3 posts from August 2006

Using Vox for the past couple of weeks, here are some impressions:

• Super simple. Almost stupid simple, actually. Not that people who use Vox are stupid, but it's so basic, it's almost a serious fault. Maybe I'm overexaggerating this. Maybe my problem is that I expect too much. But when I can't even add a customized sidebar module to show off my last.fm tracks, it upsets me a wee bit.
• What if I don't like any of the templates? When are we going to see more exciting template choices? More customizable template choices?
• No track backs? Am I missing something?
  

With the negative stuff out of the way, let me point out some things I do like about our little Vox here:

• Gets me blogging in no bloody time at all. And unlike Wordpress' post editing screen, the one here works. Brilliantly.
• Spellcheck? Big bonus.
• The "Organize" area is really slick. I can see a lot of potential here for the future.
• Nice community feel.

Now I realize that Vox is still in preview form. Maybe some of this will be added as development moves forward. It does cause me to pause a bit in really dedicating myself to this service with my personal blogging, because as it is right now, it's just not enough.

I also fear what Vox's inherent simplicity will bring: Simple minds, simple folk, uninteresting posts. A community of common people. Maybe I'm an elitest. Certainly these things plague a great number of blog areas. However, with Vox's built in community features, it'll feel a little more difficult to keep yourself a little more private. All in all, maybe not what I'm looking for.

On the plus side, I do think that Vox's simplicity will bring about a surge of computer illiterate bloggers. One of my closest friends is a complete fool when it comes to computers, but even he'd be able to pull this site off. Good for him, and good for those like him.

Also contributing to my possible lack of interest in all that is Vox is the new Blogger beta. I didn't much care for Blogger before, but the beta is looking really slick so far. A nice mix of user-friendliness with enough customizable features to keep me happy. In particular, I'm super impressed with the drag and drop interface for managing sidebars, headers and footers. The color picker screen is impressive, too, and really simplifies that whole experience.

I just loaded up my new Blogger site, so let's see who wins out in the end.

What with my somewhat insane TV obsession, this is a pretty irresistable project to delve into:

Instructions: Bold all of the following TV shows which you've ever seen 3 or more episodes of in your lifetime. Bold and Italicize a show if you're positive you've seen every episode of it. If you want, add up to 3 additional shows (keep the list in alphabetical order).

I'm at it again.

When I was a college kid, studying English at George Mason University in Fairfax, VA, I went through a very long (roughly 5 year) period of obsession with journals. The concept of the journal (or diary or whatever you want to call it) appeals to me. A lot. So much so that I can't seem to stop myself from buying empty journals with the fullest of intentions of filling with my messy printed word.

I won't go into grand detail about what I filled those journals back then with, or if I filled them at all. I'll let the reader out there, whoever he or she may be, work that one out for themselves.

As usual, I digress. So this is Vox? I figured I'd give another one of these launching pads another shot. I've tried blogspot. MySpace, too. Then, back in March, I got the genius idea of buying my own domain. Paid up front for a year of hosting, started up a sight that I ambitiously envisioned as a fantastic nexus of pop culture talk, gossip and review, a veritable solar system of Hollywood insight, masked uncomfortably as a cadre of planets revolving desperately around yours truly. That was Double Negative Pop.

If you really want to, you can check those three links. You might find something entertaining. Probably not. (And if you visit DNP, please ignore the banner.)

Then again, I'd rather you stuck around here. I'm going to give it another shot. I can't promise it'll be good. But I think I've figured that the direction I envisioned myself blogging would be something that I ultimately never wanted to do in the first place. It's the difference between choosing and feeling obligated. It's my fault, of course, but there you have it.

Stick around. I want to do this a little different, keep it a little simple, and hopefully entertain you a lot with things about me.

Cheers.