January 26, 2001

11:53 AM

SurvivorBlog2 - Crazier than the first time aroundNow, if only Yahoo would add this as a module for my start page. For those who followed SurvivorBlog1, all the old contestants are back in the peanut gallery and there's a heap load of drama, cat fights, & smack talking going around for SB2. Sick, twisted, embarrassingly addictive.
posted by jujubee (9 comments total)

Why can't there be some sort of blog contest that awards quality of output?

No offense to anyone involved, but I look at a page by the contestants, with a post every few minutes, and there appears to be a bunch of name calling and little pointless fights (and first posts!?! ok, I'll ignore that) and there's nothing to read except that? Why am I supposed to be interested in those people and their battles? Is this considered compelling content?
posted by mathowie at 12:11 PM on January 26, 2001

I quickly glanced at their bios and didn't see much variety among the contestants (average age is 22). At least for me, a wide range of types of people would make a game/blog like this more interesting. And these people want my money?
posted by gluechunk at 12:27 PM on January 26, 2001

To clarify: I know someone involved in it, and I think they are interesting by themselves, and their blog is interesting, I just don't get why a ton of people (including this person) on the same blog "battling it out" is interesting.
posted by mathowie at 12:56 PM on January 26, 2001

Why can't there be some sort of blog contest that awards quality of output?

I tried. (Yes, it's a self-link. Have mercy on my soul.) My Survivor-as-blog variant produced an awful lot of creative content - song-parodies and flash animations and running storylines, the whole nine yards. I was impressed, especially given the age of the contestants and that they had sites of their own to tend to.

The result, when all was said and done? People complained. "Oh, the posts are so long. It takes so much effort to follow what's going on. The images take too long to load. Why can't we have more little posts instead?" *sigh*....

posted by youhas at 2:57 PM on January 26, 2001

Is that why everyone has such short posts? I was wondering.
posted by norm at 7:22 PM on January 26, 2001

I hated SurvivorBlog1 with an unholy passion. It beat me by one or two posts every day on PowerBlogger. it was stupid, incessantly whiney, and i didn't really get a feel for any of the people.
Towards the end it felt different. Without 10 posters to constantly wade through i got a much more realistic sense of where the last 5 were coming from, and by the time it was down to Kevin, Anne, and Nicci - i was smitten.
I think it's hard to appreciate SurvivorBlog2 from the outside; it seems considerably difficult to appreciate it even from the inside. But, underneath the obscene volumes of posts and name-calling, there's actually some revealing and interesting bits. Of course, to call into question whether this makes for good content calls into question your ideas of good content, or just what makes you laugh. Personally, i can't even watch 15 seconds of Survivor without wretching and then running for a tape of old-school Road Rules. I think the fact that some people hate Metafilter and that others refuse to read "A-list" bloggers because of their incessantness is pretty revealing in this sense. As for Sblog2? Give it a chance when the contestants have been whittled down some. Or go read something else instead. I think it's more meant for the people inside of it than the teevee show is.
Of course, that's just my opinion... and what would i know?
posted by krisis at 12:00 AM on January 29, 2001

awww matt... sure, the people need bread, but they need circus too! let the people [both contestants and loyal readers] have their circus. =) arguing about content/terminology on sblog2 misses the point. it's not about content; it's about a bunch of people feeding off each other, reacting and counterreacting, sometimes being banal and sometimes being interesting and revealing. so yeah, one can say it's mostly for the people inside of the blog, but anyone is welcome to come along for the ride. and i can tell you, plenty of people outside of the blog are coming along for the ride. some get into it immediately. for others it's an acquired taste. others, like yourself will be turned off by it. my suggestion is, if you don't like it, don't read it. however, it does draw a lot of readers and a lot of interest. and shit... it's fun. like i said... people need their circus.
posted by notoriousbhc at 7:27 AM on January 29, 2001

OMG,
They're woo-ing on SurvivorBlog@2

I'm SWOONING!

I'm SOOO ADDICTED!
SOMEONE KILL ME NOW!
posted by jujubee at 7:27 PM on January 29, 2001

Why can't there be some sort of blog contest that awards quality of output?

Okay, here's the deal with SURVIVORblog games. I first created the game of a whim. I watched Survivor. I weblog. Hey, blogger supports multiple posters! Boom. Had to happen, right? Of course. At the time, I figured I was just riding a wave of pop culture, throwing in a hundred bucks of my own money, just to see if people would act differently.

SURVIVORblog is, essentially, the WWF of the weblogging world. You're either really into it, or you're really not. And hey, that's fine. I make it a point to not take the weblog too seriously... I LOVE it when people trash SBlog, for example. It usually ends up in the peanut gallery.

As far as quality of posts are concerned... well... you know how the majority of weblogs on Blogger consist of one sentence "I'm going to mall" posts? Think of SBlog as a celebration of that. Or a mockery. Is the game tacky and cheesy? Yeah, I think so. Do I have any regrets creating it? Absolutely not.

And gluechunk: Actually, you'd be surprised how much money plays a factor when the game is down to three people, and one person has to choose one of the other two people off. Let's just say that people start taking things real personal.
posted by littleyellowdifferent at 12:23 AM on January 30, 2001