Name: Jabed
Site: True Chaos
Review completed on: 30/03/08
SPLASH PAGE
No splash
FIRST IMPRESSIONS
OMG WADDUP!!!!!!!!!
I know, right - what the frick? What the frack? What the fricketty fricketty frack? Hope I didn't give you a fright. You know the silly job I bleated about ad nauseam, that I ended up
quitting? Well, at the group interview the main guy created his first impression by doing exactly the same as I've just done above. All the candidates were waiting in the room and suddenly
this random dude bounds in and absolutely SCREAMS WASSSSSUUUUUPPPPPP!!!!!?!?!??!?!?!?! I actually said out loud, "what the fuck?" Some people will do anything for attention won't they. Typed http://www.petshopgirlsreviews.com into your browser lately?
I gotta tell you, Jay-Win, that my first impression of your site is...is...not the greatest.
LAYOUT
I'm kind of stumped right now. When I had a pre-review look around last night I was greeted by an attractive purple layout. This former layout was simplistic too, but effectively so. Not sure if I like it mate, and it's a pity really because I know you're quite handy with graphic design and I've seen what you've produced in the past.
Simplicity can mean two different things - a fully functional, readable layout that just so happens to lack any graphic detail. I've always maintained that you don't need some flashy header to have a layout that is deemed successful. People can, and do pull off the simplistic look quite marvellously, but I'm not sure if you have. For a start, the text on the sidebar is slightly hard to read - grey text on a white background is a well-known no no. You could make this black instead, and swap your regular text (that is currently black) to a darker grey.
I've just read your latest blog where you've stated this is a temporary layout. If you're in the process of making a new layout, why didn't you just keep up the purple one until the one you're working on is ready to go live? What was so wrong with the purple layout? You also go on to try and justify the simplicity by saying you like 'minimalistic, sophisticated, clean cut, versitile, simple layouts'. Yeah well so do I, when they've been pulled off correctly. You could have had left your container/wrapper background white and had a patterned body background, making your layout simple still, yet decorative too. Have a look at Aaron's layout, simple in structure and complimented nicely by a decorative background.
CONTENT
About
Jabed - uh oh, I've been transported to a Not Found page. Pretty disappointing since this seems to be the only page available that is about you personally.
About True Chaos - I find it amusing how so many people spell Piczo with a lowercase P. Must be some kind of shame factor involved, huh? Nevertheless, this should always have a capital P since it's the name of a lowdown site building platform. Also, 'html' = HTML since it's an acronym.
Affiliate Applications - atleast should be at least.
Contact Me - instead of a mere write-up, you could include a contact form here, or rig up a mailto link so that visitors can simply click on it and an email window will pop up via their mail client.
<a href="mailto:youremailaddress@youremailaddress.com">Contact me</a>
Credits - there is no spacing between the different categories, they all follow on from each other. It'd look tidier if you added some spacing here.
Great Links Out - I see you've divided this page into two categories - Extra Special and Adored. Oh look, I'm first on the list under Extra Special! That's like, sooooo fetch. (Was watching Mean Girls earlier.) Thanks buddy, love your work. Hate to be a killjoy and ruin all the good vibrations going on but....Rihannon = Rhiannon. I'm not angry seeing it's you, but yeah! I notice you call me this through the email too...it's sort of cute really! I take it you're a Rihanna fan?
Under Adored you have Jordan of Airvaux.nu - not sure what's going on with him but his site was on hiatus for eons and now there's a suspended site message when you go to his site.
Link Me - some sexy buttons here, particularly the 88x15's. So hard to make buttons of that size look attractive.
Resources
Brushes- oh, I like the first set...are they lotuses? To be honest, the squiggles look quite....like....they took a couple of seconds to make? And the crown brushes, well, I've seen both crowns before in the default shapes section in Photoshop.
Colour Palettes - I like most of these, especially the second one. Why? Well, it features pink of course! Haha, so many people are rolling their eyes right now.
Gravatars - just four here. Did you get permission to use the images in the second gravatar, as well as the fourth? What/who are they of anyway, celebrities or anime characters? Or neither?
LiveJournal Icons - celebrity icons do not interest me, so I'll decline from reviewing this page.
Pixel Bullets - nice. Nothing I haven't seen before elsewhere, but nice nevertheless.
Wallpapers - Ooh la la! Verrrrrry nice. I love the landscape of the Tower Bridge and Big Ben - photo taken by you as well, so that's always a bonus. London's a place in which I've always wanted to go. At $1,090 a pop for a one way ticket though, well....I'll just continue reaching for that non-existent rainbow. If there are any Donald Trump-like readers of PSGR who'd like to buy me a return ticket, I'd gladly accept... :) Heh.
Life Notes - wow, this is a really original idea. Did you come up with it yourself? I absolutely love these. Big thumbs up for creativity!
Tutorials
So many here...this daunts me. I think I'll just cover the ones I feel the need to comment on.
Get A Free Domain - how is this a tutorial? It's just a write up about Ezy Rewards followed by a button with a referral link.
Hide A Tracker - ah, yes. I've seen many people try and hide their tracker in some way or other, but not in the way you've explained. Have you tried and tested this method of yours, does it work? I'd try it myself but I have zero balls and I don't want to risk losing my stats. Believe it or not Extreme Tracker will actually find out if you've been trying to hide it. I've come across sites in which the owner has tried to minimise the tracker. Being nosey, I click on it and it leads to a page saying that they're in violation of the TOS, or something like that.
Install Haloscan - you've done a great job explaining how to install this lightweight CMS. I'd heartily recommend this tutorial to anyone who is new to the web scene.
Articles
Feng Shui Your Computer - lol, this is fantastic, very enlightening. From the sounds of it, my computers' chi is about as dark as it comes! Anyhoo, there were quite a few spelling/grammatical errors present on this page, too many to list in fact. If you can be bothered, I suggest you paste the text into a Word document and run it through the spellcheck. Hate to come across as anal, but you should really check all your work before you publish it and make sure it's error free, just to maintain professionalism and whatnot.
Get More Hits - in many ways this seemed rather reminiscent of my own article, The Value Of Your Visitors. In any case, this article of yours was a decent read, although I've seen similar elsewhere, and not just at PSGR. I'm not accusing you of copying anyone or being over-inspired, I'm just questioning the originality of the piece is all.
SUMMARY
I've generally enjoyed my time at your site, despite the rather lackluster presentation! After all, it's not what's outside that counts, but at the same time it's always a bonus to have an appealing layout. I was also disappointed to discover that the only page that contained information about yourself led to a Not Found page - this needs to be fixed urgently. What good is having a personal site when your visitors are unable to learn about its creator?
My favourite section of your site was your tutorials. I know I only covered a few, but that doesn't mean I didn't check the rest of them out. You cover everything, from PHP, Photoshop, Cutenews and a whole lot more. The Photoshop tutorials were especially good, since this is an area in which you shine. One may not think so looking at your latest layout, but those who have been visiting True Chaos for a while will surely be aware of the marvellous designs you're capable of creating. I'd like to see a return of these, and I'm sure I'm not the only one. As you've mentioned in your blog, this current layout is only temporary, so I look forward to seeing the next layout. I'm pretty confident that whatever you come up with next will be successful. You've managed to pull of simple layouts before, after all.
On a side note, I'd just like to address something I read in your latest blog concerning your baby brother, Hassan. I was sorry to read that he has a problem with one of his heart valves and had to have an operation, with another one possibly to follow. I know that this is a stressful time for you and your family, and I hope that his second operation will be a success (if it is needed) and that he'll fully recover. Best wishes dude, and the best of luck, not only for your site but for Hassan as well.
