All You Do To Me Is Talk Talk

Greetings. Atomic Fireballs here, and boy-howdy, do I get to have some fun with my debut review.

I Talk 2 Much is a blog review site, much like this one. It exists, apparently, as a tool to make bloggers who submit do one of two things. Those two things are as follows: Post about the review in their blogs, explaining that they wish they could make things better by following the suggestions of the reviewers, OR, start an incredible amount of blog-drama with posts and comments flying back and forth. Option 2 always seems to be their favorite, as then, the commenters and contributors to the site start with vicious diatribes with the blog owner and it goes on and on, ad infinitum. The reviewers are mostly female, save for two male reviewers, one of whom is an "Asian Blog Consultant" whatever that may be. I guess when blogs come in for review from Asian authors, only an Asian is fit to review them for fear of being labeled racist. Whatever, it's an odd mix.

The initial template that hits me in Internet Explorer is black sidebar, grey background, black outlined box with white interior, with black text. It's easy to read, and fits well. The image at the top suggests that Charlie's Angels was a big influence in someone's life, and the listing of the reviewers is labeled as "Bosley and the Bitches". Ah, I get it. A bad 70's television show, followed by equally craptacular movies, inspires a collection of angry friends to create a blog review site. Interesting choice. I'd have gone "Sanford and Son" just so someone could be Aunt Esther. They do offer a drop-down of templates that a visitor could choose from, although why this is valuable is beyond me. The "Ms. Chatty" one doesn't load properly in IE at 1152 x 864, but that's neither here nor there, really. I generally just want to see one template. They often complain of long sidebars, but theirs isn't exactly short, despite having things rolled up in a few spots. They do explain how they rate blogs quite effectively, but it seems they generally either award "smacks" or "the golden finger". I question the need for more than one negative reviewing device, but that's just me.

Some of the reviewers offer up constructive criticism, some offer only short comments about what they don't like about a particular blog. The group seems to hate the Black Template that Blogger offers up, calling it the Black Template of Doom (or BTOD, for short). They also seem to have a major problem with long front pages, yet the front page on IT2M is at least 10 days long. They are not fans of Google ads, which I can also say is a major pet peeve of mine. The writing varies in terms of the reviewer, with some neglecting punctuation and proper grammar, while others actually form full, coherent sentences and thoughts. It can be quite jarring in terms of the differences between reviewers. None of them care for such blogging standards as Half-Nekkid Thursday, Thirteen for Thursday, or meme's of any kind. Personally, I think a negative review that's influenced by someone choosing not to like a meme or a suggestive picture is shallow as hell, but again, they have their standards, we have ours.

You probably won't learn much from reading IT2M other than the bully mentality still exists in all it's glory on the internet. Certainly, much like our wonderful site here, you DO have to submit your blog for review, and I'm sure someone clever in their little gang thought it would be cute to see what we'd say about them, but much like they say, be careful what you wish for.

Recommendations?: They won't listen, but here's what I'd suggest. Firstly, get all reviewers on the same page, grammatically. Either write coherently, or just admit that there are some of you who cannot form proper syntax. Secondly, adopt a format for reviews (here's what I like, here's what I don't, fix template this way, etc.) that's a standard, so everyone knows what to expect when they submit. Thirdly, I get that you're all trying to be internet badasses. It's pretty apparent. However, constantly encouraging this blog-drama gets really lame after awhile. It makes you all look petty and child-like. Grow up a bit, act like adults, offer valid criticisms and constructive feedback, and get the fuck over yourselves.

Two fingers for submitting to us after trashing this blog one pussy anonymous comment at a time, and then bitching about not being reviewed in due course.

And one of these for semi-coherent reviews and respectful reviews, though they are infrequent. I'm in a giving mood.