I love their write-up on you, it was hilarious and poignant. A links page might be a good idea, and I'd agree with pretty much everything else they told you.

Having absolutely no eye for design, I disagreed with almost everything that they suggest. They are under the mistaken impression that 'spirituality' must be calm and serious. I like the banner (it readability is just fine), the font looks black to me, and the blue-on-blue works just fine (I hate pure white on websites). Your RSS feed size is just fine and a hell of a lot better then their gargantuan monstrosity. I have no problem reading your font size. Perhaps a new prescription from their optometrist is in order? I use my search field quite regularly on my personal blog. Finally, your links are far enough down the sidebar that it doesn't really matter how many you have.

About the only thing I agreed with were the structural suggestions. You do have extra space on the right and some of your sidebar items are out of their frames.

Entertaining, but they were wrong on almost every account.

The theme is one of the easiest on my eyes. I can read the fonts just fine. I'm sure all the 2.0 rage is to look as much like Google or mozilla.com, but not me. C'mon, a white background? At least Mozilla breaks up the whitewash with a very effective bar that gives you what you want up front.

Are these guys monks? Their ideas of spirituality are odd, even to monks. New age spirituality, by comparison, at least TRIES to tie beliefs into something loosely based on reality. All of that stuff seemed to be a distraction from a real review of the site. Had they written a shorter piece, without that weirdness, I may be more symapthetic to them.

Okay, they have a point that the links up top make little sense to a newbie. Most of us know you in person, so we understand the links. I personally do not like the Spring Widget menu thing, but that is because I generally do not like Flash. The sidebar is empty and the link talking about twitter is hard to find.

Don't lose all the links or all the categories. I cannot see the blog catalog at work, so I have no opinion about that. Don't change the theme.

Normally, I'd advertise Ctrl+Plus to increase the font size. However, it adds too much space between category items. Maybe that was their problem.

Everyone, including me, should go here:
http://www.webdesignfromscratch.com/current-style.cfm

It offers good advice.

Actually, our ideas of spirituality have very little to do with our professional analysis, because Harry and I each have different views and Tramp's views are different than ours.

*Everyone's* version of spirituality is different from the next person, and respecting that is key.

But that's besides the point. The point is that as *professional designers*, we know what is easy to read, easy to visualize, grasps a wider audience and generally is more appealing to more readers.

Do you want to limit your friend's blogging experience by narrow views? I don't think so. Trying new things and embracing change is a wonderful thing. Would you hold him back from that?

CHANGE. And if you don't like it, CHANGE BACK. Nothing is written in stone, and this is your site, Tramp, no one else's.

Don't like white? No problem. Try a pale beige or a different shade of blue. Don't want to cut down the links? Don't. Put them on a nice page instead of cluttering the site. Love your header? Okay, great. make it less blurry or find a way to have it blend in more.

Growth, trying new things, expanding horizons or making mistakes to learn... well, isn't *that* part of spirituality and acceptance?

Pardon the interruption, good sirs, but Scotty Boy, if your info over at TFL is accurate at all - Happy Birthday!

It is indeed, thanks George!!

Jimmy boy is right about change. Personally I like the banner. Pat put some good work into it and I think it's clear enough.

And James, no one is trying to limit me. They're simply disagreeing with you. Disagreement with one another si not only allowed but encouraged here.

If there's one thing I embrace on this site and in life it's change. I will take all opinions, throw it into my brain hopper and we'll see what comes out.

I do want to make it a little clearer as to what this site is all about. It's a mishmash, a hodgepodge and it will be ever thus since I'm a little scatterbrained.

I do want to make visiting this place and navigating it as painless as possible. Given that I'm reaching a wider audience via my podcast and other online activities that becomes more and more relevant. I don't like all white. For a while this place was all beige and that was easy enough on the eyes. We'll see how it goes.

The right sidebar is cluttered, though I fail to see stuff coming out of the margins. I'd be interested in screencapped examples via email or what have you to see what that looks like to others.

As far as "professional designers" go I've noticed that they're a lot like any other media consultants in their tendency to disagree on what works and what doesn't. Harry and James are pros though so I'm gonna trust that to a degree and we'll see what happens.

I've just recently started to read Men with Pens and it was a very pleasant surprise to see your site getting reviewed.

As far as their critics go, I like your banner; I think it's original and authentic.

I like having the blogroll and stuff like that on the sidebar. But as it grows, it can really bog down a site. That's why I've gone with a links page on my own site.

It's really a personal call on your part.

Hey Lyndon! It's a small interwebz.

Pretty sure I'm keeping the banner. A lot of the rest of their points are good and valid. The more I think about it the better a links page sounds. Though I'll keep a few links on the main page, friends, really hot sites, things I'm involved in. We'll see.

See, here's where I curse IE 8.0 for giving me fits with typing and cutting off the rest of the post.

Gah!

Rather than rewrite what was omitted, here's the bottom line:

I did list things you suggested as changes to consider. You had good points to the review. I'm sorry that wasn't more obvious.

I understand that Scott has shifted the intent of his site and therefore change is necessary. As an emerging professional, he asked for your help to reorient his site for keeping new visitors.

I have an issue with the 'safe' almost universal palette for websites of white background or light shaded neutral backgrounds. Granted, I'm not a fan of black or silver backgrounds either. I simply appreciate the blue on blue look as a welcome change from Digg, Technorati, Blogger and other sites that tend to use the same 20 colors. I can read it just fine, but what one likes is subject to debate. Just look at all the vim color palettes.

At least two people didn't appreciate the spirituality reference in the review. As I said, the remark and some suggestions tied to that remark came off 'weird'. The review would have been much better without this section.

I understand the monks remark came off as a personal attack. That's my poor writing at work. The above paragraph explains it much better. With that said, I probably deserved the personal attack in return.

Change is as much a spiritual concept as the law of gravity: it is an inevitable function of the universe. I support Scott because he has been my friend for 25 years. Responding to a list of suggested changes, however vehemently, is not the same as eschewing change or holding him back as a whole. Making that argument requires a fallacy of composition.

Hey Scott,

"I fail to see stuff coming out of the margins."

Check out the Drive-By-Shooting post about you. They have a screen shot that shows both the Spiritua and Mathetes widgets extend a few millimeters beyond the frame. Those are the two that are outside the frames in my browser as well.

James:

"The point is that as *professional designers*, we know what is easy to read, easy to visualize, grasps a wider audience and generally is more appealing to more readers."

I'm sure you some of that's true. But I suspect most professional designers have difficulty separating out their personal tastes from their professional advice. In contrast, I only have my personal tastes to go off of. I like small fonts, blue color schemes, and small links. How much of your disagreement is just differing tastes and how much of it is good vs. bad design?

By the way, the actual write-up you did was very good and you do have a couple of suggestions I agree with. I should mention the good with the bad.

Finally, I have to take a shot of my own at spirituality. "*Everyone's* version of spirituality is different from the next person, and respecting that is key." A lack of consensus as to what spirituality is renders the term meaningless. And, since they are all different, no one person's spirituality is automatically worthy of respect.