You know I get a lot of e-mails from people who want me to stop by and take a look at their blogs.I am more than happy to do this as I enjoy reading the thoughts and ideas of others.However, what I do not enjoy is straining my eyes to read a blog that is primarily Black with either white or grey text.Trust me, if you find that people are not responding to your posts or seem to hit your front page and then leave, chances are your blog is designed in a way that turns people off and nothing will obviously turn people off more than the inability to see the words on the screen.
For those of you who visit this blog or my Forum regualarly, you know what a stickler I am for design.This is mainly because I am… well… looks conscious.I recognize that people like beautiful things, whether that be people, clothing, jewelry or yes, even a website.The more visually appealing your website is, the more likely people will want to return to it and stay longer.
So if you want to have a blog that will entice me or any other web surfer to visit and return to, please look into creating a visually pleasing design.Whether you are using Blogger, WordPress or some other blog software, there is not shortage of beautifully made templates to help you on your way.Just please, No Black Blogs… okay… good 
I like the Dapit Hapon template the best of the four you chose. I don’t like bright blogs (black text on white background). It’s hard to look at a white screen for too long. I don’t mind black blogs as long as the content is good.
Five minutes after writing this post I was contemplating adding a very dark theme.I might in the future if the blog becomes more popular.
Websites with black backgrounds don’t bother me as long as I can read them.It’s white webpages that leave me blinded.Sadly many bloggies are doing the whitespace thing these days especially those using WordPress and Textpattern.Movable Type and Expression Engine bloggers are way more creative and tend to use lots of color and images in their templates.
The problem often times with the blogs and sites from some of our brothas and sistahs is that they think that they’re Picasso when it comes to designing a blog. Most go for color schemes and layouts that they like instead of researching good color palettes that actually compliment each other or fonts that really convey the theme that you’re trying to bring across. As a result, the number of readers start to dip because they can’t get into the content because the site looks so bad.
Don’t get me wrong. I have nothing against a person wanting to express their individuality, but let’s be real: If you (not you Shawna) were a designer/painter, you’d be doing that for a living and making quite a bit of money at it. I know what I am good at and what I am not good at. A designer, I am not. I work with code. I am a developer. Want your site to be standards complient and show up in every browser ever made the way that you want to? I’m your man. Want a particular look or style? Really want your blog to have that Web 2.0 look? then i’m outsourceing the graphic work to this man. He’s damn good at what he does and worth every penny.
I guess what I’m saying is that I’d rather have a great looking site to go along with my great content rather than a crappy looking site that no one wants to see………
Viper have you been keeping up with the WordPress theme Competition ?
I pop in every once in a while, but I haven’t been able to check in lately due to time conflicts with work and school. Why do you ask?
Oh, by the way, my site is currently down. I’m paying for tuition myself this quarter (long story) and when it came down to the bills I had to make a choice: pay my hosting company or buy a book that I needed for one of my classes (that cost the same as my bill)? Well, ofcourse I went with the book. Anyway, they FINALLY decided to suspend a brotha’s account after three months of me being on the lam…. I can’t pay the bill until Tuesday, so until then, the site is down. Keep a lookout for me though cause when i come back up, I’m coming with a bang!
Sorry about your site VP and hope it’s back online soon.I too have been known to skip a bill or 2 in hard times.
Btw, I aked about the theme competition seeing that we were discussing themes and we both use WP.
Yeah – I don’t like dark blogs either. I was reading this very deep blog today – it sounded good and everything – when I totally lost interest! It was a black design with white letters, and my eyes got tired of reading it! I may make an effort to find it again…when my eyes get better….