Another weblog goin' down.

June 4, 2001 4:41 PM

Another weblog goin' down. There are almost too many of these to mention these days, but I hope I can be excused for thinking this one is special: Tomalak's Realm is shutting its doors on Friday after two and half years and almost ten thousand links. A genuinely useful site, with lots of attention to detail. Thanks to Lawrence for all the work.
posted by rodii (20 comments total)

A well done weblog is one of the major differences between the net and a bunch of crapy magazines.
I'm always sorry to see one go.
posted by dong_resin at 4:49 PM on June 4, 2001

Well, there's a degree and possible business venture in the works, so who can say this is really a bad thing? Perhaps Matt should pass the hat for a scholarship for dotcommers returning to grad school...?
posted by rschram at 4:50 PM on June 4, 2001

The Realm has always been a site I demoed for business people not quite clear on the concept of what a weblog had the potential to be... Despite a predeliction for blogging everything Jakob published pretty much without questioning it's value, there was always a wealth of other interesting and thought-provoking content linked there. I'll miss this one. Best wishes to Lawrence.
posted by m.polo at 4:53 PM on June 4, 2001

The Realm has always been a site I demoed for business people not quite clear on the concept of what a weblog had the potential to be...

People (business types, journalists, naysayers) are always so focused on the what people were doing with weblogs (droning on about their vacations or new digital cameras) that they completely missed the how and why (small chunks of referential content, speed, ease of use).

Increasingly, the Web (and that nebulous beyond-the-Web thing people are always talking about) will be about publishing, managing, and distributing these little chunks of content about the Internet (Yahoo! has been doing this for years with links).

A weblog is just one attempt at organzing chunks of content: bits of text and links organized chronologically, which makes a lot of sense given that time is always moving forward and people are always discovering new things to talk about and point out to others.

As m.polo says, Tomalak's Realm showed quite clearly the promise of the weblog format.
posted by jkottke at 5:04 PM on June 4, 2001

Despite a predeliction for blogging everything Jakob published pretty much without questioning it's value

Lawrence just pointed to links, he never commented on them (AFAIK). Sometimes it's better that way...people can make up their own minds after reading the articles.
posted by jkottke at 5:07 PM on June 4, 2001

jason raises a good point. Tomalak's Realm was not so much an excellent example of a weblog, (in my mind, it never had enough of a personal voice to be that) but an excellent example of microcontent.

The skill with which it was collected and edited is a tribute to Lawrence's talent. I wish him good luck and thank him for helping to influence me in my online endeavors.
posted by anildash at 5:08 PM on June 4, 2001

Fuck.
posted by peterme at 5:10 PM on June 4, 2001

Tomalak's Relam is/was more of a newslog, not necessarily a weblog. I remember when Lawrence emailed me way back when asking me how I found the links I did. I respect Lawrence for all the hard work he did. I always wished that he would have categorized his links, though. It would make a killer resource. Ah well, his site will be missed.
posted by camworld at 5:28 PM on June 4, 2001

Weblog, newsblog, giant mutant potato...whatever it is, it isn't anymore, so let's all get together and get drunk. It's what my people do in these situations.
posted by Ezrael at 7:28 PM on June 4, 2001

not a weblog? what bosh. it's one of the best weblogs going.

rcb
posted by rebeccablood at 7:36 PM on June 4, 2001

I'll especially miss Lawrence's ability to find links from the past that had a direct relationship to the news he found. I wish him the best luck.
posted by tremendo at 7:58 PM on June 4, 2001

Hmm, I hadn't intended to imply that I don't think TR is a weblog, just that it doesn't typify the genre in that it is (deliberately) focused more on excerpting the content than on delivering the voice of the author.

Tomalak's Realm is not a community, and I'm sticking to that.
posted by anildash at 8:23 PM on June 4, 2001

[Meta: I agonized briefly (about five seconds) about what to call it. "Web site"? Too generic. "Chronologically-organized list of links"? Not catchy enough. Then I decided only anal retentives would care about what it's called. (Or should that be anal-retentives?) Wish I'd thought of "giant mutant potato."

Now can we move on?]
posted by rodii at 8:25 PM on June 4, 2001

Are there other Tomalak-like lists?

> Or should that be anal-retentives?

It should be "those who derived gratification from the retention of feces during the second stage of psychosexual development."

Or giant mutant potatoes.


posted by pracowity at 2:31 AM on June 5, 2001

Leave it to Cam to both praise Lawrence and not-so-slyly elevate his own site...

It's nice to see the old guard come out and self-flagellate as only they can! We've got peterme, rcb, cam, kottke, and anil here, all we need is Winer and we could do a roast. Maybe that's what we should do the next time a weblog bites the dust! I nominate Neale as the MC.
posted by s10pen at 3:18 AM on June 5, 2001

s10pen, it's too bad you're so cynical. Lawrence was a pioneer in the weblog world, and his site has been consistently excellent since its inception. It's too bad it's going away, but you have to expect that to happen to personal sites at some point, as people move on to new projects or just get tired of doing something they don't find as fun anymore.

I'd also like to point out that despite the fact that I was running a weblog at the time as well (The Stuffed Dog came along later), Lawrence never wrote me to ask how to do anything. :)

And Cam certainly deserves some recognition for the role he played in defining the weblog as a genre, although you may not appreciate it, not being part of the "old guard."
posted by daveadams at 8:40 AM on June 5, 2001

"There are almost too many of these to mention these days...."

Let's quit while we're ahead, then.
posted by donkeyschlong at 9:00 AM on June 5, 2001

You are as witty as your handle is winsome.
posted by rodii at 10:28 AM on June 5, 2001

s10pen: so no one who is "old guard" is allowed to come out and show regret that a wonderful weblog they've been reading for several years has gone away?

after 2.5 years it's like losing an old friend. i'll certainly miss it.
posted by brig at 10:58 AM on June 5, 2001

Or not!

Let's see if we can wake this thread up. I received this via email from Patrick Nichols today:

I don't have a Metafilter account, so could you post this as a follow-up to
your original posting earlier this week? Tomalak's Realm won't be shutting down just yet, after all. Lawrence has decided to continue updating the site while he explores some potentially revenue-generating options. Check out today's Random Thought for details... http://tr.pair.com/random/2001/20010608.html.

Any ideas?
posted by rodii at 4:56 PM on June 8, 2001