I was really thrilled last year when I was chosen as a blogger for OnlineOrganizing.com, thinking that technology was “my” topic and that Thursday was “my” day. I was dismayed to discover that I wasn’t actually one of seven, but one of 62. I was also disappointed to realize that instead of using WordPress or another established blogging platform, they developed their own, which didn’t include the features that make blogs interactive, such as comments and RSS feeds. Despite those drawbacks, I am pleased to be connected with a prominent organizing site, and have only missed posting once or twice.
Of the original 62 bloggers, 30 are no longer active. Some may have run out of ideas, which is not uncommon, but it wouldn’t surprise me if others decided not to continue as they weren’t able to interact with their readers. Luckily for those of us that remain, the site administrators have removed the inactive blogs from their main listing, which means ours are now more prominent.
Even more important, they’ve finally set up RSS feeds for all the blogs. As a result, I’m now able to display my most recent posts in the sidebar here on my main blog, so I no longer need to tell you about it every week. Plus, they’ve promised to enable comments in the near future. (You can actually post comments now, but not without signing up as a forum member, so it’s not terribly user friendly.)
Don’t get me wrong – I think OnlineOrganizing.com is a great site with tons of information; I just wonder why they felt it necessary to build something from scratch that was already widely available. At least they are continuing to move forward!
You know it was interesting to read your comments about this site. I love organizing and reading anything about organizing but I had to stop visiting them because I’d get a headache every time. It’s too cluttered for me with way too much info being crammed into a small space. In my opinion this isn’t how an organizing site should be presented. I’m glad to hear they are making some changes, hopefully design will be next.
Laura, you’re not the first organizer who has said that to me! I guess it’s a challenge to try and offer so much information in an organized fashion!
I’m a Professional Organiser who likes to keep abreast of the PO blogging world. It’s for that reason I rarely visit OnlineOrganizing.com’s Blog Central. There are so many wonderful PO blogs around that I have enough to read without going to that visually cluttered site which doesn’t offer the very thing blogs are known for, the interaction. I’m looking forward to the changes.
Angela – thanks very much for your comment. Another issue that I forgot to mention is the fact that there’s no Search function on the blogs, and Blog Central isn’t even included in the Search for the overall site, so it’s very difficult to go back and find something you read in the past and next to impossible to find posts on a topic of interest.
I agree with what you said, Janet. I only go in there when Suzanne tells me she’s posted on her blog!
Marcia, to be honest, I only go there to refer to my own posts. I rarely read anyone else’s.
Since I wrote this blog post, the comments feature has been enabled, so hopefully that will encourage more visitors!