I'm doing a blog redesign, what are your thoughts? The original is at web-strategist.com/blog - Jeremiah Owyang from Bookmarklet

I love this design. I really like the social media icon circles in the top bar as well as the pulling in of the Flickr stream. Also, noticed the FriendFeed icon below the comments. Is that a plug-in or something you're having custom made? - Justin Levy

I dunno Justin if it's custom, I'm leaning on Mitch for this, he's going to implement it for me. That's why I hired him. - Jeremiah Owyang

Super clean, professional design. I really like it. I would consider making the text to the right of your logo in "{ }" a bit larger. It's kind of small and should probably fill up that entire box. I would definitely move your contact logos and the rss logo outside of the search bar. - Kevin Pruett

i do like it, but i would try it with a sidebar transparent background, just to avoid that the eyes go over while reading. -- disclaimer: i'm not a webdesigner :) - Markingegno - Donato

Hey all, I'm Mitch (the designer) and I'll be around to answer questions / take comments. There's a plugin for WordPress (http://blog.slaven.net.au/wordpre...) that I've been researching - seems to do exactly what I want. If the wheel isn't broken, no sense in reinventing it! - Mitch Canter

Thanks for the link Mitch! The design looks great! :) - Justin Levy

In general, I like it. The social media icons on the top make no sense, they look linked to search. I assume they are links to your profiles on each, if that's the case they need to be contextualized. It wouldn't hurt to be super obvi and say "Find me on..." above them. The subscribe block looks like a totally different design. Maybe that should include Subscribe via: email, FF, RSS, etc. - Clay Newton

Good feedback Clay - Jeremiah Owyang

I would also do something better with the right column. Right now, its left side is very jagged. If all items aligned left and/or there was better visual definition to the separate sections, it would be less itchy. Also, there are too many font sizes over there for similar things. Look at the job links versus popular posts. - Clay Newton

Clay: Do you mean that the font sizes are similar? or that there are too many different sizes? Just wanting to clarify :) - Mitch Canter

I like it. Its not too busy. I like the twitter status at the top ... now get back to using it Jeremiah! - Brett

I like it a lot. Clean design, corporate without being boring. I find the main blog font a bit too small, at least in this photo. Perhaps bump it up a point or two? Mitch, can you do those socmed icons for mine, too?? Now I'm jealous. ;-) - Connie Crosby

@Mitch I meant that it looks like there are either different fonts or different sizes on the right nav similar type items, like the jobs links and the links to top posts. I think it makes sense to use the same treatment. - Clay Newton

Clay: that was my intention, I may have overlooked equalizing everything. I'll take another look and will make sure the sizes are standardized. Thanks for the heads-up - Mitch Canter

there's big empty space around the { Jeremiah discusses } ... I like empty space but somehow this one sticks out - maybe its the gradient that's bothering me a bit. Overall though, its an excellent design. - Brett

I'll echo some of the suggestions I've seen that struck me as well: 1) Not obvious what social network icons next to search box link two 2) Some kind of division b/t main content and sidebar column 3) Increase font size, including text b/t { } 4) Not sure about displaying most recent tweet in horizontal strip across top. Seems out of place there (especially if you stay on hiatus!). Apart from that, it's a good, clean look. Compliments to Mitch. - Bryan Person

@Mitch: Have been doing research/testing on WP themes this week (including Thesis) and on SEO plugins that allow for customer title tags and description tags. This might be useful to include for Jeremiah, to give him an additional SEO boost! - Bryan Person

Bryan: I'm taking the "SEO Plugin" approach and will be utilizing some SEO enhancing plugins. All-In-One is my goto, but I have others that I like. I'm one step ahead of you on this one :) Thanks for the suggestions! - Mitch Canter

Thank you Jeremiah! http://www.sheysmith.com/2008... - Shey, Jamaican of FF

Larger font-size? - Winston Teo

This theme does not look professional enough, looks like one you buy for 20$. I would change this: 1. rounded design does not function well on your blog - make squared edges 2. bigger fonts, 3. don't like header, 4. too big date icon before blog title (looks realy passe) - Jernej

Jernej thanks for the honest feedback, in your opinion, what are some modern looking blog designs? - Jeremiah Owyang