“The blog is in Norwegian, it is actually written completely in dialect. I keep the blog with one of my best friends…even if you could read Norwegian it might not make much sense to you as the posts we both make are only aimed at each other.”

This site is the most awesome exercise in note passing—ever. Maria, “being an obsessive person by nature,” said that she does the majority of the postings, and spends an hour a day keeping up this blog. This is in addition to three other, less time consuming journals.

This journal serves a function that I hadn’t yet considered; keeping in touch with people and building a history of your quirk, but interesting relationship. Actually, of all the reasons to keep a blog so far considered, I think that this is the best. And definitely the most visually stimulating. It looks like an art collage to me. I mean, seriously, I had no idea what was going on but I ‘read’ all the posts because the pictures were so cool.

“I do tend to make posts that combine images with no real connection, conceptual posts of sort, it’s just something I like to play with that I didn’t really think anyone else could relate to, so it’s quite cool to hear you like it.”

Which makes sense because she said she used to be a visual artist. I’m no visual artists but I do like pictures.

I was Googling ‘unicorns in love‘, when I came across this blog, which is similar to Boing Boing in a few ways. It’s got massive advertising due to it’s popularity. It’s not personal the way many of the other featured blogs on this site are and it has won a lot of blogging awards over the course of its existence. Most recently, in October, the Blogger’s Choice Awards gave it Best Animal Blogger, Best Entertainment Blog and Best Blog of All Time. It was also awarded Best American Weblog earlier this year in March. What’s generating all this buzz? Kitties!

And duckies, chicks, bunnies, puppies, and anything else that has a small ear to head ratio. It started around two years ago; a website devoted excluively to posting pictures of the most adorable creatures around. (A notable feature of the site that differs from Boing Boing is that although this site appears to be run by one person, the founder, Megan Frost, it seems that the majority of the content is user provided. There’s even a map on the website of ‘cutelogists’–people that considering finding cuteness a priority in their lives.)

There are even cute rules, although they don’t function in the way that traditional rules. Instead of being necessary conditions—you must meet this criteria to be cute—they are sufficient conditions. Which is to say that if an animal meets one of these rules they are cute by default. So far there are 37 of these rules. The top five are:

1. Putting you paw up is cute.
2. Looking helpless is cute.
3. An inquisitive look is cute.
4. More than one species of baby flopping around is cute.
5. Fish eye lens on a baby animal is cute.

Sad or cute? This is rather bizzare, and I found it under the categories tab of the site. The images that it led me to were confusing because it was generally a tough call between cute or sad, but usually they were just sad. And ultimately I found them to be annoying. Actually the whole site was eventually too saccharine for me. But if your Seasonal Affective Disorder is acting up again this is a great, cheap, if not temporary, cure.

There’s actually a lot more police blogs out there than you care to know and most of them are pretty badly written. Take my word on this, I’ve done the research. Hope was lost until Bobby’s blog surfaced. Set somewhere in the United States it reads like a great episode of Law and Order. Entries bounce back and fourth between quiet moments of introspection, and explicative laced rants. It tends to be more rant heavy, but after all, he is a cop.

“Except for a brief stint where I wanted to be a pyrotechnician it’s all I ever wanted to be.”

I guess that’s his motivating factor for not quitting. It’s fairly clear from reading his writing that this journal serves some sort of cathartic function for him.

“If I get it all out on ‘paper’ I don’t have those frustrations lingering with me all night long. Add in the fact that the department that I work for really falls short in many categories, especially leadership, and you have my blog.”

One of the most interesting things about the blog is that it both confirms and denies so much of what you assume about police officers. In many ways he seems like every other mustached asshole that’s ever pulled you over and ticked you for a broken taillight. Yet there’s something much more pensive and human about his work. Two posts specifically come to mind, “He’s a human being for God’s sake,” and “A messenger?”. In the latter he relates an encounter he has with someone while trying to take a piss, and then they just disappear.

“I don’t know that the guy was an angel…I can’t explain my comfort speaking with him. I’m a cop. I don’t trust anyone that isn’t a cop or a friend/family member…I’d never experienced anything similar prior to that or since.”

What’s the meaning behind the title? He’s a big fan of Ghost Rider the comic book here.

“He’s far from perfect and in some cases, a real screw-up. I guess I feel like I’m not so different.”

Online journals; cheaper than therapists, possibly more useful. Telling us not only about ourselves, but giving humanity back to the fuzz.

Posting this was put off in the hopes that I would get a response to the email interviews I sent out to some of the editors at Boing Boing. Sadly, all I heard back was an echo. That’s cool though, I know they’re busy. Except.

Except for David Pescovitz, who was sweet enough to send the following reply, which I sincerely appreciate, because it was a polite thing for him to do. He was thoughtful to wish me luck.

“Hi Elizabeth,

Thanks for your email but unfortunately I’m way too slammed right now to respond. Good luck though!

-dp”  

With good tidings, and without further ado, I diligently bring you this post.

This site is huge in blogging circles, it won ‘Weblog of the Year’ in 2004 and 2005, and even though the “in” folk know about it, I realized there were a lot of us “out” folk, who had no idea of it’s existence. So, if you’re already familiar with this catalog of wonderful things, consider yourself lucky. If you’re not, consider yourself lucky anyway, because its being brought to your attention now.

Boing Boing, which started out as a magazine, has been on the web in some form since 2000. However this version of the site was only launched last August. This is noteworthy because for the last four years they had disabled their user comments section. This latest version is their first attempt to reincorporate this feature, and is currently being edited by Teresa Nielsen Hayden, who is not pictured above.

My only warning would be to make sure that you don’t get sucked into reading it all day, that’s pretty much what happened to my entire Saturday when I found it.

From an industrious Swedish man, we have the blog about cool stuff masquerading as nerdy. Until last June GeekAlerts was exclusively in Swedish (www.smidigt.se, for all those capable) but luckily Robert Birming, the creator, finally put up an English version.

“I noticed that quite a lot of the traffic came from English sites, from authors who liked the content although they couldn’t understand a word of what I was writing. So I finally decided to start GeekAlerts as an English version of Smidigt under the slogan ‘Gadgets and design Geekiness’”.

Robert not only has two versions of the site, but also does almost all of his own heavy lifting regarding site maintenance and especially finding fresh content for the site.

“I answer all of the emails and I try to reply to all of the comments. …I have a loooong (sic) list of RSS feeds that I try to check on a daily basis…I’m really not reliant on tips from readers at all, although I really appreciate getting them.”

That’s where the industrious part comes in, because all that surfing and replying can be mighty time consuming. We’re talking between three to six hours a day that he uses of his own free time to maintain his sites. And he doesn’t even have a tech job, so none of it is company time. In fact, he’s a musician. He finds that immediacy is what keeps his readership loyal.

“I think and hope that it’s the somewhat unique content that drives the readers back. You will often find stuff on GeekAlerts that haven’t yet been covered by other blogs.”

Who doesn’t want a Simpson’s Donut Maker? No, I’m serious.This may reflect poorly on me, but I think that you don’t have to be a geek to dig most of the stuff posted on the site; after all, I thought all of it was cool.

“I mostly blog about things that people think are bizarre because it’s hard to bring such topics up in everyday conversation… A lot of people who email me think I’m a goth or involved in the paranormal. Nothing can be further from the truth. I just find that stuff fascinating to read about.”

The blogs that last the longest are the ones that people love to write, because this makes them great reads. Megg’s been doing this for seven years, and her dedication keeps her audience interested.

“Quiddity actually used to be an online diary (at pitas.com) of my boring life. I changed it to a blog because I kept finding so many weird links and online articles that I wanted to share with my friends. It was also a great way to discuss politics and pop culture with people who shared my same interests.”

Megg brings up a good point: blogs are invaluable social networking tools that can be used to bring people together, especially those that wouldn’t talk face-to-face. Not only that, but no other communication medium is as convenient as simply logging on and searching for your interest to find people that are like minded. In this case, minds that like delightfully twisted stories of little kids building coffins for their dying school teachers.

“It featured a photo of them smiling next to the coffin. It was sweet, but kind of creepy.”

I have received an email from Jesus Christ. That can mean any number of things, but today it means that the creator of ‘What Would Jesus Blog?‘ was nice enough to respond to my interview questions. Written from the perspective of the Son of God, this blog discusses all things normal and mundane, but puts an understandably religious slant on them. By virtue making them no longer mundane, and instead decidedly hilarious. I know not the author’s real name, but he was willing shed some insight about why he decided to create the site.

“I like to write, and ‘What Would Jesus Blog?’ sounded like a fun blog to write for. I’m one of those people who need creative outlets. My blog is one of those outlets.”

Often times when people approach religion while laughing they are doing it just to provoke a reaction in the followers: to pick a fight or point out mental deficiency. That isn’t the feel of this site at all, and that seems due in no small part to the author’s sincere appreciation (perhaps not a belief in, but a profound respect of) Jesus and his teachings.

“People get more offended by Jesus than most other people in the history of mankind, which is fascinating because Jesus is such a likable figure. God is love. I think lots of people have problems with Christians, and Jesus gets blamed for their actions. However, Jesus always had the ability to offend, and my blog is no different.”

Of all the posts that Jesus has done, which does he prefer the most?

“I’d pick the post involving prostitutes at a church:

http://whatwouldjb.blogspot.com/2006/01/baltimore-hooker-incident.html”

There you have it. Pretending to be a deity and waxing philosophical, or just reviewing music and recommending movies, this blog shows that you can exercise your creative freedom and prove time and time again that being a lover might not be as sexy as being a fighter, but it’s a lot less bloody.

I love you,

Jesus Christ

This is a good statement that leads to an even better question: where are we as a society to find value (if any) in the blogging phenomena? Millions of people everyday all over the world plugging away at keyboards, detailing everything from their deepest sexual secrets to the quality of the tuna sandwich they had for lunch. If we are to assume that there is meaning in the liner notes of other people’s lives, as I am doing by starting this blog, what is it? Is there any point to being another drop in the millions deep bucket of online journals?

Let us first seek value in the expertise of amateur, starting with Wikipedia.com. Straight from the user written pages of the ultimate do-it-yourself site, we find: “Most commonly an amateur is understood to be someone who does something without pay or formal training.”

That’s a perfect definition because ideally that’s exactly what blogging is about. It continues, “The word comes from French, and can be translated as ‘lover of’, reflecting the amateur’s motivation to work as a result of a love or passion for a particular activity.” Yep, there’s a lot of that going on. Hopefully the rest of this blog will be an exploration of what’s important about people writing about what they love for free.

First, a caveat, which is that the Internet is a veritable goldmine of amazing truths and boring fabrications. There is so much that is the same out there, that here, the focus will be on things that standout for some reason and thereby enrich our understanding of the potential of the internet, and personal online journals. That is not to say, however, that there is not a value in the seemingly arbitrary ramblings of folks that could be classified as ‘nobodies’. On the contrary, I believe that often these are the fastest way to read our cultural pulse, but like everything in life, it’s important to strike a balance.