I’m not going to comment on whether this will take off (it very well might) - but one thing’s for sure - I think it’s lame. Let me count the ways:

1. I’ve read starblogs, and man most of them just ramble on. Xiaxue was totally off topic, but at least that was entertaining (sounded kinda like she was taking a piss out of her own “stariness” in her post).
2. I feel dirty looking at the site - like a whore. “Click here to win $75,557″, which is by the way probably a premium SMS number to SMS Stomp.
3. What’s up with the layout? My eyes hurt just glancing at it…
4. Ads for the Straits Times Interactive, and My Singapore right in the middle of the page?
5. There are no links out of the site! Blogs are about conversations between bloggers - discussions and debates and most importantly - overt point of views. They’ve just gotten it wrong man.
6. Jeff Ooi thinks this is 2.0. It’s not. I don’t see any social thing going on, I don’t see any AJAX, and blog posts are like once a week on the exact same day? That’s not blogging.. that’s a columnist. (Try to ignore the fact that I sometimes post only once a month… heh… busy lah). But nevermind all that - it just doesn’t break any new ground.
7. Anyone remember Project Eyeball? I think this will be equally as successful!
8. I think Miyagi thinks it’s lame (if I’m reading between the lines correctly).
9. Justin thinks it’s lame… for sure.

But there are some saving graces….

1. It’s XHTML Strict (ok so I’m a geek… shoot me).
2. They spent a lot of money on the photography, so the photography looks good.
3. At least old media is trying and doing something about it. At least not NATO like me heh.
4. As a content site.. it is actually very rich. Loads and loads of content. It is SPH after all.

To the mediaslut… I don’t think it’s peace for peace sake. They just wanna cash in, and they need blog readers.. so make peace lor….

STOMP - judge for yourself.

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Posted by pallid on Thursday, June 15th, 2006 at 7:30 pm.