Drive-By-Shooting Sundays: Strong White Papers
You are reading this because James is calendar-challenge. Drive-By-Shooting SundaysWednesdays will return to its regularly scheduled slot on Sunday, April 20.
“This one’s tight,” James observed quietly as he screwed on the rifle’s scope. “Hairline view.”
Even tighter than that. He had a narrow line of vision, there were people left and right of the victim, and this job would need precision. Last week’s hit had been easy compared to the distance and length of the shot needed for this job.
Harry glanced up from the pack. “Can you see enough?” He stood, looking down from the building, scrutinizing with narrowed green eyes. “Maybe we should cancel this one.”
But James was already getting into position, his left eye squinting while his right picked out the hit. “No… no.” Right there. “I’ve got him. Don’t breathe,” he added, proof of the difficulty of the shot. He couldn’t afford distractions.
Today’s drive-by consult is for the Strong White Papers, the blog of freelance writer Graham Strong. Here’s a glance at what was live before the hit:
(click to see a bigger image)
The first view of the blog is extremely appealing. The theme is exceptionally clean and minimalist, with plenty of white space and few distractions to the eye. The color theme is a good choice, conveying strength and a lack of need to show off with fancy bling.
The banner font is clear and a perfect size for screen viewing. The three globes don’t really represent anything, though, and carry no meaning to the reader. Replace the globes with the keyboard image and round the corners for smoother appeal.
One problematic may be that the site is so clean that it comes off as a website and not as a blog. It’s not clear that the blog will be updated or that there is continual new information to read and absorb.
Moving up the RSS to be visible above the fold would rectify that nicely. Choosing a more prominent RSS button and adding an email subscription feature would help with subscriber rates as well.
Ah, but wait. There is an email subscription feature – it’s just not clear because it appears above the RSS. Placed as is, it comes off as an option for a periodic newsletter. By switching its placement with a larger RSS button, the problem is easily resolved.
If you remove the keyboard image and the RSS, your “recent posts” feature moves up as well and will be better placed to encourage a click-through. I would add a title to help readers know that these are recent posts, though. The font is also small and difficult to read.
Place the Archives at the bottom of the column and add Archives to your main navigation.
Speaking of navigation, well done. Everything is labeled very clearly and simply. I would, however, remove the Blog from the navigation, as it leads people to believe there is another blog and that they are not on the blog itself.
Place Recent Comments below the Recent Posts. Comment activity is important to display, as it shows your blog is healthy and active.
Remove the tag cloud. That’s outdated and really doesn’t serve much beyond looking pretty.
Place the “Great Blogs” below categories (and thank you for the link!) I would normally recommend removing the blogroll feature completely (you don’t want to drive traffic away), but on the other hand, you only have a few well-chosen blogs there, and that adds to your credibility by making you seem selective about quality.
For the blog posts themselves, I’d break them up a little more. They’re a bit chunky in places and could use with a touch more screen-reading formatting.
Add the Sociables plugin to encourage some Stumbles and Diggs, and also change the label for commenting to say something like “Add your comments” versus “No comments”. It’s more encouraging, because no one likes to be the first to comment on a post with no comments.
Overall, it’s a very fine blog and it’s difficult to pick on one that conveys such quiet confidence. I think you’re definitely on the right track with this.
He’d held his own breath as he squeezed the trigger slowly. He’d had the victim directly in the sights of his scope, the crosshairs giving him one chance. Just one. And such a small chance… If the hit stepped to the left or to the right, he’d miss.
But he hadn’t. Cleanly, he’d dropped his shot and the victim crumpled slowly. Now he sat on the ground, clutching his foot. Just a toe this time, a warning shot.
“Hmph.” James’ head popped up, and he looked down at the victim far below with curiosity. “He didn’t even scream.”
“Some don’t,” Harry remarked, casually reaching to take the sniper rifle from Jamie’s hands. “Besides, it’s just a toe. Nice shot,” he added, glancing down and giving a nod of approval.
Love it? Want more? You got it. Check out our upcoming hit jobs:
April 20 – Chatty DM
April 27 – Bibliophile’s Retreat
May 4 – Blog Badly
May 11 – hire us for your drive-by for only $25, and get your shoot-out within five days. Contact us today, and we’ll do the job. Dirt cheap.
Come on. You know you want to.
125 Responses to “Drive-By-Shooting Sundays: Strong White Papers”
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@ Brett: I’m shopping for a new laptop myself.( I am petrified of getting Vista though) I have narrowed it to Sony, Toshiba or Apple. Any suggestions?
Jamie,
MACBOOK PRO.
‘Nuff said.
Kelly’s last blog post..Inspiration Points: Unapproachably Great
@ Kelly, does yours run on Windows?
@ Jamie – DELL. Win XP. And save the freakin’ money to put the rest in your pocket. Unless it’s gift money. If that’s the case, go with a Mac.
@ Jamie,
Kelly sort of answered it for me
(right on Kelly) if you think you could use all of the features of a MacBook Pro it would be a great machine for you. Even a standard MacBook would be good. You can always install Windows on it if need be, or run it via virtualization (I’ll do a post on this in a couple of weeks).
The Sony and Toshiba stuff would be good too (my father-in-law swears by Sony, and he’s never had trouble). I had good luck with Toshiba in business before. Lenovo is also good.
Vista is quite usable if different from XP. I’ve been using it here for well over a year and it does the trick.
My suggestion also would be to go to a shop and have a look at the actual machines. Type on them. Look at the displays from different angles, see how they look under the lights. You can get honest reviews at http://www.notebookreview.com/ as well.
Good luck and have fun!
Brett Legree’s last blog post..focus on writing – part 1 – back to the future.
@ Jamie: James is right of course, too – this machine is a Dell, my wife has a Dell and they work as advertised. Really just depends on what you need, or if you got some gift money
Brett Legree’s last blog post..focus on writing – part 1 – back to the future.
@ James- Hail Rex is a familiar refrain to me. Alas, Alain It is a only a Prince you will be. Hail Rex Chartrand… but you have to wear the gold slippers.
http://www.rexorganization.com/
@ Brett- yeah, amazing. She pours more cab. I have to tell Dorsey about the glowing Mo 99, I just keep thinking Serge would use it as mood lighting:)
@ Kelly- old? I did not see his age, diagonal reader here…it was the jaunty yellow scarf , his elan., his domain de la champagne…
Janice C Cartier’s last blog post..Vegas Wedding
Ahh, an evening of playing with laptops, my idea of a GREAT time. James swears by his no-bells-and-whistles computers. I have a Dell now that I abhor, it has given me grief from day one and is awaiting yet a third hard drive in less than 2 years.
Thanks for the advice, I value your opinions. Business has been really good so far this year, but I do have a chunk of that *gift money* coming, so its a toss up. Either way, it’s a great tax write off, right?
If Le Roi pours the champers, I get to see him finally, right?
Philly’s the third star on the right, then straight on ’til morning, darlin’. (Second star gets you to Neverland.) I promise I won’t put the pix up on my Flickr account.
I had something to say about nightmares but I’ve decided to let it go.
Jamie,
Must I be serious? No, it doesn’t. For testing and such I keep PCs around. There are various ways to do Windows on the Mac but I don’t. Why muck with a beautiful interface?
Oh, yeah, and James is rather dull about the save-your-money thing, but since it’s his blog, there’s something to it.
Janice,
I scoped him out elsewhere, but the pix tell the story. I’m still young, James told me so.
…his titre, his dough…
…his access to my favorite lady…
…who cares if he’s too old to see our kids graduate?
Kelly’s last blog post..Inspiration Points: Unapproachably Great
@ Jamie: bad luck for you with your Dell. This one’s been going well for about 2 years, and my wife’s lasted for 4. I did have to replace the hard drive once, but that’s what happens when you drop a running laptop from waist height I guess
Call me a sucker for gimmicks, but one thing I wish everyone else would copy is that keyboard backlight from the Pro and the Air… quite practical actually
Brett Legree’s last blog post..focus on writing – part 1 – back to the future.
Brett,
That is my absolute favorite thing. You can type during a presentation w/o having to be the guy struggling to get near a crack in the window blinds to see the keyboard.
Kelly’s last blog post..Inspiration Points: Unapproachably Great
Kelly,
I’m sold on it too. Perfect little feature…
Brett Legree’s last blog post..focus on writing – part 1 – back to the future.
Kelly – I’m thinking if the King is pouring it should be Veuve Cliquot Grand Dame or a little Dom. After all he has saved all these lovely pennies from walking away from the lovely MAC…. and I was merely suggesting buffet avec Alain….next to the galllant and shirtlessly creative Harry , no, he would not have a chance.
@ Jamie- you are not serious, playing with laptops, a GREAT evening? that was sarcasm , yes?
Janice C Cartier’s last blog post..Vegas Wedding
Janice,
I defer to your judgement. Let the Man With the Pen break the bank, indeed.
I almost said, what’s wrong with that, I like playing with my… then I couldn’t finish typing. Ahem.
Kelly’s last blog post..Inspiration Points: Unapproachably Great
@ Janice, nope, dead serious. I’m a techno-geek at heart.
I was just looking at the backlit keyboard online. Pretty sweet! Does the AirBook not have a disk drive?
Jamie,
Correct, it does not. It has this wild ability to be able to pull anything from the air (programs, etc.)—you install them from your other computers (even PCs), or of course these days, you can get so much right off the web. That’s pretty cool, but for most folks a bit too avant garde. Pretty much guaranteed to be a second computer, not a sole computer.
Kelly’s last blog post..Inspiration Points: Unapproachably Great
Chuckling…..oops… I see how easily….ahem…. Unintentional double entendre, my bad.
Janice C Cartier’s last blog post..Vegas Wedding
@Kelly: OK, that I have got to see! I am definitely scheduling a trip to Columbus next weekend!
Thanks for letting me pick your collective brains!
@ Jamie- gotta love ya then. I ‘m technically challenged, what would I do without teckno-geeksters? But I admittedly lust after the Mac Air…shhhh. Don’t tell the guys.
Janice C Cartier’s last blog post..Vegas Wedding
Janice,
It’s the way my brain is wired.
Methinks Le Roi has gone to Le Bed, wisely. If I don’t do something similar, it will be tough to put Le Kid in Le Minivan tomorrow.
The Men lust after Macs, too. They’re just trying to be all practical and sensible.
Jamie,
Glad I can convert somebody around here. MWP were having all the fun hacking at my steely Capricorn reserve.
Kelly’s last blog post..Inspiration Points: Unapproachably Great
Yes, Mr. Chartrand said his coffee dropped him like a brick too and he was heading to bed. He’ll most likely be his bright and perky self at 6 AM tomorrow.
@Kelly: Diversity is great and ! I like your steely reserve intact. Don’t let them gang up on you. ;P
@Jamie and Kelly- Bon Nuit .
Janice C Cartier’s last blog post..Vegas Wedding
Sweet Dreams.. I should carry the baby up to bed and call it a night myself.
@ Jamie – I’m a little late in the game, but Apple! Apple! Apple!
I had a Dell and hated it, got my Macbook and love it! True though, it is expensive.
Allison’s last blog post..Tuna Nigiri