I won't surprise many readers in declaring that I'm not the most visually creative person. A few years ago, an individual from Australia sent me an email stating that he was considering unsubscribing from my newsletter because of my apathy toward visuals. Since then, nothing much has changed. I spend most of my time in text (though my presentations include greater visuals than even a year ago). Robin Good, perhaps out of sympathy, requested to take my newsletter and spruce it up on his site. The results of week one are here, including his introductory comments: "Breaking technology news, the latest app, scores of startups launching in beta every day. The incoming wave of technology and media related news keeps increasing by the day with no signs of pause or slowdown. And while many blogs and news sites give plenty of coverage and space to the latest and most promising ventures, very few devote their time to make sense of all that is happening and connecting the dots of the ongoing revolution we are witnessing."
This prompted Mike Powers to state: "Robin Good republishes the same material but in a much more presentable form making the very same ideas seem far more interesting.
There is a lesson here for all those bloggers who think content trumps everything else."
I respect what Mike is saying. Yet I likely won't make any huge changes in how I write my blog. Why does Robin do it? I imagine the motivation is partly economic (traffic or adsense), but in the process, he is adding value to the network for people, like Mike, who prefer greater effort paid to the presentation of ideas.
I am a big fan of Robin Good and I like the way your site looks after his visual make-over. I do, however, like visuals that you can click through rather than just presented as eye candy. All of the photo's selected relate to the content of the post, but they don't have intrinsic information value themselves. My blog is primarily text, because I want to make sure that the visual content added to the site provides as much value as the words.
Posted by: Ralph Poole at December 10, 2007 10:15 PMGeorge, you sound like me. You might want to join in a bit in the recent discussion about visual thinking on my blog. Curious to get your take.
Posted by: Tony Karrer at December 11, 2007 6:54 AMGeorge, I have to own up to using the example of your site vs Robin Good's makeover to take a swipe at some rather tedious UK political bloggers known for their longwindedness. While I still firmly believe that the visual aspect of a blog is important, in general, however, I'm sure committed readers will not be put off reading good content by an erm, 'unadventurous' visual presentation. For the casual visitor (and that means the majority)it might well be a turn-off.
I agree with Ralph Poole. Robin Good's visuals do often seem only vaguely related to the content in a very generic way. That may be because he is careful not to breach copyright and therefore uses a lot of 'stock' type images, I'm not sure.
You should certainly continue in the way your comfortable with, especially if you aren't really a 'visual' person :)
Posted by: Mike Power at December 17, 2007 5:28 PM