Barf Blog Evaluation

          The Barf Blog is a well-qualified blog, successfully meeting all of the criteria I have set for evaluating. This criterion includes: creditable writers, visual appeal, and subject of posts. This blog reveals to us things you may not find anywhere else, like a featured post about sex cereal. It does this while including an informative aspect in other posts about much more important issues such as an E-Coli outbreak. The Barf Blog is not as repulsive as it comes off to be, in fact you just want to keep on reading.

            Once you reach the home page and scroll down to read the blogs you see a “Contributors” column on the right hand side of the page. This column informs us on what qualifies these writers. The first thing you see in each short paragraph about the author is what college or university they are associated with, all of them under the teaching category. If you look on the “About” page you find this description of their posts, “Opinions must be evidence-based – with references – reliable and relevant. The barfblog authors edit each other, often viciously.” This really gives you a feel of their creditability—explaining how they make sure each post is reliable, through a process of harsh editing as well as making sure the opinions are backed up with evidence. This all reassures me that these posts are well thought out and written by authors I can trust.

            What I typically look for in a good blog post are pictures and videos to show me what they are really talking about. Each post you see has at least one picture per paragraph. Some of the pictures are of the specific event the author is writing about, but others are just thrown in there. For example in a post about the FDA reducing food inspections they have a random low quality picture of a family eating. Although some including my self at times may think this is odd, I think it brings more character to what they are writing about. Now you have to feel bad looking at the happy family eating their dinner and knowing that due to FDA budget cuts they could possibly be getting sick from that food on their plate. Another thing I like about the appearance is that they also add videos. Whether it is a video about the issue at hand or someone else such as Stephen Colbert commenting on the issue as well. These pictures and videos add a lot to what you are reading about.

             One of the most important pieces to evaluating a blog is the subject of the posts. Although this is a blog that self-proclaimed to only write about “Current food safety issues” we see a little bit of everything in here. There is even one post on sexism, in fact I believe the only reason it qualified to be posted was because it was sexism coming from a master chief reality show. Most posts aren’t about food safety; they just have to do with food. I think this diversity in subject really makes the blog a lot more interesting because it includes such controversial unknown stories.
             The qualified writers, story-like visuals, and diverse posts make this blog a great one. It manages to bring in the more serious issues, but manages to include the lighthearted humorous posts. I would give this blog a gold star.