/08/2005
Stuart I'm booking my ticket to Katmandu right now. Date Added: 12/08/2005
keeefer Why do you think the men from Katmandu disappear into the mountains with all their wordly goods piled on their backs at the earliest opportunity. Sherpa is actually nepalese for 'run, here comes the mob of angry women' Date Added: 12/08/2005
Gone Away It's an interesting country, Nepal. Well, if we had our way, it would be... Date Added: 12/08/2005
keeefer We very nearly went while trekking through India. But its got a few terrorist issues at the moment which put us off a little. Other than that id love to go. Date Added: 12/08/2005
Kitty I really admire web designers too. I wish I could do that myself. Date Added: 12/08/2005
Gone Away There's another, even smaller country, called Bhutan, up there in the Himalayas. I wonder if even it has terrorist issues these days...? Date Added: 12/08/2005
Gone Away I agree, Kitty - a fascinating job. But I watched my son, Mad, through the years when he was studying to be a web developer and decided it was too much for an old dog like me to learn. ;) Date Added: 12/08/2005
swashbookler I was having some issues with the other, it always wanted me to log in, continually. It clearly knew something I did not. It was fine, but this is great news, of course. Date Added: 12/08/2005
Gone Away Xoop has been quite strange, Swash. Some people have experienced problems and others none at all. It was time to drop it, I think. Date Added: 12/08/2005
John (SYNTAGMA) You're really on that blogging hook now, Clive. You'll be taking next step soon, boldly going into the ... Podcastosphere ~ Scoble's term, not mine. When can we expect the first Gone Away podcast? Date Added: 12/08/2005
Gone Away You're way ahead of me, John. I don't even really understand what a podcast is... :D Date Added: 12/08/2005
John (SYNTAGMA) It's a bit like a radio programme. You record it as an audioblog on your computer and make it available for download, often by RSS feed. But you don't need an iPod to hear them. I listen to them on my computer using Windows Media Player. Blogging is becoming more like mainstrean media every day. The newest thing is vBlogging, or videos made by the blogger. Soon we'll all be broadcasting from our own TV stations. My God, we're going to have to be smart to master all this technology :-) Date Added: 12/08/2005
Gone Away Voice is one thing I won't get into, John (in spite of the fact that many have told me I should be in broadcasting). I am happy in the printed word, but uncomfortable in the spoken, probably because typing gives me time to think. In chat, I fought the advent of voice chat and refused to have anything to do with it. Basically, the spoken word tends to the trivial whereas the printed word has more depth (these are generalities, you understand). So I shall still be hammering away at this keyboard when you all have your radio shows. And let's not even think about TV and video... Date Added: 12/08/2005
Janus I could probably use some of the pointers here for mine as well. Good as always Gone. Date Added: 12/08/2005
Gone Away Thanks, Janus. Just checked your blog and I see you've been posting behind my back - now I have all that to catch up on! I thought you'd given up, I must admit. My apologies. Date Added: 12/08/2005
swashbookler The new site example looked great. Exciting stuff. The entire thing's a great idea, though. Props! Does anyone else have a difficult time being nice? I find myself falling back on weird jingoism, ala, 'dawg' or 'yo' or 'props'. It's extremely tacky, yo. Date Added: 13/08/2005
swashbookler I mean I'm tacky. Not you, not anyone else. It's my need to start talking jive that's tacky. Having cleared that up, i feel better. Someone's been drinking! Date Added: 13/08/2005
Josh And here I thought jingoism was more like "Iffin' yer not with us, yer a turrist ally." Date Added: 13/08/2005
Gone Away Glad you like the new site design, Swash. Now, It's interesting that you mentioned "jingoism", seeing as it's the title to this article (never miss an opportunity to self promote - preferably shamelessly). I think you'll find that the word is adequately defined therein. ;) Date Added: 13/08/2005
Gone Away Morning, Josh! :D Date Added: 13/08/2005
Ken I just looked at Josh's blog and saw his very elegant new design for WBA, which is definitely an improvement over the current beta (!). Good luck with the new venture. I see you have Ned on board already, so that's poetry off to a good start, at least and with so much drive and ability, it's bound to take the blogosphere by storm. All the very best with it. Date Added: 13/08/2005
Gone Away Thanks, Ken. Are you not going to join? I resalise that your goals for the blog may not fit with what we're trying to do with WBA but we'd be honored to have you aboard. Date Added: 13/08/2005
Ken Thanks a lot, Gone Away. If you feel that my kind of blog would fit your vision, I'd be happy to submit it to you. Keep an eye out for it! Date Added: 15/08/2005
Gone Away I shall indeed, Ken! Date Added: 15/08/2005
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