For the last time, all hail King Jon of Personal Trainer - the first of the KotB contestants to retain his crown for three weeks and be retired to the Hall of Kings. Or Elba, or wherever Nick's sticking him.
This week we have three brand new contenders vying for the throne. For some reason, I feel like I'm Carolyn on The Apprentice getting ready for a boardroom smackdown. Wouldn't that be fun? Hmm...
But now, on to the rulings.
Overall Blog/Design
In the Outer: Hmm... Blogger template. My main complaint with standard Blogger templates (as well as standard Typepad ones, among others) is that it lacks the kind of distinctiveness and personality that I like to see for a contender to rule the blogosphere. If The Bloke here wants to make his voice heard, perhaps a little work to distinguish his look from all the others would be a good move. However, as Blogger sites goes, this template is simple, uncluttered and pleasant. The colors are pleasant - I go for blues, greens and purples any day. The sidebar text is a good size with the exception of most of the blogroll/aggregator lists, they're a tad on the eyestrain size, but since the lists themselves are so long, it's not as unbalanced as it could look. Speaking of looking unbalanced, I find myself listing to the right a bit while viewing the page. I'm pretty sure that was intentional - the graphics in the right column are wider than anything in the left column, but I'm not sure how well it works for me. Other than the design stuff, I see we have Haloscan comments and trackback (a plus), searchable archives (another plus), good profile and "50 things about me" info to make us feel like we know a bit about The Bloke. Except his name. But that's OK, I'm semi-anonymous here myself. I can dig that. Overall, In the Outer gets a 4 - I like what I see here.
Radical Centrist: First off, using my mother-in-law's computer and Internet Explorer, the header graphic appears to want to repeat itself just as the main content column begins - looks like a glitch of some sort. Not a huge deal, just a little bit less slick and professional looking than the Radical Centrist here intends. The layout itself is streamlined and easy on the eyes, neutral colors with the only real punch coming from the word "Radical". Comments and trackback enabled, check. No search feature, and no indication of whether this Radical Centrist person is male or female. Except that we know that the Radical Centrist is also Bird from Bird's Eye View, and there's a sketch in the sidebar on that site that leads me to believe that Bird is male. Other than that, we know nothing about R.C. here, and that gives me no context as a reader for his writing. I like to know something about the person I'm reading - age, gender, country of origin, religion, profession, interests, something - so I can understand where the opinions I'm reading are coming from. Never underestimate the importance of an "about me" link. Radical Centrist gets a 3.
Dawn Xiana Moon: I'm intrigued by this - Dawn has set up a blog here that integrates well with her overall website. Everywhere I look here, Dawn's personality and interests shine through. To really be part of the "community" of the blogosphere, I'd make some suggestions - add a blogroll (there are a few blogs included on the "links" page, amidst other sites, but it's not really prominent)... and add trackback capability. As one who reads other blogs and references things I read on them, I like trackback because I can let the other blogger and his/her readers know that I've written something nice about the post elsewhere, or expounded on the idea, or just continued the "conversation" at my place. Not everyone uses it, but it's a good option to give other bloggers. The comments feature amused me - it appears to have been a French-language plug-in aimed at musicians with websites to allow folks to submit comments on a song. Nice adaptation. I'd like to see a search feature for the archives - Google has a piece of code you can snag for free from their website, if need be. Despite the little nagging things that I don't see, what I do see is plenty about Dawn, who she is and what she thinks... and I like it. Randomness gets a 4.
Submitted Post
In the Outer: An excellent essay about Westerners' feelings of cultural superiority and the Biblical concept of showing mercy to the poor. I was impressed with The Bloke's writing - except for one sentence that appears to have missed the grammar proofreading (and kind of surprised me, right in the middle of such a well-written piece) - emphasis is mine:
Perhaps, all these busy activity and speech only serve to camouflage our true state: we are of all cultures, the most unfree and poverty-strickened.
Hmm... Is "strickened" a word? (I don't know about "unfree" either... but I get what you mean.) Otherwise, a fine piece of writing, and thought-provoking to boot. The Bloke's submitted post gets a 4.
Radical Centrist: Beautiful job. This political post is superbly crafted - it lays out the scenario, makes its points well, and stays true to its voice and purpose throughout. R.C. gives us some meat to chew on, prepared by a good chef with a flair for proper seasoning. This submission earns a 5 - aside from a typo or two (I believe Mr. Rivera spells his first name G-E-raldo) I don't see how it could have been done any better.
Dawn Xiana Moon: Deeply personal and moving - I could totally identify with where Dawn was coming from in this post. She expresses herself very well - the writing is fluid and effortless to read. You just can't compare this post with the other two deep and thoughtful entries, because it's meant to touch a different part of the reader. Dawn lets us in to her heart and spirit instead of her mind, and I'm giving it a 5 because it was done so well.
Challenge Post
In the Outer: OK. Another new group of contestants, another reminder: Please, oh please, for the sake of the judges who get realllllly tired of it, try to find a more creative way to introduce your post than "here's the question, here's the response". You can even do a separate post right before the challenge response warning your regular readers that the nonsense that follows is in response to the King of the Blogs tournament challenge question. Or link to the KotB tournament round post that includes the question somewhere early in your response. Or just confuse random passers-by with the response out of nowhere. </rant> To the entry... The Bloke presents us with a written draft of his first speech to the masses, complete with strikeouts and rewritten bits. A catchy little approach, and one that amuses me. Gratuitous sucking up to the judges, hosts and commissioner - another plus. Self-linkage to appease Harvey, who likes to see that sort of ego in a pretender to the throne. The one thing that nagged me throughout reading this speech, however - The Bloke seems to think that this is a democratic monarchy - like the voting we allow the masses to participate in is more important than the judges. Now see, support of the masses can put you over the top if the judges have no clear favorite in this tournament - if it's close, it can make the difference - but you must always be careful to appease the judges first and foremost, because of your possible 51 points, 45 of them will be coming from myself, Harv and Pietro. A decent first speech... The Bloke gets a 3.
Radical Centrist: An improvement on the "here's the question, here's the response" intro - and creativity in format to boot. R.C. gives us a script, complete with asides and crowd reactions. Too many high points to highlight here - I love the blog-centric "inside jokes" tossed about here and there... my only complaint is his disdain for cat-bloggers. Heh. R.C.'s challenge response earns a 5.
Dawn Xiana Moon: Despite the lack of creativity in the intro, and even the format of the speech itself, Dawn has given us a taste of her reign of terror as Queen and I like what I see. Her attitude is properly imperial (or is that imperious)... Her crusade to rid the blogosphere of grammatical errors makes the Grammar Cop and the English Teacher lurking within me stand up and cheer... and the thought of beheading webmasters who continue to use multiple animated GIFs and horrific color combinations and poor layout and... *ahem* anyway, I like what this Queen has to offer. Normally I'd take points off for a non-creative format, but the content of this speech is the deciding factor. I'm giving it a 5, because I'm a judge and I get to make my own exceptions to my own rules, so there.
The Queen's Rulings
In the Outer: 11
Radical Centrist: 13
Dawn Xiana Moon: 14
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