The guest post program now over with I am glad to be back to a more active posting schedule as I have caught up with my reading and my reviews and my organization. Hopefully my plan for reinvention into a more reputable reviewing blog with intellectual bling to bedazzle almost every publisher to ignore my geographical status will work, but I do not rule the possibility to work extra hard on my reviews.
While we are on the subject of reinvention I am announcing the obvious, mainly the slightly improved look. In addition to the template I introduced months ago I commissioned an artist acquaintance of mine to create buttons for a genre segregated review sections. This is more or less an experiment with both aesthetics and functionality.
Time will tell whether it is a good idea or not, depending on the volume of reviews I organize within these categories and the readers’ own opinion via a poll after a trial period. As an addition I will include an official header with the blog’s name and logo, which I find simplistic and straight to the point.
I may be a bit behind on adding a page with the authors I enjoy and recommend reading and following through the Internet, but I do hope to fulfill that goal in due time.
The reason I have been negligent of that is simply because I became sucked in Twitter, which is a whole new experience that needs acclimatization to. I opted for an account there despite my reservations simply because it’s quick with news that can be potentially useful for my reviewer undertakings as well as for my fiction endeavors. For all interested to hear me text short nonsense and updates, here is my profile link.
Google Reader has been immensely helpful with stalking in great detail the blogging scene and boost the speed, with which I learn things. To be honest I am not sure why I postponed using this organizer for so long. As with all things superbly useful I am quite addicted beyond the point of being able to function. I am still working on the idea to create a group on the Book Blogs social network dedicated to “Reviewer Time”, which I think will become my longest feature that will grow to fill the whole calendar year, starting next February after a due break.
I am aware that perhaps not many bloggers share their goals and development of such, but then again I do have a terrible memory, so I might be mistaken. Nevertheless I am quite happy to do these progress reports for I feel as if I have signed an official contract and hold and obligation to bring these plans to fruition. It’s a great strategy for self-motivation.
Anyway, not to leave this post be entirely centered around me I would love to know what you think about publicly stating your intentions and goals for your own blog in this post’s comment section.
4 comments:
Shoot for the moon and even if you miss, you will land among the stars. I like the new genre art, it is simple yet original.
Every so often I do a "State of the Blog" post that usually entails my thoughts on the blog and my motivation for doing the things I do or even creating the blog in the first place. These often include a bit of me begging for people to bear with me while I try to improve on my reviews. What they do not tend to include is my goals or intentions towards the future.
Even now, so soon after creating the blog--which was born at the end of August--I am already seeing things that I can improve on and when I notice these things and make a decision towards them, I will usually post right then. At other points I will not say anything about a new feature until I do a test-run on it. Which is what happened with Overly Critical, a weekly opinion piece that is barely critical at all.
I began work on a recommendations page the other day, but scrapped it after about an hour's work. I will work on that some more in the future. Right now my focus is on improving content and trying to get the word out about the blog in the least annoying way possible.
I have no plans to work on design, mostly because Wordpress.com is rather limited in that regard, but also because I rather like the extremely simplistic look of the blog.
~ James
The place looks great. And I've added you on twitter... but if I see you spending too much time there, I'll chew you out, okay?
cjh
@ Alec: Yes, exactly. I still see that there some kinks that have to do with the white edges, but overall it's cool. I'm happy how they turned out.
@ Daze: That is a great thing you have going on. I myself leave the format and work speak to me and I choose a method to review them. I usually have a structure for novels and novellas, but outside it's a free zone. I have gone through many permutations on how to review and I think I have gotten better.
Yes, Wordpress doesn't leave much for tinkering, which naturally leaves with Blogger as my favorite place for hosting blogs.
@ CJ: Oh I don't plan to be addictive/active there. The time zone deal helps me not be caught up too much.
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