I'm not talking here about actual hugely successful blogs. If I was half as insightful as Colby Cosh, or as dedicated to uncovering events as Kate McMillan or as widely read as "Inkless" Paul Wells, or the investigative sleuth of Steve Janke then it would be another story. Blogs like that aren't even worth noticing. If 2 years from now I can total the 60 comments that Kate received from this minor post alone I'd be gangbusters. I'm talking about some of the blogs I've stumbled upon far more comment-laden than my own. This bothers me, because these blogs are vapid, brainless, and...well, I'll comment on each:
- "what was I thinking?":
Every entry in this blog is in multiple colours (usually red and black and whatever else is handy), odd fonts and formatting, like a really bad attempt at freestyle poetry. There are some relatively decent rants on a few entries, but in general its a hard to read hackjob. Comments? 6,10,13,12,16,14,15,13,16. Ack! - The Bupner Report: A Real Canadian Speaks:
Just to show that this isn't going to be politically biased, this blog is nothing but an exclaimation mark proceeded headline, a weird picture, a 30 word description, and then nothing else. It looks like every story is the end of the world, regardless of its interest or impact. Comments? 1,1,1,6,2,3,0,3,0,3. - Silleygirl Erin's LiveJournal:
Including a LiveJournal or MSN blog almost shouldn't count, its just too damned easy. Huge paragraphs which say nothing, kitty-pictures showing "current moods", and a refusal to use the <Shift> key when it might come in handy. Its all there. Comments? 0,1,1,2,2,1,3,0,2,1.
Finally... - Le Revue Gauche:
What rundown of "why the hell is this popular" blogs would be complete without Edmonton's "anarchist libertarian" Eugene Plawiuk? I mean really. The excessive sloganeering in the multiple title fields, a complete lack of certainty which parts of his posts are him and which parts are quotes, the spam window that popus up when you load the site, the page-hanging that develops 3 seconds after the page is seemingly about to load, and the inexplicable hard drive churning that awaits any computer who dares visit the page. There aren't a lot of comments on this page, but I know he gets a fair number most of the time. And the total number of comments on the current frontpage of his site (1 comment over 6 posts) isn't any better than mine (3 comments over 18 posts).
