Please read and be prepared to discuss the following article, and listen to the audio link:
Technorati State of the Blogosphere 2009: “Who Are the Bloggers?” (There are three pages to this article, please read all.)
On the Media clip (listen) 141942, (read) transcript here.
Then evaluate two of the following, paying special attention to the quality of the writing, even if the topic is not something you care that much about–how do you judge quality writing on a blog?
BONUS: a long review of the Kindle, from David Byrne (anyone? lead singer of the Talking Heads, and all around cool music guy…) I’m paying way more attention to these reviews, now. Am I coveting a Kindle? Not sure.
Here’s the link to the article about the cutely-named Nook!
The Rhetoric of Blogging 
October 22, 2009 at 1:18 pm
Go Fug Yourself:
I think this website is so funny! Even though it may sound embarrassing, I really find myself sometimes sucked into these types of entertainment blogs. One blog that I sometimes read is PerezHilton.com. I know it may annoy may of you, but I think it is incredible the way he makes fun of actresses and actors. It gets more annoying if he particularly doesn’t like them, such as calling Jessica Alba Jessica “Don’t Call me Latina” Alba to make her mad.
Anyways, I think that gofugyourself.com is even worse. I think it is very frustrating to criticize people, but I find it very creative to come up with a blog like this one where you label every post with the word fug or yet fab. It is funny how every entry has a picture of a person they’re about to criticize. For example, one of today’s entry pictures is Shakira. Shakira sometimes dresses in a very funky way when she performs. Shakira performed on SNL wearing a black cut-out unitard with some material pasted to her hips. When I read the blog’s post I thought it was very interesting. This post was made by Heather and she says that the material on her hips reminds her of shoulder pads. She finishes the post by saying that “maybe her hips were lying.” I though it was really funny as a whole story.
These posts are made as funny stories and contain many of the author’s annoying opinions to the actresses. The blog doesn’t contain posts about actors. They mostly criticize the women by the outfits they wear, the pose they strike and the performance on their movies/shows. The comments are harsh and disrespectful and they have nothing nice to say. They are short posts, sometimes have CAPITAL LETTERS to enforce a thought and always include a picture. On the sidebar they have archives of all the actresses they’ve criticized. Even though it may seem as a distinct blog within the entertainment business, I guess it must grab many’s attention because the comments are a total hit. Besides, you can link the post to twitter, facebook and myspace.
Smitten Kitchen:
I loved this blog. I think that it is a very intriguing to have food and personal thoughts combined together. I really liked the way each entry has a title of the food that’s being talked about, and I like that a big picture that details the title comes right after it. Example: Apple cider doughnuts, and then a big tasty picture of the doughnuts. This sort of blog reminded me a lot of the Rachel Ray show. I love the Rachel Ray show since she started with the program of 30 min. meals, but then she made it kind of a talk show where she invites guests and she opens up about her favorite foods for such events, what she craves and the comfort that these foods give to her. This blog gave me that type of personal connection feeling. I think it is awesome that the blog is composed by Deb and her husband. I think it’s such a great connection to cook with someone you love. I personally love cooking with my husband, and then everything in the kitchen seems more fun than scary. I like that her mini stories relate to the food she talks about and think that the recipes are easy to follow. I like that it’s a simple clean looking blog. I find the tools they use as their sidebars very adhoc to the blog such as FAQ, Tips, Good reads, Surprise me, etc. I think that the category use in this type of cooking blog is very useful and I love that all the posts include pictures of the dishes, so that when you try it a home then you can compare the recipe with them.
October 23, 2009 at 11:33 pm
Smitten Kitchen
I really enjoyed this website. Her pictures were beautiful, and the design was really pleasant to look at. She had a useful sidebar, and the ads weren’t ugly, and almost look like they belong. I think if the font was bigger I would have enjoyed looking at the site more, but I really liked reading the content and looking at her pictures.
I liked in her about section how she said she didn’t use fancy ingredients like truffle oil. I hate when I’m trying to cook a recipe and I find out all the ingredients are super expensive, and that made me feel like even though her food looks really gourmet, I could actually make it too. I also liked how she said she wouldn’t take expensive samples from pr people to use in her recipes too. I think her down to earth vibe appeals to her audience.
Go Fug Yourself
I like the content, and think it’s funny, but I think the header is really ugly. The blog doesn’t look nearly as fun as it actually is. Perez Hilton is all pink and has big fonts, but this site is not very eye-catching. I thought the sidebar would have been better if there was a drop down menu of the celebs instead of a long list, and the ads were a little much.
That being said, I had fun reading the blog, it is silly and kind of mean, but I liked that it didn’t play favorites like Perez. It drives me crazy how he’s friends with lady gaga and katy perry and never makes fun of them. It seems like it updates a lot and I might come back when I’m doing my bored web surfing.
October 24, 2009 at 12:08 am
Mouth Piece:
I don’t really follow sports but this sports blog was kind’ve funny. I liked that the writing iwas simple, witty and effortless. The author isn’t trying to hard to sound “cool” or witty, it just happens naturally, although I can’t point specifically why, maybe because of the subtlety of his colloquial tone.
I must say, however, I wasn’t a fan of the blogs aesthetics. I found it annoying and distracting that the tool bar was just as wide as the column for the posts. I also hated the advertisements, especially their existence on top of EVERY single post.
Smitten Kitchen:
First impression: this blog is gorgeous!! Especially by contrast to Mouth Piece. The photographs are stunning, the color palate is delicate and simple, which I love. I also liked that the posts are broken up by pictures. It made them easier and more fun to read. I also think this blog had a great concept — each recipe has a story/thought behind it. It’s not just a recipe but rather a memory, reference, metaphor etc.
On the writing side, I am not a huge fan. I didn’t think the writing was BAD, just a bit wordy and trying-to-hard-to-sound-casual. I’m blogs. I think good blog writing must sound personal and casual (not super pretentious or authoritative – as in museum plack style writing). While I do think Kitchen Smitten used a casual tone, I didn’t find it find it as fun to read as I did Mouth Piece (and, bear in mind, I do NOT enjoy watching sports…which shows how writing can matter to a blog’s success!)
October 25, 2009 at 11:58 am
Go Fug Yourself
I had no idea what this blog was so I started with the FAQ section. I was still a little confused about the different uses of the word “fug,” but I did learn that this site is probably pretty popular if they aren’t able to handle the number of comments coming in (and thus disabled that function). Back on the homepage, I noticed they have a “share” function to connect to facebook, twitter, myspace, email, and then a plus sign. I was really impressed with their short list of social networking sites to link to because I figured it seemed pretty comprehensive without going overboard. I was wrong. The plus sign after “email” contained more than 172 other ways to bookmark or share. That seems like a bit of overkill.
As for the quality of writing, I think this site has done a pretty good job. The spelling and punctuation in the posts is good so it isn’t painful to read. It has a casual voice, often incorporating the word “like” in between thoughts, but I think that is more about style than quality. It reads the way someone would talk instead of how someone would write. If you judge quality of writing by grammar, I’d say the writing is good. The only hesitation I would have is that most of their writing is in short, caption style phrases or sentences. For some reason I have a hard time admitting that these short sentences can have a high quality of writing in them.
Smitten Kitchen
Next I checked out Smitten Kitchen and after seeing the picture of cauliflower with almonds, raisins and capers I was happy I did. I liked the layout of the site and that it had only two advertisement sections. The pictures are great. The showcase the food beautifully and show more than just the final product by including pictures of the ingredients or the dish in different steps of the cooking process. I like the Google search bar that allows you to search for recipes in previous posts (according to the FAQ page).
I really like that her blog isn’t simply a list of recipes. She adds a personal touch to it by talking about her family and why she made a certain dish when she did. I liked her style of writing because it was casual but still proper.
I noticed that most (if not all) of her posts have a jump to them. I assume this is to get her click number up for advertisements, but I found it a little annoying. I hate having to jump because it is too much of a commitment for me. I enjoyed scrolling through her posts but wasn’t always interested in delving into each entry. I suppose the upside of this is that her homepage is clean and the posts don’t seem so long.
October 25, 2009 at 12:06 pm
Go Fug Yourself
Really funny. I don’t like celebrity gossip stuff because I think people who do that are evil (Perez Hilton, anyone?) and celebrity targets are just far too easy to take down. Even though the page jumped from topic to topic,it works because it is a gossip site. I like the way it incorporates photos and catty gossip. Great content.
The content was good, the layout was ugly. The header is distractingly homely. The ads are chaotic and of poor quality. The ads, header, and glut of links detract from the sharpness of the writing. The poor construction of the site and layout make it look very unprofessional. If they fixed this, they could attract more readers.
BookSlut
I wanted to like this site. I like reading, because I am an English major, so I thought these people would have the same sort of passion. I did not like the content. It was too scattered, there were very poor transitions, and it was extremely pompous. It reminded me of everything I hate about English majors at the U of M. The writers don’t really write like literature aficionados, they write more like bitter critics, and it makes you want to avoid their site.
The look of the site was very 90’s. The color of the links did not go well with the site. The bookslut image header was boring. The image could be used to draw people into the site, but it is instead distracting and silly. There are too many links, making the whole site seem very patched together. There are other literature sites that do this much better like http://www.bookarmy.com/
October 25, 2009 at 1:18 pm
Mouthpiece Sports:
I am a huge college football and professional tennis fan but I rarely read about these sports on blogs and instead get my news from newspaper websites or ESPN. This blog made me realize that not all sports blogs are boring or overly opinionated. I think the author is witty and I was laughing at many of his posts. His writing reflects his opinions on the player/sport/team and consequently he comes across as ranting at times. Luckily I found his rants to be amusing and I was not annoyed with the author’s tone. In addition, I really liked his use of questions in the titles of his posts, for example “Have You No Decency, Goldy Gopher?” The questions effectively introduced the blog entry and made me interested in reading more.
Smitten Kitchen:
This blog is a great example of a beautiful and effective food blog. Although the blog is primarily only recipes and pictures of the cooking process, I still feel connected to the author. Her writing incorporates tidbits of her personal life with the food she is cooking. She describes why she is cooking a certain dish, discusses how she acquired the ingredients, and how it turned out while adding a personal touch to her posts. However, she does not stray from her purpose of being a home cooking blog. She and her husband recently had a baby and she mentions this development and alludes to the huge change in her life yet she does not change her writing to include more about the baby. I like being able to use this blog for recipe ideas and cooking tips while also reading interesting stories about the author and her family.
October 25, 2009 at 1:32 pm
MOUTHPIECE Blog:
For a blog that purports to give readers a direct link to athletes (see the “About” page), there seems to be a paucity of first-hand content from athletes. For example, one post by Ryan Corazza (“The case of Cedric Benson vs. the Bears”) just takes an excerpt of a Sun-Times article in which said player is quoted. It makes me wonder if they intended to go to their primary sources and have found it difficult, or if they simply forgot that they ever put that in the “About” page. This oversight aside, however, the blog stands on its own merits.
Mouthpiece has a good thing going as a sports blog. They’ve got Chicago’s teams, carving out a niche for the authors, but also delve into national sports news, making it accessible or shareable material as well. The writing necessarily conveys personality, especially when Ryan Corazza (apparently, the primary author) toes the line between objective analysis and personal expectations of games. This is where he writes the best – when a sports fan wants a semi-authoritative perspective (i.e. that of a really big sports fan) but without too much technical detail. It’s the kind of writing that can get into some of the finer points of the subject matter without losing the more casual reader.
Smitten Kitchen:
The first thing that struck me about Deb Perelman’s blog was the quality of the pictures. One could easily pass by the text for the visual feast. That would, of course, diminish the full experience of her writing, which oozes personality and manages to mesh details of her personal life (which normally wouldn’t interest me at all) with her experiences in the kitchen. Her posts are about motherhood and daily life as much as food, alternating between each subject freely or talking about both at once. This is necessary, since the visual element of her blog is usually food-related and would easily lead readers to expect pure recipe posts and whatnot. For example…
“Among the many slightly absurd ways we’ve been getting ourselves ready, we decided that we needed to clear out our DVR queue last week, to make room for all of the shows we’ll likely be missing the first runs of. And what needed clearing out? Episodes and episodes of Barefoot Contessa…”
How did she just do that? She just talked about something completely mundane – the DVR queue – and made it germane to the post’s apparent subject ,”grilled lamb kebabs + tzatziki”. (Barefoot Contessa is a show on the Food Network, for the uninitiated). This evenhanded and comfortable shift in frames of reference is where her writing shines the most, and a big part of what makes her blog not only accessible, but successful.
October 25, 2009 at 1:47 pm
Go Fug Yourself
Sadly, I have to admit to spending a lot of my time reading celebrity blogs. Each one is quite different; some provide large articles, going into intense detail, while others simply rely more on pictures and captions. I have never heard of “go fug yourself” but I happen to really like it. Firstly, I like how this site organizes its articles by celebrities so the reader can easily find an article on whichever star she/he feels like stalking. Many celebrity blogs employ this tactic and I happen to this it is very useful. I also like that each article accompanies a picture because you can scroll through the site and stop to read when you find an interesting picture. I passed through the articles about celebrities I didn’t care about and when I saw a picture of someone like Paris Hilton I read the commentary. Moreover, the writing for this blog is nothing impressive but it is enjoyable to read. I think this reveals how a popular blog doesn’t need to be written by a journalist or someone with an English degree. The language is simple and sarcastic which is effective in making the blog fun and pleasurable to read. The tone of this blog feels like one of my friends is giving me her opinion. I personally judge the quality of writing on a blog as to how well it fits with the topic. For example, a blog about technology should have sophisticated writing. When it comes to blogging about celebrities I think the writing needs to be energetic and interesting, and I think that this blog’s writing fits that description.
Smitten Kitchen
I don’t really understand those people who are obsessed with the food network. I have a huge problem with watching food being cooked and then not being able to taste it. Originally I thought I would have the same problem with this blog. How could I read about the amazing foods someone is cooking but then not get to enjoy it? However, this blog surprised me in the way that it incorporated Deb’s (the blogger) life. Each article incorporated a piece of her life and the food she was cooking. One of my favorite pieces was when she showed a picture of her baby’s head and wrote “we immediately tried to eat him because of his cinnamon swirl hair.” The writing on this blog is very interesting and has an enjoyable tone. Deb acts as if she is talking to someone rather than writing in an impersonal manner. I also really liked the pictures that accompanied the article. Her pictures were just as amazing as the ones on dooce. Interestingly enough, her FAQ also asks what kind of camera she uses. Additionally, I like how the recipes weren’t on the main page of the blog. This made it a lot less overwhelming and easy to navigate. Although I couldn’t eat the delicious food she was describing, Smitten Kitchen’s personal language definitely made me enjoy this blog.
– Chelsey
October 25, 2009 at 4:59 pm
Mouthpiece Sports
I was pretty excited when I saw we were able to evaluate a sports blog. I have never heard of Mouthpiece Sports and I thought it was okay. I really liked the layout and visually it was pleasing to the eye. It was easy to find anything I wanted and linked well with other sports blogs. I like how there was a couple colors and it seemed very well formatted.
The blog itself I though was okay. I did like Ryan’s writing style as it was very easy to read and he wrote in a witty way. He used some good metaphors and I like the way he wrote. The actual content though was decent. Most of the Chicago related sports stuff they talked about wasn’t anything special and it didn’t seem like he knew so much more than anyone else. It seemed like the purpose of the website was to hear content and information directly from athletes and there was nothing of that anywhere in the blog. When I went to the main page there was a couple things here and there with some Chicago athletes but not as much as they preached in their About section. I feel like they should take that part out because it is sort of misleading when there isn’t any content directly from athletes.
Go Fug Yourself
I do like my celebrity gossip and I thought this blog was really funny. More than anything the writing and language stood out to me. I could really care less about what these celebs are wearing but the language and they way they make fun of them was awesome. The site layout was nice and I didn’t mind it.
The writing was awesome though. I love how they have taken this concept of FUG and literally evolved it into everything. For an avid reader of their site I think that is great – constantly using Fug as this is their “trademark.” I just like their saracastic witty remarks and how they setup up a post, show the pic, and then give their sly remarks. The titles of each one was great like, Fugmilla Belle or Evan Fugchel Wood. I don’t know but I just think that is refreshing and funny. They did a great job with the pictures and they all seemed to be very high quality. Also, they linked to tons of other sites and places which was awesome. They really have created a community.
October 25, 2009 at 5:27 pm
Go Fug Yourself-
I really liked this blog! Obviously the writing style of this blog is what MAKES this blog what it is. It’s very funny and extremely sarcastic, which it has to be if it’s going to rip on beautiful celebrities. I really liked the post where she writes an entire made up story explaining why the dress in the picture is “unintentionaly” ripped and torn, in the voice of a complete valley-girl. It was suggestive of the fact that the only explanation for why the designer dress would have looked as destroyed as it did was because she fell through elevators, got in physical fights, and was attacked my vicious animals. I laughed out loud multiple times and thought the whole thing was very creative. In addition, the other posts are equally funny- I felt slightly bad for the celebrities because of the really terrible things they say about them (!), but also felt they deserved if for the ridiculous outfits. I think this blog exemplifies what language and writing style can do to the content of a blog. The quality of the writing is unique, especially to this topic, which makes it that much more enjoyable to read.
Smitten Kitchen-
This blog is very sweet (no pun intended). It incorporates both content about food and recipes with attached delicious looking pictures, in addition to snippets about Deb Perelman’s life- her husband, her baby, her life in which she balances cooking and child-care…the whole works. Her writing is very personal and informal which gives the reader a comfortable and relaxed feeling while reading her blog. I think this works particularly well with the blog, as it is all about food and we all know what comfort food brings. The informality of her writing quality, however, is not matched with the formality of the website- The blog is completely professional looking and has every element you would expect to find in a food blog- a recipe section, seasonal dishes, and beautifully arranged photographs.
October 25, 2009 at 8:27 pm
Smitten Kitchen-
I liked this blog a lot. Her tone is inviting and quirky. Cooking is not a strength of mine, but her blog posts/recipes make it not so intimidating. Her pictures are beautiful and clear. Even if you just ate a huge dinner (like I just did), it still tempted you to dream about eating all her wonderful recipes. She talks about food with personality and mixes her personal life in. It made for a good read to know that she leads a busy life (just having a baby) and still finds time to make amazing meals, not to mention write posts and take pictures. In terms of formatting, it was great. The blog was clean and organized. I like her navigation layout also– the season favorites.
Go Fug Yourself-
I’ve read this one before. The tone is hilarious and witty. Although, I sometimes cringe at the comments, I still laugh and am engaged in the reading. The writer sucks you in so you want to continue to read, and the commentary is hilarious without being too mean (like Perez). I feel like the writer humanized these celebrities. I feel like our culture puts them on a pedestal when in actuality at the end of the day, they are still normal people with bad hair, outfit, and make up days. At first glance, the layout is tacky. When you first click on the page, without scrolling down, a third of the page is ads. Clearly the point of the blog is to make money, since “advertiser info” is prominently placed on the main navigation. I like the Twitter feed, search, and share capabilities which again stream back to the point that they clearly seem to want to most number of eyeballs on their blog. Overall, I liked the tone. I could get addicted to it.
October 25, 2009 at 10:04 pm
I just tried to comment and it got deleted (like a few of my blog posts have been). Here is my comment the second time around.
BookSlut:
I was extremely unimpressed by this blog. Maybe I went in with the wrong expectations but I thought that because it was called “Bookslut” it would be reviews on lots of different books, because obviously the writer reads a lot of them. More importantly than the fact that I did not enjoy reading the blog, I also did not think that the writing was good. The sentences seemed to be out of order and random with no real purpose to any of them. There were too many links too close to one another and the writer’s thoughts seemed to be so scattered and random and almost incoherent. I had to read each paragraph at LEAST twice before I as able to understand it. I did not like the way the page was set up or the writing. The only positive quality I saw was that all of the articles were short so that I did not have to go on reading the confusing and random writing for so long. I definitely would not go back to this website again. I did not like the content or the writing. Sometimes great writing can make the worst content interesting, but this site lacked both good writing and good content.
Go Fug Yourself:
I really enjoyed this website. I used to have to look at both this website and celebuzz when I worked at Gossip Cop this summer. My main job was to roam the blogosphere to find false rumors on the celebrity gossip sites. This was one of the websites I actually enjoyed going to. I like the way the writing is concise and that you can see many different stories at once without actually having to read all the articles you don’t want to read. I think that because the entries are so short the writers are able to be more witty than Perez Hilton. I loved the first article about Jessica Simpson and Gerard Butler. I really liked the first sentences: “STOP, CHILD. JUST STOP.” When I read them I actually laughed out loud. The website writes about celebrity gossip in such a funny way and I really appreciated all the humor. I haven’t looked at this website since I stopped working, but now that I have seen it again I may start going back…
October 25, 2009 at 10:52 pm
Smittenkitchen is a pretty simple, well put together blog. It’s about section is very strong and informative. The page explains the entire site, has a short index section and then bios for the two writers. There are a couple advertisements and the theme is mainly a white background. I think the white backgrounds are good for the array of food pictures on the site. I don’t read many food blogs, so I don’t know if this specific topic is overplayed. It sounds quite unique to me and I read a couple of their posts and it’s some tasty sounding food. They also have a huge organized recipe list so that readers can cook an assortment of food. There other “widget” is a conversion tool for different measurements. The blog centers on food, but it has a mommy blog feel. There is a lot of talk about personal events and day-to-day stuff. This means that the blog probably caters to and older more female audience.
Mouthpiece Sports seems like a pretty run of the mill sports blog. Their blogroll is quite similar to the stuff that I read on a daily basis. They have a bunch of different tabs at the top for different sections of the site. It’s a Chicago sports blog, so I don’t really have any interest in the topics. When they do talk about national stories it’s stuff that’s been covered in a better fashion on other sites. The sites appearance also isn’t very attractive. It has the feel of a low-tech local news site. The posts weren’t bad, as they present an interesting perspective on certain topics. They also produce a lot of content, so that’s certainly a positive. Also the site is run generating money from ads, not sure how popular the site is though.
October 25, 2009 at 11:05 pm
Go Fug Yourself
Before I start, I do need to say that the content of this blog could not interest me less. I really just don’t like celebrity news/gossip/whatever, and personally think it’s a total snoozefest. That said, I thought the writing was quite funny, possibly because it’s similar to mine.
Some people might argue that the quality of this writing is bad. I mean, the writer(s) do use the word “like” a LOT, and they have a lot of run-on sentences and all-caps speaking, but it’s funny. It’s about voice. I may be biased, because I personally love me some run-on sentences, all caps, and the occasional “like” when it sounds funny in the context of my writing, but I think that the style many would find as “low quality” has thought put into it, and that makes it…less low quality. Reading it, it doesn’t sound like they’re dumb and that they’re writing like that because that’s how they talk or anything, it sounds like they’re doing it because it’s funny. So I guess I still consider it “good.”
Smitten Kitchen
While I do love me some Food Network (for some odd reason), I can’t say that food as a subject is interesting to me…I don’t even like food that much (seriously, I’m, like, manorexic). THAT said,
Smitten Kitchen is still quality writing, but a bit more obviously so. That is, most people would consider her a quality writer, because she has a more traditional way of writing than, say, Go Fug Yourself. Sentences are nicely constructed and well thought-out (I think we’re seeing a pattern here in what I look for in writing), like she chose her words carefully to make it sound good.
Where I thought some of her real talent came through was in the actual recipes. Sure, she wrote well in the introductions, but I feel like a lot of people can do that – not everyone can be organized, clear and eloquent enough to make a recipe well-written and easy to understand. It didn’t sound dumb; with super-short sentences that just described exactly what you had to do, but it wasn’t overly complicated either – it was very eloquent while being very clear on what exactly needed to be done in each step. I think this is where the talent really is.
October 26, 2009 at 12:10 am
Mouthpiece Sports
The Mouthpiece Sports blog is definitely something I would say does not have good quality of writing. Yes, the author Ryan Corazza kept the posts interesting but they did not seem that intelligent or grammatically correct. What I believe makes a blog noticeable for its quality of writing is when it seems credible, has good grammar and intelligent remarks, and is simple to read. However, what I did enjoy about his blog was his interesting posts and what he had to say. They were fun to read, but finding simple spelling errors was annoying. Maybe if the blogger did not rush, or re-read what he wrote before posting, I’d find his quality of writing better.
Bookslut
This blog was great to read, especially if you are a book lover. The blogger gives great feed-back and information on not only various authors but their books and books that are similar. Even though I don’t necessarily read many books in my spare time I’d consider visiting this blog again to see what authors to look up. I think this blog consists of good quality writing because she shows that she is up-to-date and intelligent with her books, uses good grammar, and makes the posts interesting and clear for the reader. All of those qualities are what I believe make a blog of good quality.
October 26, 2009 at 12:16 am
On “Blog of a Bookslut”:
I really liked the content on this blog. It felt really smart and very in depth, especially on the relatively specific subject of ‘good books’. The only problem with the site is the layout and overall aesthetic of it. The name is catchy and all, and the information is amazing and has a very informed tone, but frankly and ironically (possibly intentionally) it reads much like a book. There really isn’t much flair, not a lot of jokes and stuff, but that could be expected from a website like this, especially a professional-y one.
On ‘Mouthpiece’:
I really loved this blog. Even though I didn’t really feel all the NFL football coverage (especially all the Bears bias) I liked the tone and the flair. The layout was simple, but entertaining and looked good. Most of the coverage was behind-the-scenes, interesting, and the commentary was refreshing, down-to-earth, and witty. I think I could link to this site a few times in my own blog, and given that it’s got quite a lot of non-hockey related substance and it’s a ton of Chicago. I could also see myself scrolling through archive upon archive, opening tab upon tab of interesting stuff. Which, with my schedule, is saying something