Friday, April 25, 2008

A Vacancy

Like a bit of a pillock I quite zealously guard those spaces on the left hand side of my blog, the ones that come under the "blogs I read" category. Why?

Well firstly because they genuinely have to be blogs that I read, and they are. Every day, or thereabouts I check in to see what's been happening on them. I'm not up to scratch with RSS feeds, readers and things so that, and Kottu are my main reference points. Secondly it's because I feel as if I'm providing a bit of a service to you, my reader.

If I'm reading a blog and it has a list of hundreds of other blogs down its side in the "blogs I read" section I tend to pay scant attention to those blogs. I might have a quick scan but usually I can't be bothered and the sheer volume of titles makes me lose interest. So, on my blog, though I don't have a maximum number in mind, I keep the number of blogs to a level that I think might retain a person's interest.

I also have my own policy of adding new ones to the bottom of the list, with the remainder in anything but alphabetical order. Darwin's and Cerno's go second and first respectively, though that sentence would have been much cleaner if I'd written it the other way round like this:

"Cerno's and Darwin's go first and second respectively"

But, once the linking had been done I just got lazy. Sorry about that.

Either way, they go first and second, or second and first, because they are the last two years' blogs of the year, admittedly awarded by only me, but around these parts that means something. Then we have Java, whose blog just demands to be read. After that the order gets a bit random, loosely based on a combination of how frequently they update, how sexy they are, their taste in music and what I think of their writing.

It's important that I don't have "dead" blogs or dodgy links there too. As much as I like a blog, if it's not updated regularly I, and most others, lose interest rapidly. Lady Luck seems to have gone quiet and I don't know if she's stopped blogging or is just inundated with patients or something. It's a sad and disappointing state of affairs if she's now putting her work, that whole looking after people and curing them thing, ahead of blogging.

So, after some rambling, I've got to my point. Which is that N of Tiny Little Fractures is in retirement from blogging. As much as I like reading his archives this means that my link to his blog is going to go. It's harsh but fair and it's for the greater good. I have a few ideas on which blog I'm going to add in its place.

But what do you think? I guess you know a bit about what I like. Are there any blogs out there that you think demand to be included in my sidebar? Do you even care?

Answers on a postcard please.

Or a comment.

I'll be away for a week or so but I'll check in and be back before you can say "Yes, I remember that blog"

Laters.

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

Something I've grown to love in the past couple of months is The Gutterflower.

I'm in love with Gutter's writing. She's not what one could call a frequent blogger, but she manages something in the likes of one per week. But that one-per-week-post, is almost always a gem.

So I would suggest taking the Gutterflower.

About you going missing, is what I hear from "reliable sources" about your movement true?

Anonymous said...

Well I'd definitely recommend............. using a RSS Feed Reader. If you use firefox there are a host of plugins that support it, if not google feed reader. It's a pain to use kottu to keep up with the blogs on my blogroll. I have ALL of em on my feedreader. Just drop by kottu once in awhile to check out what's new.

As for the vacancy.. it's subjective.. so why don't you go with your feel.. what's the point of letting some Mervyn Silva type minister influence you.. :)

Jack Point said...

I'll second the comments on gutterflower.

Rhythmic Diaspora said...

Dinidu - Yes, her's in one of the top candidates that I was considering. You now know the answer to the question!

samanalee said...

have to agree with Dinidu & Jack Point.
Gutter Flower gets my vote too :-)

Sunshine Junkie said...

Yup, I'd go with gutterflower too, she's got a nice combination of quality with quantity. The frequency thing is pretty hard to keep up I find!

Anonymous said...

If you have asked this question a week ago I would have definitely recommended Mia at http://whisperings.wordpress.com , but sadly she stopped blogging, at least for a while , http://whisperings.wordpress.com/2008/04/20/course-of-life/

T said...

there are a whole lot of new blogs i really enjoy, and my personal faves are
Leaving it for Later
Lost
Gutter Flower
Tiny Little Fascist
Paan Waati

Anonymous said...

Add my vote for gutterflower too.

Getting on your blog roll carries a lot of credibility - been getting a nice bit of traffic from your link! :) Sitting up there in the top left corner of is prime real-estate is a big plus. :)

Angel said...

Gutter Flower gets my vote....

:)

Gutterflower said...

Thanks a lot for the thumbs up about the blog. Am extremely flattered and even more flabbergasted. Really appreciate it.

I haven’t been in the scene too long, but the blogs I always follow and enjoy are already on your blog roll. Others, which are favourites, are ‘Lost’, ‘Leaving it for later’, ‘Paan Waati’ and ‘Angel with a pitchfork’

(Sorry, but I haven’t figured out how to do the linkage thing in comments.)

Rhythmic Diaspora said...

I'm sensing a trend here, can't quite figure out what it is but it's there for sure!

Darwin said...

Stranger to Sanity (but now known as 'The Slow Descent Into Alcoholism - http://hipsterdouchebag.blogspot.com/) is a damn cool blog! Not very mainstream but that's what makes it unique!

I've given up on linking other blogs though, there's far too many of them to maintain a blogroll so I reckon you need to sort yourself out with a RSS reader.