Doctor Who and SJA

Info

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

Web Host: Blogger

Run by: SJA

Opened: 12th October 2008

Review

Owner

The owner, SJA, obviously takes pride in the visitors that come to the site, whether it be newcomers or frequent visitors. They talk on the cbox often, which is great for interacting with the guests. They put quite a lot of work into the site, which is pleasing, and trying to make everything mostly right, and the language used throughout makes it an affable place to spend your time. One downside might be that the owner doesn't check some of the things they write, and so mistakes crop up every now and then, but this is not hard to adjust. Another thing also might be that possibly the owner could come up with things that are completely their idea, and not from other sites. This is clear to see in posts on the main page, and its pages.

Layout

A very bold design makes Doctor Who and SJA a pleasurable place to visit. It stands out well, and thankfully looks fantastic. With a few tidies up in posts and the sidebar, it can be even better! The main part has a grey background with mostly light grey text, which works well, but is this just a Christmas layout, as unfortunately it does look a bit dull, as there aren't many colour variations. The sides are white, but, with a few more colours, it might start to look a bit better going into January. Pictures do bring it to life though.

News Posts

The posts on the main page are starting to become more frequent, which is great, as the site is now becoming more reliable with more of them. They are good posts, and always contain a picture. There is just one negative point, before most of the positive ones, though. Some posts and pictures are off other sites, which shows that the owner is quite lazy in making their own news and writing it. The latest posts though, are a lot better, which shows that the site is steadily improving. One other point is that the pictures look a tad untidy, because there is no plan on how big each one will be, and so every single one is different. I'm not saying that they all need to appear the same size, but they could be anywhere. I think I need to see a few more posts to make my final view on the matter.

Spelling and Grammar

Every now and again, you are able to spot errors, but these are definitely nothing too big, which is reassuring. Unfortunately, they are not just in the posts. Like, on the sidebar it says 'threatin', instead of 'threaten', so we just need to see a bit more care gone into things, and more checking over. Grammar is mostly fine, but more structure to posts would bring out more in the site, like it has the potential to achieve. There are a few sentences, which need a few more words to make proper sense, but this can very easily be sorted out.

Pages

The owner has clearly just started thinking about pages for the site. At the moment, the links to these are marked at the top of the site, and in good colours, to see them better. There are two extra open at the moment, except that there are many that are put down, either in progress or planning, which should be up soon enough.

• Christmas is the page all about the festive time of year of that very name. There isn't a lot on it at the moment, but there are pictures and videos. Plus some Christmas lights at the top, which just give it that extra touch of sparkle. But this, again, is another factor that they could have made up themselves, rather than getting the whole idea from one specific site. Hopefully, there will be things the owner has thought of nearer Christmas.
• The other page is the Site Banners feature. This allows visitors who own a site of their own to ask for a banner to be personally made for that site. This is a new thing that sites are now doing, and is a great thing to be doing. There are two images up at the moment, and at first glance, look rather good!

I'm very much looking forward to the new pages coming soon.

Sidebar

A few brief facts at the top of the sidebar prove useful to those who want a bit of information, without looking too deeply into the site. The page hits are reasonably good, and should go up more and more as the site grows. The cbox feature allows you to communicate with the owner and anyone who visits the site and just above that is a picture of the next Doctor Who episode. Being a site with Sarah Jane Adventures also in the title, shouldn't they also have the next SJA? There is a poll usually up, to cast your thoughts onto a certain topic. Then you can definitely tell that the owner is a fan of Doctor Who (if you didn't already), with a picture that he owner of Doctor Who Fansite made for everyone who wants to put it on their site. Still in its early days, it's amazing how many followers the site has already gained, which is delightful! And then you have Quote of the Week. One possibility for the sidebar could be the archive, so visitors can have links back to older news.

Other Features

Banner; The banner certainly shows what the site is supposed to be based around. Doctor Who and SJA, and so it has the Doctor on the left and Sarah Jane on the right, plus the two logos, linking them together with an 'and', which in the end makes up the title of the site. Genius!

Our Key Suggestions...

• Take care with spelling and apply more structure to posts
  
• Put more features into the sidebar
  
• Sort colours
  
• Have more own ideas
  

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

Overall

Doctor Who and SJA has working potential, and I'm sure that after reading this, there may be a few changes, to make the site better, without too many errors and new features, but at the moment, a good start.

Rating:

Word Count: 1068