It matters little whether you are able to give a topic a ‘fresh new take’, avoid writing a post on thes topics!

• Pagerank. Whether it when up or down or did a loop-de-loop, we don’t care and many of us have the google toolbar so can see for ourselves.
• “Sorry I haven’t posted in a while.” Honestly, we can see that and if there’s a shiny new post there, so be it. Make it a good one, not a “Look everybody I’m back!”
• Pictures you took off another blog. If they’re on one blog, they’re probably already seen, especially if you use the same social networks (eg Entrecard)
• Lists of interesting facts that aren’t true.
• Endless complaints about mild inconveniences some free service has caused.
• The same old ‘make money with adsense/bidvertiser/payperpost/other well established organisation’ story that provides no new insight, humour, feedback or experience.  

Fresh, original content is what the internet wants. News, not Olds.

Now I’m not a parent myself and I don’t know much about it, but I do know that white font on a pale blue background may be a nice colour scheme, but not if you actually want to read the text. And medium blue text on a brown background is also painful to read.

And my goodness, would you look at that! There’s 40 posts on the main page! 10 posts is the high end of normal, but 40!

There must be a better layout out there somewhere, surely there are free blogger templates around? It needs to change. Fix the colours, reduce the number of posts displayed one page, decide whether you really need all those plugins and widgits in the sidebars and generally tidy up. The blog will be much more approachable and readable then.

The first thing that strikes me is that the blog is very neat. The blue theme is professional looking, but I must say it’s wonderful to see colourful thumbnails next to the most recent posts. They lift the page and catch the eye, which is something most blogs need in this era of tiny attentionspans.

The content is presented on the homepage as short paragraphs with a “Continue Reading” link. Certain web users with hang-ups about page load times would complain that they have to click another link before reading the article and that full posts should be visible on the homepage, but I have no complaints in this case. The summaries work well and keep the page tidy.

The information is easy to understand and covers a good range of topics about general blogging and networking without a heavy focus on making money, or being more eficient. This makes it a light hearted but useful read and doesn’t put you under any pressure to optimise your blog or lower your bounce rate.

The monkey I don’t quite understand. (I assume it’s a monkey, it may be a particularly ugly child.) As a logo it could be well utilised as a trademark for the blog. It could be used as an entrecard card, a forum avatar or even as a favicon, but I only see it twice on the page. There’s some potential there.

Overall, a 6 out of 10.

Go to the Google homepage.

Type in “find Chuck Norris”.

Click the “I’m feeling lucky” button.

I like knowing that some webmasters have a sense of humour.

It seems that Blogging has become so popular that it has prompted health officials to conduct a study into the effects of Blogging on the human mind. While we poor bloggers have long been characterised as “lonely desperate souls searching for validation in our meaningless lives” the study actually found that:

• Blogging encourages critical thinking
• Blogging encourages feelings of connection with other people
• Bloggers feel less lonely as a group
• Bloggers feel less isolated and more satisfied with their friendships
• Bloggers feel less anxious, less depressed and less stressed

The study concluded that this was because blogs are a medium rich in ideas that encourage them to exchange and critique information.

It would seem that some bloggers find that regularly posting in their blog is a constant that they can always return to, something that gives them a sense of regularity in life. It’s also a creative outlet, a means to improve writing and part of a larger network as a whole.

Honestly, who here couldn’t have told the researchers that themselves?

I think this blog probably has the most unique concept I’ve seen so far. It’s essecntially a collection of photographs of people smiling. In a world where there’s nothing cheerful on the news anymore, this blog is a welcome relief.

There’s not much else to say about the content, other than to have a look for yourself. I’d have to say the RIb tickling smiles are my favourite.

The layout looks custom, and is well balanced all the way down the page. Having two RSS icons are a littel confusing, until you realise that one is actually for email subscriptions. The only think that really bothers me is that it might not be designed for viewing in my browser, because the header looks like this:

The RSS feed is covering up the catch phrase!

Overall a highly enjoyable site. earning it a 9 out of 10.

If cats could talk, they probably wouldn’t. At least, that’s what I’ve been told.

I tend to think that if they could talk, they would mostly be saying the following

• Food. Now.
• Let me sleep.
• Open the door
• I demand your full attention
• Fool. That’s what you are.
• I have changed my mind.

And yet, there are countless blogs out there that claim to be written by cats. And what’s more, these cats seem to have the ability to say more than the half a dozen things I listed above.

Yes, I realise they aren’t actually cats that are blogging, but doting owners who want to share their love for their kitty over the internet. And some of them are actually quite good reads if you’re only looking for a bit of fun. Even though it does seem a bit strange to be blogging as your cat rather than about your cat.

Theseblogs do seem to generate quite a big following. This just goes to show that the internet can never get enough of cute cat photos.

So if you’re languishing for comments on your blog, consider harassinf your cat with your camera and posting some photos. I’m willing to bet that cat photo posts always generate comments.

It is, of course, Domestik Goddess, a lady’s blog about all those sorts of things that ladies are interested in; homemaking, clothes, craft, pets, kids etc. Not a power tool in sight!

I feel quite out of place reading a blog such as this. There’s lots of sewing and craft, and I can’t remember the last time I tried to do anything of that sort. Don’t get me wrong, they’re very informative, but they’re going to appeal to those people out there interested in doing creative and practical things around the home.

Mind you, I was entranced by this post: Bacon Bits Collection. Fascinating, especially as I’m writing this just before lunch.

The layout isn’t as pink as I originally implied. The page is bright, clear and easy to read. Even the placement of ads doesn’t detract from the overall appearance, and the regular use of images makes it an appealing blog to read.

Is there anything I would change about this blog? I’d maybe consider havign one less post on the front page so that the length of posts match up with the sidebars a bit more. I know standard advice is to have at least 3 posts on a blog, but the recent posts widget in teh top left would probably compensate.

Overall a 6.5 out of 10.

It’s childish and petty. Not one of them would freely give up their pagerank if they could, they are simply following the philosophy of “I don’t have it so I’ll claim I didn’t want it anyway”.

That’s not to say that a Pagerank is everything. It’s nice, and it’s not worthless. It’s nice to have if you do, for many reasons.

1. Pagerank shows your site is here for the long run. It is an indication that it has been there for a few months, and that you’ve put effort in to linking it around the internet. You can’t fake a pagerank in a google toolbar.
2. It shows that Google has noticed you.
3. It’s a fast way for advertisers to assure themselves that your website is of reasonable quality.
4. Some people and services value your links based on pagerank.

#4 has been a big issue in the pastm especially as Google stripped ranks from sites that appeared to be selling links. People are increasing looking to other ways to assess a website’s value, so whether you choose to place a large or small value on Pagerank is up to you.

Just grow up and don’t proclaim it to be worthless if you don’t have one.

Have you ever tried using Yahoo Answers? To be honest, it can be a tough place to get a real, helpful answer when you need one. It’s full of people with the following tendancies:

• Strongly oppinionated but dont’ know anything about the actual topic
• Don’t read the question so don’t give you a useful answer
• Insult you because they can
• Copy passages from wikipedia that aren’t helpful
• Answer with “I don’t know.”
• Give you a sentance teaser, and then a link to their website.

So if you actually DO come across a good, helpful answer, they are like gold. Not to mention a boon for webmasters seeking targeted traffic.

You see, so many people focus on Google and Google alone when trying to build up their space in the internet, that they forget about Yahoo. Yes, people still use Yahoo. And people still type questions into search engines when they don’t know where else to look, and Yahoo questions often pop up on page one of the SE results.

Yahoo! Answers is a boon for webmasters is particular niches, such as automotive, beauty, food, health, pets or science, because you have a multitude of potential visitors all looking for information. Information that your website just might be able to provide.

There are a few tricks to gaining that traffic, but they are quite simple.

1. Actually be helpful. Nobody is going to click the link you dropped if you haven’t given any information.
2. Don’t drop links all the time, and don’t link exclusively to your websites. It’s spam.
3. Use a username which relates to the website you are trying to promote, and mention the website in your profile. I have noticed an increase in yahoo search results for nich website names using this method, rather than direct traffic from dropped links.
4. Don’t copy text. Write out each answer individually. Few things will earn you more thumbs-down than copy-pasting a wikipedia article
5. Vote for your answers. A lot of the time a ‘best answer’ will not be chosen by the person who asked the question, but is instead chosen by hte most votes it gets after the question is closed. You have nothing ot lose by voting for your own answer, so why not do it? Best answers get more exposure!

The point to all this, of course, is being helpfull. The internet has enough junk on it already, stand out by helping someone.