Studio Tour of Chris Miles' Blog Veteran Dissent

As a whole, the blog seems to function well. It is unified by a single topic, anti-war sentiment, while other topics such as existentialism, are woven in. The blog is primarily about Chris's experience as a veteran, his views on war, and existentialism. Materials from other veterans, such as videos or written articles, help lend Chris's arguments or views credibility and bring readers' attention to the fact that war affects more than just a few people. I find this fascinating because I have no experience as a veteran, and I have no formal knowledge of existentialism, so this blog can offer something new for me.
It looks like Chris is also using this blog to help himself process what he has learned regarding existentialism. There are a few journal type posts, and almost every post written by Chris has at least a hint of his own views on the subject of that post, some more than others. However, I found it slightly confusing at times because this distinction between Chris's thoughts/views and those of the existentialist philosophers that he was paraphrasing was not always clear. In several posts, mostly about Nietzsche, I had trouble discerning whether Chris was asserting a statement of his own, or whether that statement was meant to be what the philosopher determined. Sometimes a paragraph or post will begin by simply stating what so-and-so thought, but then, the non-committal narrative/writing style made it tough for me to tell where that person's thoughts left off, and Chris's began. Clearer wording, and maybe more use of personal pronouns, might help distinguish the two more. For example, in the Critique of Chrisitan Approach to LifeMarch 28th post on Nietzsche and his critique of a "Christian approach to life," I cannot tell whether the 3-5th sentences are thoughts Nietzsche developed, or whether they are Chris's or whether or not, if they are Nietzsche's, Chris agrees with them. Since, according to the rest of his blog, Chris says he can know only the "truth of (his) experience," I think it would be good if he could give readers a plainer statement that would let them know his views on the information he is sharing.
However, in several posts, Chris does a terrific job of synchronizing his views and telling readers the views of others. One example of this is the March 13th post Consequences of the Absurd. Chris is doing an admirable job of relating his personal views in the blog, especially in this post, it just seems that it sometimes could be made clearer who the speaker is of some of the statements.
One thing about this blog's unity, is that it is very centered on Chris and his experience, but he is wanting to impact others' experiences and defend what he sees as right by using his own views and experiences. The blog's premise, as I understand it, is that the war should be ended, and that war (especially this one) is wrong. However, this seems to be inconsistent with existentialism's basic premise, as outlined in the blog, that there is no absolute truth or standards by which we may judge truth outside of the individual. For me as a reader, I cannot see how the idea that individual experience is the only truth, and that humans have no authority over other humans since there is no absolute truth, can support a call for the war's end. It does support the view that the war is not justifiable according to the view of individuals, but at the same time, it enables the argument that perhaps the individual who sees the war as wrong has a view that is not justifiable. How can something, like the war, be called "wrong" if there is no "right" or "wrong" if everything is relative and there is no overarching standard of morality?
But, as I mentioned earlier, I am no expert in existentialism, but just from reading the posts, this is my understanding of it.
Some strong points of the blog are its unity to topic, its many posts (which requires lots of effort and time!), the amount of time Chris has been able to keep the blog up, and the great visual effects. The well-chosen, symbolic images are excellently related to the blog's content. The organization of the posts and categorization is also well-done, and easy to use.

Studio Tour of Christa Smith's Blog Weirdoftheday

Weirdoftheday's subject matter is perfectly suited to a blog. The main blog topic of weird events is able to hold the varied subject matter of individual posts together well. Christa's posts are all related somehow to her topic. I found the unusual stories to be interesting. The length of the posts was also well-suited to their content - they were just long enough to inform and entertain, but not too long to be boring. The sources used for the stories are also well-chosen, and varied enough to be provide the readers with stories they probably would not have found otherwise. I like the way this blog is like a hybrid between a filter blog and a topic blog.
The main reason for this blog seems to be to inform readers of weird, random happenings, and to give readers that information through Christa's perspective. She does this well, with an entertaining style. However, I found myself wishing for more of her in the blog - more of her humor, her interpretation of the events. Some posts, likeSkepticism seem a little too dry, and could be spiced up a bit with more of Christa's creativity, perhaps.
I also thought the visual images used with the posts are great! They relate very well to the blog's content, and encourage reader interest. When I saw the picture of the cat, I immediately was interested in the story. I thought the huge list of categories were a bit confusing and intimidating though. When I saw all 20 or so of them, I almost wrote them all off because I knew I'd have no time to read them all. However, since there are only one-three posts in each category, it doesn't take long at all to read them. Anyway, it might be better to condense the categories, clean them up a little. For example, "Animals" could include "Birds" and "Cats." The blogroll ("Associates") seems a little lacking. I would think that there would be tons of other blogs out there reporting the weird and random, which, if linked to, could possibly both increase Christa's blog readership and establish more connections with other bloggers which may lead to future discussions.
The overall layout of the blog lends itself nicely to the tone of the blog - it looks professional enough to be credible, but informal enough to be fun. The lime green color adds the fun, wacky element while the black adds the more factual, reporter feel.
One other thing that I noticed was that the first post Greetings! and the About Page contained almost identical content. Condensing the two would seem to make more sense to me, so that as a reader, I am not required to read the same thing twice. Overall, as a whole, this blog project looks tight. Its posts are fairly well organized, they all pertain well to the blog's topic, and the blog was interesting and entertaining to read.

Casey Fisher's What's on the Shelf?

What's on the Shelf is hilarious. Maybe this is just because I am a literature/movie fan, but I honestly enjoyed reading almost every post. As a whole, I think the blog works. It is really not a topic- driven blog, but neither is it a personal journal blog. The variety of the posts' subject matter is entertaining, but also rather fragmentative since there doesn't seem to be a very strong topic that can bring everything together. The stated topic is "what's on the shelf," but as that could be almost anything, it doesn't seem to be something that can unify posts.
Having said that, I think that the variety offered in this blog is one of its strongest points. The extreme differences between movies and books that this blog reviews is wonderfully entertaining. X-Men and Seven Brides for Seven Brothers?! Wonderful! The 'snarky' way Casey reviews these is very amusing and fun to read. Her portrayal of her personal likes/dislikes is clear, original, and interesting.But, to get back to the 'blog as a whole' thing, I think that the current organization is not user-friendly. There are 7categories (Books, Classics, Movies, New Movies, Music, Plays, and Uncategorized), and their order does not seem to make much sense. Having 3 categories for movies seems a little weird. Instead of having Movies and New Movies, why not just have Classics and New Movies? And, maybe this is just my personal preference, but I think that having posts overlap in categories wastes readers' time. Some of the posts were not categorized as I thought they would be. They Don't Make 'Em Like They Used To, a post about leading male film actors in
the 50s, is categorized not under Classics, but Movies. But It Won't Go Away, a post about "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers," is categorized under both Classics and Movies. Cleaning categories up a bit would seem to help readers find what they want, and at this point, because there aren't too many posts, it seems rather odd to have a category for only a few posts when those posts also show up in other categories.
The Tag section was really crowded and if I was looking for something in there, it would take me forever. Maybe another Tag format could be used? Also, it looked like
the Blogroll could be more developed to include links about plays (if kept as a category), and a few more about movies or books.
A Refound Favorite is also categorized in both Classics and Plays. Considering that only the posts on Seven Brides for Seven Brothers and Death of a Salesman are in the Classics category, and both of those posts could be moved elsewhere, maybe the Classics category could be eliminated. And, the Classics category as it currently is, could mean classic music, films, plays, books, etc. I think better organization would be helpful for navigating around the blog.
I also noticed that a significant number of YouTube videos posted to the blog were disabled. I'm not sure why they were disabled, but if it was deliberately done, it might be a good idea to just remove them from the blog completely. I know I was really frusterated when they wouldn't play, and I was expecting them to...especially since there were not just one or two that wouldn't play, but like five or six.
I thought that another strength of this blog was its good use of images. The pictures of Depp and the Cheshire cat are great, and really promoted my interest in the posts.
So overall, I think the blog might be able to be tightened up a bit. The individual posts are fine though. They could easily stand on their own, but since they are a part of the blog, it would be nice if the overall organization and layout of the blog complemented them.

Grade Contract

I am writing to earn 200 points. I hope 'dinner' was good - there was a lot to eat.