Closing Up Shop

I've been putting this off for several weeks, but I think it's time to face the facts. This site is not coming back.

Our goal of helping people find the funniest blogs on the Net was quite an ambitious undertaking. In some respects, I believe this blog was a success. On the other hand, it never quite lived up to the original idea I had in my head.

The problem is two-fold and it falls entirely on my shoulders. I do not have the time required to do this site properly. I do not have the web-design ability to make my ideas become reality. I had some wonderful designers offer their services for free, but most of the things I wanted were supposedly impossible.

Rob Kroese and I share a similar goal of helping readers find the funniest blogs on the Internet. His site, Humor-Blogs dot com, features an on-going project similar to ours. I can't recommend his site enough.

I want to thank all of you who have volunteered your time as reviewers. Our reviewers are directly responsible for any success we have had. I'm just sorry I wasn't able to live up to my responsibilities.

Thanks again to all of our readers and reviewers. Please visit Humor-Blogs dot com.

All-American Girl’s Roadtrip

All-American Girl’s Roadtrip ended up with a pretty good review.

It made our Top-50. A few nice comments here and there. But the people who didn’t quite like it will surely send Road Chick to our Proverbial “grain of salt.”

CONTENT – 6.4
“It didn't strike me as a humor blog, more like a personal blog with anecdotes about the blogger's life. It wasn't bad. It just wasn't all that funny to me.”

“The content is pretty good, but the third-person writing is distracting.”

“How is any of this stuff funny? Parts of it are cute, but cute isn't funny.”

“There's not much for me to say except that this is a really nice blog -- fun, interesting, well written. “

“Uninteresting.”

“Sorry, but this content didn't hold my attention at all. I was terribly bored reading it. If this is a humor blog, I obviously don't get it.”

“The reviewer thinks the whole third-person shtick runs thin about halfway through the third post.”

“A little too self-involved. Only the 'pee/pea' post made me smile.”

“Nice blog. I liked it.”

DESIGN – 6.9
“Modified grey/green Blogger template. Gets the job done, but it sure as hell doesn't grab my attention.”

“Nice, clean design. Love the banner.”

“Basic blogger, but fairly clean.”

“Pretty cool, I guess.”

“Ho hum, but it's easy to read.”

“Nothing special, but nice color and easy to navigate.”

“Blogger template with a cool, custom logo. She uses a graphic with every post too. Nice.”

QUALITY OF WRITING/GRAMMAR – 7.2
“I like the easy-to-read, conversational writing style.”

“Her writing just it not to my taste, but she writes well enough. But enough of the third person, please!”

“Didn't see any errors.”

“I didn't see any problem with the writing besides the fact that it bored me to tears.”

“I kind of enjoy the third person voice.”

“The third-person writing is a gimmick. I get it. I imagine she keeps doing it to carry on the theme. I would probably enjoy the blog more if it was written in first-person, but it’s her damn blog. If it means that much to her, I’d suggest she keep it. If not, ditch it like a bad habit.”

INTANGIBLES – 8.0
“No ads, nothing distracting. Good job.”

“My only complaint is that some of the posts are a bit long.”

“This blog has a lot of potential. Make it funny!”

“I did not like how she writes in the 3rd person. I thought only Dennis Rodman talked like that.”

“I really wanted to like the blog more, because some of my peeps love it, but I just couldn't make the commitment.”

“Length, style and frequency varies a lot. What is this blog about?”

FREQUENCY – 7.0
“Road Chick averages about three to four posts a week.”

WOULD YOU READ THIS BLOG REGULARLY – 48% Yes
“Probably not.”

“Yes.”

“No way.”

“Yes. Love it!”

“I wouldn't read it every day. Seems like it's more for the MySpace crowd.”

“No.”

“Sure.”

“No, but I wish her well.”

OVERALL – 73.5

huh, no shit?

Most of the reviewers of huh, no shit? were non-committal about visiting the site on a regular basis. Lots of kinda-sorta-maybe, almost-but-not-quite comments.

With that in mind, our third straight review where the blog managed a cumulative score in the low-70s isn't nearly as bad as some would seem.

CONTENT - 6.2
“I didn't feel strongly about this blog either way. I liked it, but in kind of the way I like peas. Peas are OK, but you wouldn't build the meal around them. They're just .. peas. Nice and mildly amusing peas, but still peas.”

“This is nothing more than posted pictures with an accompanying, half-assed, brief comment.”

“Somewhat regular posts, can't seem to quantify exactly how I feel about the content. Some of the pics I've seen elsewhere. The writing doesn't jump out at me, grabbing my attention and beating it into comedic submission. I think the URL is fitting though, because my overall first impression is somewhere between mediocre and ‘huh?’”

“I enjoy the random photos and short entries. Shoutbox Karaoke is always worth a look.”

“There's really not a lot of content. Most posts consist of a sentences and a funny picture they found on the internet. I wouldn't exactly categorize this as a humor blog, but I kind of dig its style.”

“There doesn't seem to be much effort here.”

“A little too much ‘aren't I funny because I'm writing silly nonsense instead of actually trying to be funny.’ The posts that actually aim to be funny are pretty funny though. Also, evolution, secular humanism and vegetarianism don't really hit my funny bone.”

“Every now and then it’s clever, fantastic, very funny. Other times ... meh. Overall, not so bad.”

DESIGN - 5.2
“It looked like a standard template, but I can't say much more for my own page.”

“Nothing special here. It's easy enough to read, which is all I really care about anyway.”

“Basic Blogger template. Blah.”

“It looks like they played with a Blogger template just enough to almost fuck it up. Spend $20 on a new template from one of the many talented, cheap designers out there.”

QUALITY OF WRITING/GRAMMAR - 5.3
“Blogs without much writing don’t deserve a lot of points here, but what they do write isn’t bad.”

“Honestly, there's not enough writing here for me to even give it a score on it's writing/grammar.”

“The writing is kept to a minimum but what there is of it is humorous and composed correctly.”

“I only came across like one grammar error, but you better not have many errors when your posts are all under three sentences.”

“The best part of this blog is the sprinkling of haikus he/she/they post.”

“The quality of writing is good when they do it, but they don’t do enough to rate it against a narrative blog.”

INTANGIBLES - 7.0
“Stupid name for a blog.”

“They have a link to Jorg3, the piece of shit who hijacked my blog. Other than that, nothing else pisses me off.”

“The only major pet peeve I saw was inside jokes. If you make those kinds of jokes, you have to make it funny even if you don't know the people involved.”

“Um? What the heck is the audio file on the profile supposed to be?”

“The sidebar gets a little clunky with all of the political links, but I’m on the same side of the fence on most of those so I don’t mind.”

FREQUENCY - 10.0
“Authors indygirl and Pablo post every day.”

WOULD YOU READ THIS BLOG REGULARLY - 29% Yes
“I liked it, but not enough to add it to my daily reads. It's ... pleasant.”

“I'd check up on it every so often.”

“Way back in 2004 I did stumble upon this blog and read it regularly until I was left with that feeling that one gets after eating Chinese food. I just needed more. And sadly, unlike Chinese food, this blog did not deliver. I was in the mood for moo-shoo and I ended up with the pu pu platter.”

“Already do!”

“No way, Jose.”

“It doesn't grab me enough to blogroll it, but it's not bad.”

“Almost, but not quite.”

OVERALL - 70.1

Say No To Crack

For the second straight week the blog we reviewed received mixed results and almost made it into our current Top-50 list.

Say No To Crack has several fans among our reviewers, but the detractors and the marginally amused kept this blog from scoring too high.

CONTENT – 5.9
"I think the content is great! It's always something interesting and it's never raunchy."

"Some of the material seems recycled or unoriginal. I've seen it done elsewhere."

"While I could see how it could be amusing to some I just don't find it funny."

"Always has something somewhat interesting to catch my eye."

"I am prejudiced against blogs that use photos, news stories and other links as their main content. I'll probably rate this one much lower than those who have no such bias."

"This blog is definitely above average. The blogger is doing a quality job running her site."

"I like this blog. At first, I wasn't sure about the concept. Having people to submit jokes and pictures seems like a little bit of a cop out. As I read more though, it grew on me."

"Very informative."

"This blog is primarily a dumping ground for content that was created elsewhere. Granted, some of this pilfered content is funny, but it's not at all original as it relates to Say No To Crack. There are very few actual ‘original’ pieces of content. I didn't find these original entries amusing enough to consider this blog a humor blog."

"It must be a lot of work to gather the funny links, pictures, videos etc. and post them on a regular basis. I found most of the content mildly funny. I did find some really good links through this site."

"I can see where some of these posts are cute but that’s about it. I like my funny a little more raunchy. I like it nasty. I like it to cross the line. None of this crosses the line. It’s G-rated fun for everyone. If that’s your bag, this is the place."

DESIGN – 6.8
"The design is better than a standard Blogger template but it’s nothing special."

"The design is very bland and boring, but it gets the job done. At least the sidebar isn't cluttered with ads."

"Very neat and professional. I liked it!"

"Minimalist, yet somewhat lacking oomph! However, it does not detract from the content."

"Just a basic template with weak graphics. Definitely nothing to celebrate."

"Clean and simple. My two of my three favorite qualities in a blog design."

QUALITY OF WRITING/GRAMMAR – 6.4
"Posting a picture someone sent you doesn’t compare to all the hundreds of people who slave over their blogs with quality, original works."

"A misplaced comma here and there."

"She knows her way around a sentence. I'd like to see more of what she thinks of the videos and items she slaps up on her blog."

"There isn't much of it, but it's good."

"Basing this on the original content, the grammar isn't great and the spelling errors I found suggest that those who maintain Say No To Crack have no proofreading policy in place."

"There's really not a whole lot of writing (it's mostly funny photos, etc.) but what I do see there is well written."

"There isn't enough writing to give me a definitive sample."

"This is kind of hard to fuck up, because the author writes so little anyway. This is more of a news/odd information blog."

"This little bit of writing doesn’t deserve a lot of points."

INTANGIBLES – 7.5
"Any blog with an about page gets big points from me. I’m neutral about the reader box and the sidebar doesn’t have anything else to be annoyed about. Lots of ways to subscribe to feeds and support the blog. Good job."

"I hate being asked to submit content (jokes, pics, links) to a content-less blog. Who's doing the work, the blogger or me? Maybe my review shouldn't be used since I'm predisposed to hating the entire concept of this blog."

"I really like this blog and I visit it often."

"I hate those ‘members viewing’ boxes. Why would I give a shit who else is reading your blog at the same moment as I am?"

"The blog author's name is Anita Bath. Get it? Anita Bath. That's pretty much all you need to know about the kind of humor here. Lame? Funny?"

"I intensely dislike humor blogs that are light on original content and can't even muster witty commentary on the pilfered content they present. I believe sites like Boing Boing have this genre of Web site covered well enough that Say No To Crack has little reason to exist in it's current form."

"No complaints, a very nice, non-obnoxious blog. I took a couple of points off because most of the content isn't all that funny, which kind of defeats the purpose of this blog. But the idea itself is great."

FREQUENCY – 10.0
"Anita posts every day."

WOULD YOU READ THIS BLOG REGULARLY – 44% Yes
"I'd read this blog a couple more times and then be bored. It's not the bloggers fault. About 99 percent of blogs make me sleepy. I just expect to be fed ice cream through the computer screen."

"If I had more time, I would check in regularly in the hopes of finding more good links. But I don't, so I won't."

"Probably not ... only because nothing stood out."

"Other than how clean the design was, and how short and to the point most of the posts were, I just like a little more excitement than there was to offer on this blog."

"I already do."

"Doubtful. It just didn't grab me by the small hairs and scream, ‘I will not be ignored!’"

"Maybe twice a week."

"No. I can't think of any reason that I should."

"No. I have my own blog to come up with content for."

OVERALL – 71.1

Does This Mean I'm A Grown-Up?

The scores for Does This Mean I'm a Grown-Up? were all over the place, but it still almost made our current Top-50 list.

The first comment from our reviewers probably says more about our mixed review than any other.

CONTENT - 6.5
"It's not a 'funny' blog, but it is well-written and honest. The content is very good but it probably wasn't the best blog to review for humor content."

"I didn't find this blog to be incredibly funny, but it's still a good personal blog. Some 'mommy blog' type of posts are sneaked in here and there, but it's not an everyday thing, thank God."

"Wow. There's just so much ... nothing. It was like reading about the stuff that I should be doing, like laundry or cleaning out the car."

"Normally not my cup of tea, but her prose is imaginative and compelling. Plus she's actually very very funny."

"While the content seems to be fairly well written, I have a hard time relating to mommy blogs."

"While I didn't find the content to be 'laugh-a-minute,' it was strong and interesting enough that I kept reading and was rewarded with a funny bit here and there. Her accounts of daily life are wry and stealthily witty."

"Not bad ... nothing really stood out for me, though."

"Amusing 'slice of life' meets 'mommy blogger.'"

"It was a struggle for me to read through all the posts on the first page. I dug into the archives to give her the benefit of the doubt and to try and find something funny. I wasn't successful."

"Genuinely funny and makes the mundane interesting."

"Nothing really groundbreaking here. Lots of so-so posts about kids, motherhood, and other boring crap. She tries to make it entertaining, but it falls flat with me."

"Everyday topics I can identify with."

"Even the 'popular posts' didn't catch my attention really. And I tried. I really, really tried."

"It's standard parent blogging fare. I didn't discover much original thought."

"I didn't dip into the archives, however what was on the front page was reasonably interesting. At least enough so that I read it all, top to bottom, and didn't start squirming. Even though I found the posts interesting enough, possibly as I'm a parent of a teen and a pre-teen as well, there were only a couple that made me smile and one that made me laugh. Again, if I went into the archives that might change."

DESIGN - 7.7
"The theme is fantastic. It's very attractive and well done. The red-stripe-fade in the middle of the page looks cool, but it also detracts my eyes when I'm trying to read. Everything else is perfect."

"Love the design. It's orgasmic."

"I like the design, although the big ol' picture at the top of the screen might be a bit much."

"The design doesn't match the content. I was expecting a sultrier, sexier read based on the graphics."

"When I first clicked in I thought, 'Oooo!' Quite nice. Dark, but not overwhelming, and really a well balanced design. I'm jealous."

"It's pretty, I'll give it that. Bonus points for no flashing things."

"Unique."

"All the roses aren't my thing, but I won't let that stop me from giving her a nice score. Even though roses don't do it for me, she did a damn good job."

"The layout is good and easy to navigate but I really don't like the theme. It reminds me of a
Nagel poster form the 80s."

"Not a bad looking blog. The header image is attractive but I disliked the dark background, it made reading the posts a bit of a chore."

"Dark color scheme but appealing -- not dark in a gothic, mysterious way."

"Very nice design, but the banner was a little large. I'm also not a big fan of light-colored text on dark backgrounds."

QUALITY OF WRITING/GRAMMAR - 7.2
"The writing is very good and I don't see any spelling or grammar errors."

"Well-written, nothing horribly wrong."

"Her writing style was easy to follow, almost a conversational feel. As for grammar, it all seemed well assembled, but I'm probably not the best judge."

"Not quite what your English teacher from high school might want, but certainly not bad. Her writing style is personal and engaging and the few mistakes I found weren't enough to turn me away."

"Vivid prose without getting sickly cute. She knows when to rein it in."

"Well-written 'life as she sees it,' yet nothing laugh-out-loud hysterical. Still, well-written, nonetheless."

"She has a working knowledge of grammar and punctuation."

"The quality of writing is impeccable but it is still difficult for me to get over the content. It's a well-written blog, just not my thing. Hopefully, she'll understand that without calling me a fatty."

INTANGIBLES - 7.2
"She needs to take off the use of the ALL CAPS and bold in the content. Too much of it detracts the reader from the message/story. I also thought the bold words contained links to old posts or Web sites."

"The only things I could find wrong were that the archive list shrank as you went back in time and there were a few weird characters in some of the posts."

"Sidebar is very clean and mostly ad-free. Posts are a good length. She doesn't post very often though."

"She seems so darn nice that I feel bad about not liking her writing more. I'm sure that says something about me."

"Nice organized sidebar. YAY for the lack of annoying ads!"

"The color scheme annoyed me."

"The bold words suck, and she gets a little long-winded sometimes, but there's not much else to bitch about."

"I just get a good feeling from this site. No ads is certainly a plus."

"Her posting frequency is quite low and, as I already mentioned, I found that the dark background made it hard for me to read the posts. Other than that, I enjoyed the posts that I read at her site."

FREQUENCY - 1.0
"No posts this month. Only six last month. None for the previous two months. Lives are busy but this category only counts for 5 percent of the score."

WOULD YOU READ THIS BLOG ON A REGULAR BASIS - 41% Yes
"There's nothing I don't like about it, but it doesn't really grab me either. Maybe because I'm not a 'mommy' myself. I'd read it in passing though."

"Yeah."

"No, there just wasn't anything there to grab my attention."

"Probably not."

"Yes. It's a good read, even though its not really a humor blog."

"No. She doesn't post often enough, and the writing doesn't compel me to keep checking in for the sporadic updates."

"Maybe two times a week."

"Probably not. While it was nice to visit, I'm not compelled to go back on a regular basis."

"Sure."

"Perhaps, although if she drops off again like she did in November and December I would likely drift away."

"I'm planning on adding it to my sidebar, yes."

"I wouldn't read this blog regularly. It just isn't my type of humor."

"No. However, to be honest, there are plenty of well-written books, autobiographies, and blogs out there that some folks latch onto and some do not. This particular blog did not inspire me to put it in my bookmarks despite it being a 'nice blog.'"

OVERALL - 71.2

raymitheminx

If you’re new to BlogLaughs, please don’t think all of our reviews are negative.

On the other hand, almost all of our reviewers took their claws out when it came to raymitheminx.

Canada’s best and most humourous blog managed one of our lowest scores.

CONTENT – 3.7
“She updates a lot and I love that her cat makes an appearance in a lot of her pictures.”

“What exactly is the content? Raymi is all over the place. She is more photoblog than humor blog. Her content is boring, insipid rantings and ravings from an extremely immature mind. Who wants to read her IM messages? She is not funny and the humor she attempts to provide now and then is forced. Plus, 499 pictures of Raymi is not exactly what I call content. Delving into her archives, she places a lot of topless pics on her blog. I suppose she needed to draw an audience. Her writing wasn't going to do it, that's for sure. Things such as "some crazy bitch is posing as me on myspace!!!!!!! go tell her off please." are so horribly immature.”

“Maybe I'm just old fashioned, but aside from pictures and web design, and how she looks young and hip and slightly edgy, I'm not sure if she has anything compelling to say.”

“I didn't find this blogger to be entertaining as much as I found her to remind me of my 23 year old, overly-entitled, whiney cousin. In my head, as I read this blogger's words, my cousin's voice was in my head reading it as a narrator.”

“Maybe I am just too old to appreciate this blog? I don't know. I have tried to understand the appeal, I really have. I just don't get it.”

“Anytime I come across one of these famous ‘award-winning’ blogs, I try to approach them with the assumption that, in some way, they're worthy of an award. Sometimes, I am rewarded for thinking such things. In the case of raymitheminx, though, all I can say is 'Holy Christ, WTF?' If this is Canada's Top Blogger, perhaps the US needs to annex and subsequently destroy the whole country. I dug through her archives, trying to find some hint as to why raymitheminx would be, in any way, a 'top humor blog' and ended up sorely disappointed. It seems to me that the site gets hits strictly because Raymi is willing to take her top off now and then, not because of her writing. Her posts are excruciatingly hard to read and 80 percent of the time they contain absolutely pointless drivel. Personally, I'm not willing to sift through mounds of worthless crap just to get to a shaky picture of some Canadian chick's flat chest.”

“There were a couple of funny gems in the writing, but my scoring is weighing heavily on the nice pictures.”

“Merely mentioning that you saw a movie does not a review make.”

“I don't think her blog is relatable for folks over 29. As it is, she's pushing that unenthusiastic, hostility point that most immature Emo kids pass at what? 19?”

DESIGN – 3.9
“I'm not a big fan of large images tiled as a background or wickedly long sidebars, but I realize she's trying to do her own thing here and I'm cool with that.”

“Hold on, I'm still waiting for my eyes to quit rolling back in their sockets in loathing.”

“Like her content, her Web page is all over the place. Going to her page was like a bad acid trip. Her sidebar is cluttered with so much garbage! Ads, thinks that blink. Ridiculous pics. More pics of herself. More ads. It's probably the worst Web site design I have ever seen. Her header, like the rest of her blog, smacks of her self-love trip. Oh, and lest we forget, the Pepto Bismol pink with the magenta writing shoved all the way over to the left in one long tedious column. Yeah. That's appealing.”

“I like the background, and the colors work well with this girl's personality. The only thing I hope she changes is how the text is aligned. Widen that shit up!”

“I hate everything about it. It makes my head hurt. I think my eyes are bleeding.”

“The sidebar is a mess. Since there are no labels for the sections of her blog, I thought the blogroll was some nutso inside joke or weird ass advertisement.”

"Despite the relatively attractive (assumedly original) artwork which adorns the background of the page (and the header), the page design as a whole is pretty basic and the page can be annoying to navigate. While I'm of the opinion that the sidebar exists more for the blog owner to get around to places than for the blog reader to do so, I still found myself annoyed by the jumble of absolute crap in the sidebar on raymitheminx.”

“I think she changes thing up quite a bit, but it’s God-awful ugly and not very functional.”

QUALITY OF WRITING/GRAMMAR – 2.6
“It's horribly written … if you can even call it writing.”

“One rarely sees such a callous disregard for punctuation and capitalization.”

“It's a bit rambling at times. However, I'm also a fan of blogs that carry a conversational tone, which contributed to my score.”

“This being my first Bloglaughs review, I didn't want to come across as 'too harsh' but this chick seriously comes off as an idiot. She uses absolutely no punctuation and misspells (intentionally, perhaps) way too many words for my liking. I also reiterate my comment on her content -- her writings are mostly pointless.”

“Her prose is nothing to write home about.”

“The lack of capitalization and punctuation makes for a slightly annoying read.”

“What does this chick have against commas? The random all caps words are more annoying than effective in keeping the reader interested. e.e. cummings called and wants his capital letters back.”

“Her writing is alright, but she makes little sense. Her grammar consists of a lot of made up words, abbreviations and a complete disregard for punctuation. It reads like a child or a very angst ridden teenager wrote it. A teenager that dropped out of junior high, I might add. Sample? ‘the highlight of the nite was giving the finger to this girl's throw-away camera behind her and her two poseur friends fil was all WHO ARE YOU FLIPPING OFF i said dude they won't know until they develop the film i'm a coward like that.’ Yes. Let's hear it for the run on sentences!”

“The only person I knew who could get away with the ‘no capitalization’ thing was e.e. cummings, and well, this blogger is no e.e. cummings.”

“This blog would be much better if she just posted pictures and didn’t write at all.”

INTANGIBLES – 1.2
“For some reason, I had a really tough time trying to access the archives.”

“She has millions of fans I'm sure, so my negative comments won't make a difference.”

“I found it amusing that this blogger would mention on their 'about me' blog her suspicions on how she won best diarist because Dooce didn't mention it on her blog. I feel I have somehow tainted Heather Armstrong by even referencing this blogger and Dooce in the same sentence.”

“I don't understand why people read this. This is the blog equivalent of projectile vomiting.”

“I liked the pictures, but it took some time for them all to load. I'd suggest narrowing the scope of the main page and using the archives feature to your advantage. All the GIF's in the sidebar didn't help things either.”

“Normally, I’m all for posting pictures of one’s crotch. This time, I don’t think so.”

“I've heard of her before … back when her loyal followers were stumping for votes for the ‘Best Diarist’ award she ended up winning. I didn't understand it than and I don't understand it now. Maybe it's all the pictures of her?”

“Everything about this page annoys me. She strikes me as the type of person I wouldn't save from a fire. Her face is even irritating. I like her cat cartoon at the bottom of the page. The one that vomits on her face.”

“This blog has won awards? How many people can this chick afford to blackmail?”

“There are hints in her writings that she may be playing a character and the whole ‘stupid girl’ act is just that: an act but I don't buy it. Even at her best (and these posts are very hard to come by), she still comes off as a self-absorbed drunk with no clear concept of punctuation and a shaky handle on reality. Seriously, if this is the kind of blogging that's required to achieve great numbers of readers, I'll gladly toil in obscurity.”

“The whole thing is one big pet peeve. I’m sure I’m not the only one giving her a zero here.”

FREQUENCY – 10.0
“Like it or not, raymitheminx posts everyday.”

WOULD YOU READ THIS BLOG REGULARLY – 9% Yes
“Probably not. It's good, but it's not exactly my thing. I'd probably hop over there every once in a while though.”

“Hell no.”

“No way in hell. I wish I hadn't read it for this review.”

“NE-VER!”

“Dear God, I'd rather shove a hot curling iron up my own ass, sans lube.”

“I won't be reading this blog regularly. It wasn't bad though, and I suggest others to have a look, because I can see it having some appeal for certain people -- just not me.”

OVERALL – 45.7

Tiny Voices in my Head

The cumulative numbers for Tiny Voices in my Head were pretty respectable, but some of the comments were downright nasty … and not all of them were used.

Mixed review? Yes.

Love it or hate it? You bet.

This blog caught a little bit of everything, getting every number from 0-10 in most categories. Tiny Voices in my Head obviously meant more to some readers than it did to others.

CONTENT – 6.3
“Dawn is witty and engaging and I never fail to be entertained by her blog. Oh yeah, she's funny as hell too.”

“There are approximately 8,437,298 MySpace sites done by little girls with Hello Kitty wallpaper that are more interesting than this site.”

“I love the personal nature of this blog. Dawn seems like a real sweetheart and it comes across in her work.”

“The content is pretty mediocre. There's nothing very unique about her blog, just reading the posts that are right there. I'm sure if I were to dig through her archives, I'd see more creativity.”

“I didn't even crack a smile while reading this blog, much less find anything funny.”

“The dual-comments insanity aside, this is one of my favorite ‘personal’ blogs on the Internet.”

“I read all the entries on the first page and wasn't inspired. And in a show of fairness, I clicked her archives at random, settling on the month of October 2004. After reading all of the posts from that month, my opinion is still neutral.”

“This is good stuff. If there were a female version of me, this would probably be it. Or close to it.”

“I just couldn't connect with the content.”

"It's a real bloggy blog. Some days are better than others."

“I have seen Webmiztris around the Web here and there. We frequent the same blogs, but admittedly, I had not visited hers before. Her blog content is not what I would call funny, so much as conversational and matter of fact. She is not intentionally trying to be amusing. She simply tells a story. If you laugh at the end, great. If you don't, so be it. I actually like that kind of writing.”

“Dawn’s blog is naked truth. It’s not always funny, or smart, or anything, but it’s always Dawn. I like that.”

DESIGN – 7.5
“She has probably the absolute greatest looking blog I've seen. It's very easy to read and the layout is the best.”

“It's not the greatest design, but it's easy to navigate and read. She always has a hot photo of herself in the ‘about me’ section, which would make even a bad design look good, so I have to factor that in my scoring.”

“Her blog design is cute, fits the theme of her page. I can only assume she designed it herself, because her advertisment asking 'do you want a new blog template' leads to her e-mail address. The blog is very clean and neat. She's got everything all rolled up like most Web designers do.”

“It's not that bad, but what's with the two places to comment? The calling thing seems like an invitation to stalkers and other psychos. I can't condone that.”

“Love the header, but it's a bit big. I don't like having to scroll down just to see the first post. I also don't care for the drop-downs in the sidebar. Just list everything and get rid of the ads. But it's a nice design and easy on the eyes.”

“I love the theme and the main graphic a lot. It’s a personal touch for a personal blog. I like it.”

QUALITY OF WRITING/GRAMMAR – 6.5
“Her writing style is very suitable for what she has to say, and even long entries are a great read because of her breezy prose. About the only thing that bothers me a bit is that she injects an 'LOL' on occasion, which is completely unnecessary and disrupts the rhythm of her writing. Her blog is funny already and doesn't need a laugh track.”

“Ooooh! It's the angry goth girl with dyed black hair and a blue streak, talking a blue streak because she can, because, like, wow, I mean, oh my God, it's the Internet, and we can say whatever we want out here and, like, Mom and Dad can't rag on us about it, you know?”

“I can't give a decent score to anyone who uses the word ‘redonkulous.’”

“The writing is simple, no grammar problems that I noticed and nothing that really stood out as obtrusive. However, she has a whole lot of one-sentence paragraphs. Why? It might work for the whole conversational tone, and perhaps it is meant for dramatic pause now and then. But, every single post? Maybe it's my own personal quirk. I don't know.”

“Again, good stuff. Thoughts are nicely broken up into small, easy-to-read paragraphs. Lots of gratuitous profanity. I like that!”

“Dawn has a casual writing style that fits a personal blog.”

INTANGIBLES – 7.4
“LOVE Dawn, HATE that she has comments running on both Haloscan and Blogger. Why? It's a pain in the ass for readers to have to monitor two threads of comments, and I'm sure it's a pain in the ass for her as well. Dawn has a lot of fans that love her blog, why is she punishing us like this? On the good side, she publishes her entire entries in her webfeed, which is always appreciated. Too bad she buries the link to her feed in a non-descript FeedBurner icon. If she used the more recognizable orange webfeed icon and didn't bury it, I'm sure she would have more than 21 people subscribed.”

“She can have a 7 from me because I don't find her overly annoying.”

“Nice avatar, but I'd like to see a little more skin. I'd like this blog a lot better if my blog was linked in the sidebar!”

“I neither like nor dislike her blog.”

“Having two sets of comments is terrible. I’m not real crazy about the sidebar, but it’s not bad. I don’t like having to make extra clicks, but I guess it’s a necessity.”

FREQUENCY – 9.0
"Dawn averages between four and five posts a week."

WOULD YOU READ THIS BLOG REGULARLY – 52% Yes
“Already do. Love her.”

“Probably not … nothing stood out for me.”

“Not even if the only other available reading on the planet were Tom Green's autobiography.”

“Yep. Aleady do.”

“I probably wouldn't read this blog on a regular basis.”

“I don't find it compelling or entertaining or enlightening enough for me to incorporate reading it as part of my regular blog reading habits.”

“Yes, love to.”

“Overall, it's just another ordinary blog.”

“Yes, I would read this blog regularly.”

“Perhaps, just because we have mutual friends. Would I die if I missed a day? Probably not.”

OVERALL – 74.5

Ingrown Brain Stem

Ingrown Brain Stem drew a couple of fans and a couple of detractors, but most of our reviewers were relatively indifferent about this site.

"I can see why a lot of people like this blog. I just don't get it."

We didn't get a lot of comments to go with our ratings this week, but most of them had this same apologetic quality to them.

CONTENT – 6.4
“He keeps his posts relatively short, which is nice. There's nothing I hate more than bloggers who go on and on and on. And he's pretty funny. I can relate to a lot of what he has to say.”

“It looks like a lot of work goes into finding all the things he writes about, but it's a bit of overload. I prefer blogs that go into more detail about one or two topics, rather than posts with a whole mess of topics. I also like blogs with personal stories, and I only came across one of those; the one about his grandmother.”

“Nothing about this blog stood out for me.”

“Is it me, or are we seeing a lot of people who are utilizing links in their blogs and passing it off as being original material. Yes, once in awhile, a link to a news story is fine. Some original content around that news story, great! But, one sentence with a link? Oh Lord. I was so bored. I can surf the web on my own, thank you very much.”

“My score would have been much higher if there weren't posts like Ass Rape Isn't Always Funny. He's wrong. It's never funny. That aside I dig his cynical and sarcastic wit and he had me laughing out loud quite a few times. I almost fell off my chair reading Jesus of Zombia.”

“I think this guy is funny, but the site just doesn’t do it for me.”

DESIGN – 6.7
“Well done. I like the zombie motif. I would have went with a 10, but there were some items along the side panel that made no sense to me.”

“It's pretty basic, but it's easy to read, which is all that really matters to me.”

“I suppose it's fine. It's neat, organized with a relatively clean sidebar, though, I would suggest rolling up that blogroll. And, that header is kind of obscure, though I think it is a part of the whole Zombie theme. Maybe I'm too old to get it.”

“Clean and simple.”

“Relatively simple design, easy to read.”

QUALITY OF WRITING/GRAMMAR – 7.2
“When he really writes, the writing is well-done. Pretty good grammar too.”

“I didn't see come across any grammar errors, but I also wasn't wowed with any of the writing.”

“I didn't notice any major errors.”

“This is hard to apply a number to because most of the content is not original. The parts that he does write are cute at best. Yes, I realize that the word ‘cute’ will probably irritate the author, but frankly, Scarlett … yeah.”

INTANGIBLES – 5.5
“No pet peeves here.”

“He links to the Animal Rescue site, so he has my heart right there. The sidebar is long as hell, but at least it's nice and neat. He just seems like the kind of guy I'd really like if I knew him in real life.”

“One point for the shitty blog award proudly displayed in the sidebar. Five points for the animal rescue site logo/link. Minus one for the Amazon crap. Minus one for the genuflections, because self-praise sucks ass.”

“His side bar is too messy.”

“The profile picture freaks me out but not near as much as the sidebar. It’s neat and organized but most of it is unnecessary. It makes the whole site feel awkward.”

FREQUENCY – 6.0
“Copygodd posts about three times a week.”

WOULD YOU READ THIS BLOG REGULARLY – 34% Yes
“He has a good take on a variety of topics, but it's not quite funny enough for me. I'd check on it now and again, but I wouldn't add it to my favorites.”

“Actually I do read this one every so often.”

“We read some of the same blogs, but I don’t read his. It's OK but just doesn’t do anything for me.”

“Yes.”

“No, though, it isn't the worst one you have made us review.”

OVERALL – 70.9

Best Week Ever

After compiling this week’s reviews, it is a good bet most of our reviewers would have had a higher opinion of Best Week Ever earlier last year. It appears many of you have grown weary of the celebrity snark sites.

CONTENT – 6.1
“I am sure this appeals to some, but I am very weary of celebrity pop culture Web sites. There is so much to look at here I don't know where to start. If I had just happened upon this site on my own I would have kept right on going.”

“Loved all the links to lots of cools stuff that I wasn't aware of.”

“Not exactly my thing. I hear more about Britney, Paris, Lindsey and the like more than I care to as it is, so I probably wouldn't visit this blog regularly, but people who are interested in that sort of thing would probably really like this blog. It's kinda like People magazine in blog form.”

“Painfully forced humor coupled with television goodness and a whole assload of YouTube movies which can be seen on YouTube. Why sort through 4,345 ads to see them when you can simply go there, without the eyesore?”

“This is what happens when bloggers sellout and get paid for ‘writing.’ I loved Michelle Collins’ blog [You Can’t Make It Up] but she rarely posts anymore. I assume she and the other contributors post for pennies here instead. Too bad.”

“If you like this stuff, it’s better to subscribe through Bloglines so you can avoid the ads and horrible design.”

“Regular, timely posts, I will immediately commence peppering conversations with the word, ‘robo-vagines.’ And I have promptly passed around the ‘Box in a Box’ YouTube a bit.

“It's just regurgitated crap from other blogs with idiotic comments. Nothing about this blog is funny.”

“They hit more often than miss.”

DESIGN – 4.1
“It's easy to read, but nothing spectacular. And the sidebar is a bit overwhelming. Do people really click on tag clouds and categories? I never do. They always seem like such a waste of space and they make the sidebar look so crammed. And of course, there's a shitload of ads. Ugh.”

“Too cluttered, too much to see. My eyes, my eyes! This is freaking my ADD out!”

“What design? It reminded me of one of those refrigerator magnet games, you know, the one with all the words just strewn everywhere? Except the magnets were mixed up by a 5-year-old. No, nevermind. That would probably make more sense to me.”

"Oh God, not another mediocre celeb-u-tainment blog."

"Holy shit the sidepanel is cluttered. Who has time to sort through all of that?"

“It's too damn busy. The pink font annoys me.”

“There is just too much going on. Too many different fonts/colors/sizes. It looks like a big jumbled mess.”

“The design wouldn’t be all that bad without all the ads and other nonsense.”

QUALITY OF WRITING/GRAMMAR – 5.9
“I don't see any problems with the writing and grammar, but I don't exactly find it all that exciting either.”

“It's fine. It ain't Shakespeare but he could get a gig with People magazine probably.”

“What quality? Everything was taken from somewhere else! Of course the grammar is perfecto! It was taken from other sources! The parts that the author does write, however, are fine. Not Rhodes Scholar fine, but grade school at best.”

“Good use of grammar and punctuation. Should spell check a bit before hitting publish. However, the writers of this site do know their way around a sentence. Currently, I'm enamored with the following: ‘Looks like it’s that time of the month … time to go to rehab.’”

“The grammar is correct enough to get the vapid ideas across.”

“The writing style is so so.”

INTANGIBLES – 3.3
“Ads. Lack of original content. Broken links. Pics that don't work, in the header no less! A blogroll that reads like the Who's Who of the superficial, malcontent and unoriginal. Ugh. I can't find anything redeeming about this blog, except for the little X in the right hand corner of the screen. Here's a 1, just for allowing me to escape.”

“Blogs like these are so impersonal because there is no ‘about’ the blogger/author. You have no idea who's writing it. I have a hard time getting into blogs like this.”

“Is this guy a professional? Look at the bottom of the site. Does he work for MTV or VH1?”

“I am just so burned out on stuff like this. I spent a lot of time going though this blog, but frankly five minutes in I was exhausted.”

“Anything that has to do with VH-1’s Best Week Ever automatically loses credibility with me.”

“I was in a shitty mood before I read this blog. Now I'm ready to gouge my eyes out.”

“Could they add just a few more tags? I think they missed ‘and’ ‘it’ and ‘the.’”

“I think the concept works much better as a TV show than a blog.”

FREQUENCY – 10.0
“Best Week Ever features several posts each day.”

WOULD YOU READ THIS BLOG REGULARLY – 48% Yes
“No, I read too much about celebrities now.”

“If I happened upon it in my web surfing, I'd read it, but I wouldn't blogroll it or add it to my Bloglines.”

“God, no.”

“Yep. I subscribe through Bloglines.”

“Let's play this by ear, shall we? I've put it in my bookmarks and promise to ‘glance’ at it every couple of days. Fair enough?”

“Hell, no!”

“Yes, but only because it's always up-to-date.”

“I might now, but only for the purpose of finding new music.”

OVERALL – 69.2

The Life and Times of RevRee

The sexual banter that often highlights The Life and Times of RevRee brought out a little bit of that in our reviewers this week.

[Apparently, one of our reviewers really likes green eyes.]

RevRee managed pretty good scores in every category except frequency, setting a relatively high mark for the first review of 2007.

CONTENT – 8.1
"Great content! I don't see any boring ‘I woke up and had a cup of coffee and then I took the dog out to take a shit’ lame-ass type of posts. I like that. She doesn't blog all that often, but when she does, she rocks."

"Hand porn? I'm on board with that concept."

"Even though I don't relate to what she says on many things, she's a lot of fun."

"A good blog makes me want to jump right in and comment. A bad blog makes me want to watch TV. I'll definitely be commenting on this blog in the future."

"I read (almost) every single post on this blog and barely cracked a smile. She has a few sentences that are amusing but even that was pushing it. She does mention in her profile that she often ‘slips in sexual innuendo,’ which can be funny in the right context (self deprecation for example) but here it doesn't quite work. I guess I never caught her at the right moment."

"It's a really nice blog, even though it can be a bit too girly for my taste. The frankness is good, especially on sexual matters."

"How convenient that Rev just did a post in which she picked her favorite posts of the year! I seemed to like the posts better in which she told stories that gave insights into her life."

"She's a funny girl. And she's sassy. I like sassy. She's somewhat provocative in a fun way."

"This is my kind of blog. She comes off as smart, sexy, and funny. I can’t wait to dig deep into her archives."

DESIGN – 8.5
"I like the look of this blog. Very clean and easy on the eyes."

"I like the header image a lot ... very nice colors. Black text on a white background is always very easy to read and the sidebar is neat and tidy. Perfect!"

"Simple, clean and easy. What more can you ask for?"

"I like the lay of the land. Well done."

"It's clean an easy to read. I'm not blown away, but neither am I nauseous."

"The design is clean and neat. I don’t normally like green, but I imagine she has green eyes. That makes my cock hard."

QUALITY OF WRITING/GRAMMAR – 7.3
"I really like her writing. She reminds me of myself. The post about ‘How Not to Pick up a Chick at a Bar 101’ Oh yeah, I can totally relate! That one had me rolling!"

"Please use the spell check."

"I saw a few spelling/grammar errors and the writing feels a bit stunted at times."

"I wish it was more ‘different’ but it's good writing and she is who she is."

"As bloggers go, her grammar is pretty good. She had a good amount of grammar mistakes, but often times she'll use a comma wrong in one instance, and then use it right the next in a similar situation. This leads me to believe she merely needs to proof read better, which is why I'm cutting her a break."

"She's a good writer. I like her style, although she uses exclamation marks like she gets paid for every one."

"She’s a good conversational writer. Not everything is perfect, but I don’t care. It’s a blog for God’s sake."

INTANGIBLES – 6.3
"I can't find anything I don't like about this blog."

"I had to take a point off for no Tom Jones references in the Sex Bomb post."

"Good writer. I'm really surprised she's still single, actually."

"If you allow comments on your blog a chat box is superfluous, not to mention just plain annoying. And what's with the voting for best movie of the year? I can see it on Pajiba but here it makes no sense."

"No pet peeves for me."

"Nice tagline."

"I don’t care for the chat box, but that’s just a slight deduction."

"Dude, she has pop-up ads! That’s unforgivable!"

"I really wish she would post more often. It looks like she recently moved and changed jobs, so perhaps that explains the recent dearth of posts."

FREQUENCY - 4.0
"RevRee has averaged almost two posts a week the past six months. It’s been more like once a week lately, but we’ll go with the average."

WOULD YOU READ THIS BLOG REGULARLY – 74% Yes
"Yes, I added it to my Bloglines."

"No."

"Yes, I already do."

"Oh, hell no!"

"God, yes."

"Maybe."

"Yes. Thanks for another good one."

"Yes. RevRee is perfect for Bloglines because you never know when she’s going to post. It's a good day when she does."

OVERALL – 87.2