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Originally posted by CaptBaggytrousers:
A while ago you mentioned you might make it possible for us to post art on the site. If possible, this would be a great feature for the Blue Sun Room.

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Originally posted by hippydog:
has a very nice feature.. You can "view posts since last visit"..
doesnt sound that great, I know.. but I find myself using it everytime I go there, and it does save a lot of time..(and maybe even saves some bandwidth)

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Originally posted by Haken:
I already have something similar on when viewing a thread, but it's rather temporary in the sense that if you viewed the thread twice while you're online, it'll switch from "posts since last view" to "posts as of today." But if someone was to post a new message while you're online, it'll switch back to "posts since last view" and show you the message that was recently posted since your last viewing of the page.

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Originally posted by hippydog:
for me I guess, the biggest difference was "the latest posts" just shows the name and time.. maybe you could add the thread title also?
(i find myself wondering all the time if i have already read that thread.)

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Originally posted by hippydog:
whats a weblog? and what should I be doing with it?

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journal vs. weblog
Hundreds of online diary authors keep weblogs. And thousands of people use weblog sites and software to keep journals. So what's the difference? Plenty.

That is to say, journals and weblogs come from very different places, even though today they have collided — or should I be trendy and say "converged"? — and are indistinguishable to the untrained eye.

In short, and in my humble opinion, a traditional weblog is focused outside the author and his or her site. A web journal, conversely, looks inward — the author's thoughts, experiences, and opinions. Some sites, of course, do both. So to better see the "perfectly blurred" line, you have to step back a bit.

Online diaries and journals have been around almost as long as the World Wide Web (Justin Hall and Carolyn Burke had a mixture of personal information and commentary online by late 1994). Weblogs didn't really pop up until 1998 (although some say NCSA link pages dating back to 1993 counted as the first).

While web diaries caught the fancy of the media now and then in the late 90s, more recently, weblogs have really generated some buzz. But the mainstream fad-trackers, not surprisingly, tuned in late, and thus even some big articles in reputable publications (like Deborah Branscum's March 5 piece in Newsweek) have gotten some basic things confused.

The Nebulous 'Blog

Since you probably know what an online journal is, let's focus on the original, basic definition of weblog:

"A weblog (sometimes called a blog or a newspage or a filter) is a webpage where a weblogger (sometimes called a blogger, or a pre-surfer) 'logs' all the other webpages she finds interesting." — Jorn Barger, Weblog Guru

The alternative definitions — notably 'pre-surfer' — helps clear things up a bit. Originally, weblogs were basically richer (and often automated) link lists. "Click here to see an article on human cloning, here's what I think about cloning, click here to post what you think about cloning."

Instead of forwarding "check this out!" URLs to your friends, you could post them on the web for anyone to see. A weblog's popularity would grow depending on the uniqueness and novelty of the sites you linked, and the commentary you'd provide about them. And the appeal for readers was simple: why waste hours trying to be entertained, educated or disgusted on the web when someone else is happy to do all the surfing for you?

Evolution

Automation is a central reason why weblogs exploded. People created a variety of ways for people to start and maintain a weblog. Scripts like Noah Grey's Greymatter made linking, reviewing and commenting a point-and-click affair. And web-based services like Blogger minimized the need for extensive HTML tweaking (and partner site Blogspot provided free, weblog-friendly hosting). Five minutes and a few forms later, and anyone could be a blogger.

It should be no surprise, then, that people enjoyed simply speaking their minds, and started dropping the "link" root of weblogs, instead taking advantage of weblog tools as an easy path to online publishing. Or, more specifically, to simple and irresistable expression. "Here's what I think about cloning... and here's what I had for lunch."

Today, it's quite possible that more people are using Blogger and weblog tools to keep online journals than to comment on the web. (The only difference to visitors, really, are generally shorter entries and the 'newest on top' convention.) And that's probably why newcomers figure that's what all weblogs are all about.

But now you know they're not. Longtime bloggers at great link-and-commentary sites like Slashdot would be the first to say so. (I mean, who wants to be associated with online diarists?) And that's why online journalers start weblogs without a hint of redundancy — their journals are about them, and their weblogs are about where they go on the web.

A person who keeps a diary or journal online is logging their life, not the web, no matter how they get their words out. So the next time someone uses "blog" as a synonym for "web diary," do both bloggers and diarists a favor and straighten them out.

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Originally posted by Succatash:
This isn't so much relating to the Blue Sun room, but I've often wished we had a HOME option on posts.

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Originally posted by defender82:
Hakken
In re Blue Sun Room. Some of the other fanfiction sites have a feature that groups stories by author or at least lets you search by author, eg Fireflys glow. Is that a feature you could add? Thanks for all you do.
Kate

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Originally posted by Haken:
You mean like a subscribe to thread function?

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