The subject pretty much gives it away. What makes a good online journal? Do you have any favorites? Any least favorites? Tell me everything.

-- Anna (bubble@mbox301.swipnet.se), July 06, 2000

Answers

Favourites? Judy, Corri, CatterPills and yours of course Anna :) Least favourite? None, really. When a journal doesn't appeal, I just move on. I can't remember the names of the crappy ones.

What makes a good online journal? Hm, honesty first of all, openness, a sense of humor helps.. For me it's mainly the feel of the thing, though.. If the person shines through, even if the writing itself isn't Shakespeare, chances are I'll love it cause it's *real*

Um, yeah :)

Emmeke

-- emmeke (emmeke@krd.net), July 06, 2000.

Honesty, I think. Just throwing away your inhibitions and letting your true opinions and self show through, which I know must be hard sometimes if you have friends in real life that go to your site. :) Also, reactions. I think that emotional outbursts to things that affect a person really show a lot about the person and what they feel passionite about. I love seeing people get mad or sad or generally upset about something. Well, that sounds mean, but sometimes I just think "Wow, this person FEELS something that really touches them, and it touches them so much that they react to it." I think it's beautiful.

So, there ya go, Anna. :D

-- Meg (magicite_hunter@cephiro.com), July 06, 2000.

Hey, Anna...I found your forum!
Anyway, I think my tastes in the journals I read are pretty eclectic but among the ones that I consider as outstanding, there are some fairly consistent qualities. I love a clean design that's easy to navigate and load. I like a minimum of spelling and puncutation errors (punctuation errors, especially detract from the flow of an entry, in my opinion!) and I also like entries that emit a lot of passion with a smooth flow of ideas. I've only just found Anna's journal even though I've been aware of it (i'm slow, I know) and from what I've seen so far, she's got what I like!

Some of my absolute favourites that I've been reading for awhile now include: First Person Particular, The Delta, The Mombat Situation and...well, I have quite a few others but it would take forever to list them!


-- Sasha (sasha@restraint.org), July 07, 2000.

To me, the things that make a good online journal are kind of abstract. The first thing I look for (and my biggest problem with my own journal) are somewhat frequent updates. After that, I guess the next thing I notice is the spelling and punctuation. But the thing that really gets me in the end is the style of the journal. Does the person really tell you about themselves? I don't want to read a plain list of everything someone has done one day... at least, not unless they tell me something about themselves along with that. The only way I can get into a journal is if I can feel in some corner of my mind like I'm making some kind of a connection with the author. That's not to say I think we're best friends, or even that I pretend to know everything about them. I just want to feel some kind of connection. Vague enough for you?

Now I'm going to look like I'm brown-nosing... I'm not, honest. I'm glad to see Sasha here because I've really been enjoying her journal as of late. She's got style. :) That's all I wanted to say.

-- Jen (fallen@edible.nu), July 10, 2000.

A good journal is easy-to-read . . . a nice (not too flashy, not too mundane) layout, and honest writing. Of course - journals are supposed to be more for the benefit of the girl in charge, right? SO who cares if you don't fit the 'good journal writing' agenda, eh? I have a tond of favorites, and I'm finding more all the time . . . and of course I'm almost just as compelled to read the shxtty one's too. WTF is that about?!

-- dudoso (GingaXXX@yahoo.com), July 10, 2000.

Oh yeah, and journals with NOTIFY LISTS are good, because I'm lazy and scatterbrained and just don't like ckecking every place I read every damn day.

:)

-- doubtful one (GingaXXX@yahoo.com), July 10, 2000.

Good design is essential. There are some journals I have regretfully given up on because although the content is good I can't read the text without first cutting'n'pasting it into notepad. Poor contrasting colours is sin #1, tiny text is sin #2 and text spanning the full width of the screen is sin #3.

Journals that load lots of images (background or otherwise) get the thumbs down from me and I usually don't bother to go back.

Journals where the tag does not include bgcolor, text, link and vlink color make me angry. I know these properties can be covered by a stylesheet but it's sloppy coding not to include them. I'm a coding nazi... *shrug* Worse is where only one property, usually text colour, has been set, and it doesn't show up well on my default background colour. Sometimes I'll write to the person, sometimes not. Usually if I don't see a prompt improvement I'll never go back.

Spelling counts, as does intelligent use of language. Reading "off of" or "had of" just puts me off, also "your" instead of "you're" and misplaced apostrophes. I'm sorry, I really can't help it.

Good journals, IMHO: Antipasto, Matt's Mind, Alchemy.

-- Glee (gleemonger@greyfort.org), July 10, 2000.

I think that journals with a good distinct layout are good. I don't do frames well unless they are VERY well put together. Also, I only read a handful of sites w/out notify lists because like Judy, I am very scatterbrained and I can't remember who is who w/out email updates. :o)

But I love it when people talk about their everyday life and what they do...ie go to school, how work was, etc.

A good sense of humor is a good asset as well. :o)

-- Nicole (Nicole@Nicole2112.com), July 10, 2000.

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-- (razoo@pizza.face), July 29, 2001.