Saturday, June 30, 2012

The photo-less blog

After hitting "publish" on my last post.  I wondered if I should have added photos for all those books.  Nearly every personal blog (as opposed to news-type blogs like Althouse and Instapundit and such)  I come across now has scads of photos - sometimes more photos than text.  Cooking blogs document every step of the recipe with a photo. Book blogs show the cover.  Family blogs have photos of the kids and pets. 

I like photos.  Well, I don't like all the photos on the cooking blogs. I don't need to see a picture of melting butter, or a bowl full of dry ingredients.  Sometimes they are pretty and artistic, but more often a distraction. May I just see the recipe, please?   I do like photos of places visited, gardens, homes, family members, artwork. Stock photos stuck onto a blog post for no apparent reason (other than to have a photo) don't do much for me though. 

Do photos enhance your blog-reading experience?   Are they necessary to your enjoyment of a blog? 


4 comments:

Sarah at SmallWorld said...

It drives me absolutely CRAZY to see step-by-step photos on cooking blogs. I can't even read Pioneer Woman's blog--I just scroll down to the recipe.

G said...

It is funny - I just "decluttered" my blog... I felt all the book pictures, even in the sidebars, were just too much.

I love SOME cooking photographs, but I do think people tend to go overboard.

HomeGrownKids said...

Totally agree! It drives me insane too. If it is a photography blog then fine... I know what I'm getting into but too many photos - aaacckk!!! Plus, not everyone is on cable or ADSL. Some still dial-up! Archaic but true, LOL.

And my other pet dislike is video - video can be so slow. I'd rather read a tutorial and get through it much quicker.

theYoungerMrsWarde said...

I really like pictures on blogs, though I agree a picture of melted butter does seem unnecessary. When I look at three paragraphs on my blog with no pictures I wonder if anyone will want to read all of that without them (sign of the times, I guess.) Plus, pictures of kids learning and having fun are so cute! :)