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Simon Willison’s Weblog

More blogmark tweaks

I’m up to 110 blogmarks now, and from my point of view they’re the single most useful feature I’ve added to this site in a long time. I’ve modified my day archive pages to show the blogmarks added on that day, and I’m considering adding them to individual entry pages as well so that an entry is displayed along with the blogmarks added while that entry was at the top of my blog. The idea there is that I could aim to blogmark “related items” for the top entry, although obviously unrelated sites would end up in there as well.

The other thing I’m currently mulling over is whether or not blogmarks should allow comments. Jason Kottke’s inline links get a decent amount of comment traffic but I’m not sure mine would get enough individual traffic to warrant a comments thread for each one. I could always add comments to the blogmark daily archive pages, although that could get confusing on days with a lot of comment-worthy links.

Does anyone actually look at the blogmarks? Would you comment on them or read the comments if they were available?

Posted 11th December 2003 at 12:28 am

This is More blogmark tweaks by Simon Willison, posted on 11th December 2003.

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13 comments

  1. I share your enthousiasm for blogmarks. Inline blogmarks a la Kottke are a good option, but your right-hand list is your trade mark. Stikethrought for visited links is cool.

    We like blogmarks because they are simple, fast, straightforward. Comments could get in the way.

    kodiak - 11th December 2003 00:42 - #

  2. it depends. if you are linking to a blog entry, i would follow the link and if i feel like discussing on that topic, it makes sense to me to put my comments on that blog rhater than on yours. if it is a link to a reference that doesn't have commenting mechanism, then yes, i would comment on your blogmarks.

    moonshake - 11th December 2003 01:12 - #

  3. My opinion: If I wanted to comment on any given topic, I'd go to an appropriate forum or a chatroom. I think that the comments here are for people to add their 2p on what *you* have written. If you wrote an article about one of the blogmarks then cool. On another note... your labels are kind of cunfusing in IE. I get what looks like a random invisible link all the way along the line for "comment:", and more spurious stuff for the rest...

    Tony - 11th December 2003 01:37 - #

  4. I like how the blogmarks are at the moment, and visit about 40% of them and their associated via URL. Anyway if you embed your blogmarks in a blog entry, you could put them in an OL so the visitors could refer to the numbers of the LI in their comments. But even that way, it could become a mess if there's many blogmarks in a day.

    Mathieu 'P01' HENRI - 11th December 2003 02:28 - #

  5. I really like your blogmarks, but I don't think comments are necessary.

    Manuzhai - 11th December 2003 02:41 - #

  6. Ditto for appreciating your blogmarks, but how about providing some visual indication through the a:hover selector? You don't use this technique at all on your site, it must be an aversion to all things flashing and blinking. Perhaps Simon you can elucidate? If this site had a body ID, i'd use: body#simon-incutio-com div#bmarks a:hover {text-decoration: underline;}

    Adam Bramwell - 11th December 2003 03:58 - #

  7. I use the blogmarks, too. Comments would seem out of place here, though, since you're just providing helpful linkage, and not adding to the conversation... IMHO.

    Jeremy Dunck - 11th December 2003 05:09 - #

  8. I like them too, and I agree that comments wouldn't be particularly useful, maybe even get in the way.

    Peter - 11th December 2003 12:51 - #

  9. Yeah, forget the comments, don't go down the "Office" path of adding stuff just because you can, make sure whatever you add adds value while not diminishing the value of existing functionality (or at least ensure the gain is greater than the loss). You blogmarks was a definite blogValue++ IMO

    BenM - 11th December 2003 13:03 - #

  10. You should leave the blogmarks as they are. It is both simple and elegant and easy to maintain.

    I like your idea of implementing the blogmarks; recent entries on top, "via" links, strike-through when read etc - like a vertical ticker.

    Comments belong on the source blogs. If do wish to implement it, make it easy on yourself.

    ...I wish I had thought of the strike-through first - now I can't implement it ;)

    Kayode Okeyode - 11th December 2003 13:09 - #

  11. Adam Bramwell: I'm not sur if you intentionnaly mentionned the use of a BODY ID, but if this site had one, you could indeed add your CSS rule in the userContent.css of your Mozilla/Firebird profile. I had wondered so far what what the use of setting a DOBY ID, now I know ;)
    Thank you for popping that idea of customizing CSS.

    Mathieu 'P01' HENRI - 11th December 2003 13:37 - #

  12. Ixnay the ommentscay on the ogmarksblay. If it's something that really merits discussion, write a full-scale blog entry on it, or let the discussion happen elsewhere (like the target link, maybe). That's the conclusion I came to when I set up my own "hit and run" blog, anyhow.

    I would, however, like an RSS feed of your blogmarks.

    Adam Rice - 11th December 2003 17:28 - #

  13. I've had a blogmarks RSS feed for a while linked from my "RSS Feeds" menu, but I've added a link to it from the bottom of the blogmarks box as well now to make it easier to discover.

    Simon Willison - 11th December 2003 19:54 - #

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