So here they stand in all their dated glory. Most of the links are broken, and many of the blogs I linked to have also given up the ghost. But it’s worth thumbing through to see how things were before “blog” was a household word.

Not long after I shuttered Prints the Chaff, I took up hiking. Two-Heel Drive, my hiking blog, showed up about five months later.

The emerging responsible faction has no time now for the witless applause lines the jeering jackdaws on left and right repeat to themselves to their own perpetual self-admiration and delight.

I’m too lazy to look this up, but what the hell is a jackdaw? A great blog name, in any case: jeeringjackdaw.org.

The crowd is appallingly sparse. Maybe they need the players to bring their families along or something.

Back in photo-j school I was taught a very simple but effective formula for writing cutlines. Explain the 5 W’s – when, where, what, etc., then follow it up with one interesting fact.

For example: Barry Bonds hits his 711th homerun in San Diego last night. He’s hit 3 homeruns in 4 games this week.

Simple, short… yet informative.

Besides, I hear that captions are the third most read/viewed elements on the page, just behind photos and headlines. You must respect that and be careful not to cheat readers.

And this note to designers: Look at your photos and ask yourself how many words it’ll take to name everybody in the picture — then look at the lengths of their names. Estimate how how much room that’ll take, then give twice that much space to actually write something meaningful in the caption. There’s nothing like having to ID four people and the designer leaving only enough room for two.

2) Sheila Lennon underscores the risks of putting pictures of yourself online. (This is another of those hilarious examples of goofing off with Photoshop.)

I wonder if “fecund” is one of those 100 words every freshman should know?

Link via Nicole Stockdale.