In no particular order:
#1- No archives. I like to read a blog from the very beginning so I get to know the person writing. I'm weird like that. I often don't have time to do that but I do at least like the option of clicking back to the beginning of their blog so I can get the backstory on things they are writing about currently. If I am forced to scroll back through every. single. post to find the beginning of the blog, I usually just hit the back button.
#2- Slow loading blogs. I have a fairly new computer, if it takes my computer more than a full minute to load your blog then I'm out of there. It seems like the blogs with a ton of widgets, gadgets and ads on the sidebars are the worst. Several of them freeze my browser and even shut it down on occasion. I have stopped reading more than a few blogs for just this reason.
#3- Hard to Read. Black backgrounds, light colored type and small fonts. All 3 give me a headache.
#4- Lazy Linkers. I think it's just bad blog etiquette to link up to a blog party and then not bother to visit any of the other participants. I don't have time to comment on all the blogs that link up but I make sure to at least leave a comment on at least 5 other blogs who are linked before me. I love linky parties, and I link up to quite a few of them each week. It's a great way to meet new people and discover great new blogs. Some of my favorite blogs are ones I found at a linky party. Don't link up for the sole purpose of promoting your own blog, it's rude. In addition to that, it's proper blogger etiquette to provide a link back to the host within your post. A lot of hosts provide you with a button to use but I tend to just do a text link back to their blog.
#5- Follower Fishing. I hate it when people use a giveaway or a linky party to make people become a follower on their blog. It's sneaky. Now I'm not talking about the people who state "become a follower for an extra entry." That's different, that makes it optional. You still get an entry even if you don't become a follower. It's the ones who make you become a follower to get any entry that annoy me. Same with the linky parties that force you to become a follower under the threat of having your link removed. I hit the back button and move on to greener (and friendlier) pastures.
#6- Follower Guilting. You may have seen the whining on other blogs. "I follow so-and-so but she won't follow me back. I'm unfollowing her right now." Well let me just add my two cents. I don't follow any blogs with that blogger follower thingy. I follow all my blogs in my Google Reader. If you follow my blog, thank you and please know that I am not shunning you. Chances are, I'm reading you in my Google Reader. I do not have that little follower box showing the world how many people you have following your blog. It feels way too much like a high school clique with the potential for some mad drama. I had enough high school whilst in high school, thankyouverymuch.
#7- Ads that make my internet shut down. What is up with that anyway? There are some blogs that have ads that close out my internet every single time I click over there. So I don't visit those blogs anymore.
#8- Blogs without RSS Feed subscription ability. As I mentioned, I read blogs in my Google Reader. In order to do so, the blog must have RSS Feed subscription ability. I can't tell you the amount of times that I have gone to add a blog to my feed reader and it won't work. Very. Annoying.
#9- Catfighting. We are not in high school. There is no need for name calling and posse forming. Suck it up and move on. I will drop a blog like a bad habit if I'm continually wading through stupid and pointless drama!
#10- Anonymous Hater comments. Personally I believe if you are going to say it then you also need to own it. Leaving an anonymous comment is a waste of time, in my opinion. It does not matter to me if what you say in your comment has relevance or makes a good point. The fact that you left it anonymously completely negates any credibility you may have had if you'd just owned your comment.
#11- All Negative, All the Time. I know people go through seasons of life where they may be down and it's usually reflected in their writing. It's happened to me, multiple times in fact- like all of last year. However, one way to get deleted from my Google Reader for good is to only write whining, poor me, my life sucks posts endlessly. I don't mind rants, I'm rather good at those myself. I'm talking about the blogs that seriously just suck the soul right out of you when you read. Every post is about how their life sucks, how nothing good ever happens to them, how they wish they were never born....blah blah blah. If I want to overwhelmed with that type of negativity, I'll go to group therapy. With The Mother Law.
#12- All Positive, All the Time. I know, I'm so picky right? I also hate reading the blogs where every single thing seems to be sunshine and roses. Nothing ever goes wrong in those bloggers lives, everything is perfect. They have the perfect marriage, nary a fight. They have perfect, honor roll children who never talk back or fight. They have the perfect house, decorated to perfection and bigger than yours, of course. Who wants to read endlessly about someone else's perfect life? Blah.
#13- Every other post is sponsored by someone or something. I don't mind reading a sponsored post every once in awhile but every.other.post is pushing the limits of my tolerance. I've noticed a lot of bloggers that I used to read because I appreciated their writing style and their content have all of a sudden become sponsor heavy. Everything I loved about their blog is gone so I've stopped reading them. And don't even get me started on the sponsored giveaways. Once in awhile, cool. I love a good giveaway. 4 times per week....delete. Gah!
#14- Short Blog Feeds. I read everything in Google Reader. I hate, I loathe, I despise when all of a sudden one day I go to read a new post by a beloved blogger and now I have to actually go to their blog to read more than the first 3 lines because they've changed their settings to only show short feeds. Half the time the stupid ads cause my internet to close and it takes me 3 tries to actually read the post in question when I go to the blog in question. It annoys me. I understand that some people choose to make money off the number of visits to their blog. I understand that choosing the short feed setting ensures that they make more money per day by forcing people to go to their blog. That doesn't mean I have to like it. I have stopped reading many blogs because I got tired of waiting for their insanely slow page to load after they changed to short blog feeds.
#15- The Know-It-All Blogger. You know the ones. They know everything about everything and by George, you better never question anything they say or you'll be blocked so fast your colon will need to be cleansed. Can't tolerate it. Must leave before I start a riot.
Revised January 2012 to include even more pet peeves:
#16- Stealers and Poachers. I have had both my content and my pictures stolen on more than one occasion and it blows. Follow the basic rules of courtesy and common sense. If you didn't take the picture yourself, don't claim it as your own. If you didn't write it, don't post it without permission. See, very simple. Getting writing inspiration from something you read on another blog is great. As long as you give credit for the inspiration, don't copy what they have already written and give credit if you use any direct quotes from their post.
#17- Music players. I had a music player way back in the day that was set to autoplay when you arrived on my blog. I quickly learned that it was super annoying when I would click to someone else's blog and get blasted by their music. Especially when it was the middle of the night and I was trying to nurse a kid to sleep while I blog surfed. I switched my music player settings so it would not autoplay when you arrived at my blog. Music seems to be one of most griped about things these days so if you're getting a lot of very short visit stats to your blog, you might want to turn off your music.
#18- Word Verification. I know, I'm about to be a hypocrite because I had word verification on the old blog. You'll notice that I do not have it on this blog. I removed it because when I'm trying to comment on blogs from my iPhone, I cannot leave one if they have the word verification. And I've heard it's the same with the iPad. I used to get hundreds of spam comments a week on the old blog. So far I have only had 2 on this blog. I still have comment moderation enabled because there is a certain person who is likely to leave inappropriate comments about my family. If not for her, I would not have comment moderation on this blog. Hopefully one day she will find another husband to chase after and I can remove it.
#19- Fakey Fakers. Be authentic in your writing. Don't try to emulate someone else or you will come across as fake. For example- if you met me at Target you would find that I am pretty much the same in real life as I am on the blog. Blunt, sarcastic and pretty damn funny, if I do say so myself. I'm too tired to try and be someone I'm not in the blogosphere. I imagine it's exhausting to pretend all the time. Let your real self come through in your posts and your blog will so much more entertaining. Obviously I don't mean dishing out personal information but write the way you talk. I approach blogging the same way I approach having a conversation with someone, I write in the same style in which I talk. I say y'all. I use naughty words.
#20- Spastic Writing. I had a hard time putting a name on this pet peeve. It's more about finding your niche. Write about what you love, what interests you. Know your target audience. Are you writing just to keep the grandparents off your back about pictures of the kids? Are you writing to promote your business or your brand? Are you writing to preserve memories for your kids? Are you writing to find a community of other stressed out moms whose kids might be aliens? That one might just be me....anyway, moving on. Don't worry about how many comments you get, write because you love it. Don't worry about hoarding readers (I'm totally picturing a blogger on an episode of Hoarders with a gaggle of readers stuffed in her basement *snicker*). In simple terms, be yourself and write about what you know. The readers will come, the comments will happen- you don't have to kill yourself being something you're not.
#21- Inconsistant Blogging. I know, totally hypocritical of me. Go ahead, point your finger at me and tsk tsk. I can take it. I am committed to doing better with this new blog. The old blog became a place I hated, a place that had too many reminders of bad events. This blog is fresh, and new and I love it. In order for your blog to be a success, you have to write. It's that simple. You don't have to have a set blogging schedule that is rigid and confining, that works for some but not others. General guidelines are good though. It lets your readers know when to expect a post from you. On the old blog, I never posted on weekends and I never posted in the evenings. I posted 4-5 times a week, almost always in the mornings. This time around, I'm much more flexible. I blog whenever I have a free moment and schedule posts ahead of time when I can. I blog on weekends and sometimes I publish 3 posts a day. It seems rather random but one thing I can say for sure is that I will publish at least 5 posts per week, every week. Some weeks might have 15 posts and others might have the minimum of 5. But I am committed to publishing no less than 5 per week. Moral of the story? Let your readers know what to expect and then be consistant in meeting those expectations.
This concludes today's edition of How Not to Annoy People With Your Blog. Just slap my ass and call me intolerant.
Go ahead, I can take it and I might even like it. *wink*
