Tardis Newsroom

Info

Site Address: http://tardisnewsroom.blogspot.com/

Web Host: Blogger

Run by: Dave (Doctor_No1)

Opened: February 2007

Review

Owner

Unfortunately, the owner of Tardis Newsroom does not get to interact with the site's visitors all that much. I see that the whole point of the site is to give you ALL the latest news that there could be, and it definitely does! This means that, as it is used as a fantastic reference to all things Who, the posts aren't written in the owner's words. I'm not trying to say that they are supposed to be though, as the site wouldn't be what it is. The only communication is the site's cbox, which is well hidden near the bottom of the sidebar. Even that isn't in much use a lot of the time! There wouldn't be much point in commenting on posts though, as there are so many new posts every day. I can see what the owner wants the site to be and it works very well!

Layout

The layout for Tardis Newsroom is a plain blue feel. Nothing too special or fancy, making it nice and easy to understand with no distractions, but could maybe be a bit boring at times.

News Posts

The whole point of the site, I think, is to fill it with as much news and information as possible, becoming a fantastic reference site. I'm am still very puzzled as to where they find all the news! It's amazing! This site has ALL, I mean ALL the news you could ever want! Of course, I don't think you are meant to read the whole of the posts, but are there as a reference, so you can see them, and then know certain amounts about the story. Links are clearly put to the site that it came from, under the main part of the post, so you know where the information is coming from, and can also read it on the main website, which it came from. A lot of the time, there are posts which contain various different stories. Very short, compiled into one post, but with links in them. Also with these, a lot of the time, come clever, witty post titles, like "Last Sontaran, the seeing I, Dalek image winner and another impossible podcast"

Spelling and Grammar

Well, as no posts are written in the owner's words, it's a little hard to talk about this topic, but the other sites, at least, use good spelling and grammar! Well... occasionally, if it's not the Sun!

Pages

The are no pages, at least, for the site, but the owner does run loads of other related sites, which is again, amazing, because of the effort but in! Like Tardis Newsroom, there are spin-off sites, Torchwood Newsroom and Sarah Jane Newsroom, also full with the latest reports. Tardis Scanner seems to be the main one, packed with more than you could ask for! I would recommend having a look! These other links are displayed near to the top of the sidebar.

Sidebar

The sidebar is absolutely crammed with so much news and information about every topic, from Actor to Merchandise, and from other news on other websites, to a review round-up. It's amazing! It's all updated, usually by matters of blogrolls. Plus at the moment on the top, there is a next time feature, showing the trailer for this year's Christmas Special, The Next Doctor, plus a 'Featured Site', that changes regularly. Below that is the archive for the site, but at the moment for me it doesn't seem to work very well, and doesn't go to the page you want!

Other Features

Banner; The Banner at this time in the year changes quite a lot. It often shows promotional pictures, screen captions and other pictures. At the moment it shows one of the classic series versions of the Tardis, with, what looks like to be, an alien planet in the background. The title is always very simple, and has colours that go with the banner at that stage. Unfortunately, though, the title is a bit blurry, so looks slightly untidy.

Next Episode Countdown; There is usually a countdown to the next episode of Doctor Who, under the banner, but not one embedded from another site, so looks professional and great!

Series 4 Poll; At the time of writing, there is a fourth series poll for Doctor Who, and looks very colourful, so remember to vote when visiting!

Tardis Scanner Link; There is a linked picture for their main site, Tardis Scanner.

Tardis Viewscreen; At the bottom of the page is a viewscreen, showing a fun slideshow of merchandise, either out already, or upcoming, with the title of the product

Tardis Webring; Shown at the very bottom of the page.

atts suggestions

• Maybe more interaction with visitors?
• Probably not a new layout, but maybe an update?
• I might suggest moving the cbox further up the sidebar, so more people can see it an comment.
• Nothing much else!

Note - these are only suggestions, which you may or may not want to take into account.

Overall

This is an amazing site for what it's trying to achieve, which is loads and loads of news, but maybe not classified as a 'fan site', but more for reference.

The rating is very difficult, as it's different to other fan made sites. For the effort and what it's trying to achieve, a definite 10/10, but does not have the features of a fan site. So, I'm going to give a different rating this time;

Achievement Rating:

Word Count: 918