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Review for Silently Howling
The site is very purple. I don’t mean that in a bad way; just a simple statement of fact. The choice of colours collaborate quite well with the manga image used in the layout, but the layout itself looks like it was put together in a matter of five minutes. There seems to be a lack of effort in incorporating the image into the background as a wholesome design. There is no cohesion whatsoever.
Information
Site: Silently Howling
Type: Fan-Related
Owner: Sinmay
Reviewed By: Misao
Date Received: 06/26/06
Date Completed: 12/16/06
Preview
Presentation
The manga image of Mitsuki and Izumi sticks out like a sore thumb. Now I can’t be sure if the background is a pre-made texture or a section of a wallpaper, but currently, the breakdown of the layout looks like a PNG pasted over a stock image or some sort. Add some text, and done. There is no extra effort - Photoshop effects - put into making Mitsuki and Izumi a part of the layout rather than an a piece of it. If Mitsuki’s hair on her left was not feathered out, or if the image had some sort of outer glow or dropshadow effect added to it, it would have incorporated into the layout a whole lot better.
As well, the black starred background looks too artificial against the moon. It looks like a black background with random one-pixel white dots scattered throughout. Notice how the clouds only appear before the moon and none behind it. Of which, clouds do not exist in space so the whole concept sits rather oddly with me. I like the navigation hover effect, although I would use the same text colour or the same colour in a lighter shade. The peachy-orange colour on hover provides too much of a contrast.
Layout organization and navigation in general is great. All the links on the main updates page are properly linked (although you sure haven’t updated in a long time). There are two small flaws on this page: 1) The tracker link should open up in a new browser and not in the same browser (you can hide the tracker link with a <noscript> tag, and 2) Since this page is the main index page, a back link is not required unless you want visitors to leave your site and go back to the page where your site link was found.
A HTML 4.01 Transitional declaration is present in the HTML so I put the site through a HTML validation test, in which Silently Howling passed. The site is also compatible in Internet Explorer and Firefox. The only error I can visibly see is an extra <!-- before and after the ‘Misc’ navigation link that shouldn’t be there. The style sheet file could not be located so I cannot review this section of the site’s coding.
Content
Information
I really like how a brief summary of each page is provided after each link. That is very thoughtful and helpful. The introduction is very brief and not quite as informative as I expected. Although shinigami is well defined. The summary is not synchronized and there is not transition from one sentence to another.
Twelve-year-old Mitsuki loves music and loves to sing. Her father used to be a member of a famous band, and Mitsuki wants to be just like him. Mitsuki’s other motivation to become a singer is a childhood friend named Eichi. She made a promise with him that when she grows up, she will become a singer. Mitsuki also wants to attract Eichi with her voice and bring him back to her. She has no family members alive, except for her grandmother whom she lives with. Despite her love for music, Mitsuki’s grandmother hates music. Her grandmother blames Mitsuki’s father for stealing Mitsuki’s mother from her and from a better life. Mitsuki’s grandmother is a very bitter person. Unfortunately before Mitsuki could achieve her dreams, she was diagnosed with throat cancer. The doctor highly recommends surgery because of serious risks of death, but the removal of the tumor may also result in Mitsuki losing her voice. This is one part of Mitsuki’s life that she cannot lose. She decides to fight her throat cancer with her will and determination to live.
I am sure you can see the clear distinction between my summary and the one offered by Silently Howling. I like the character profiles. They are more carefully written than the series description and more effort is clearly seen. There are no misleading information, but there are a few errors, starting with Izumi’s profile:
- When he first shows up, he causes mischief, and is sadistic to Meroko. - Misuse of tense.
- Nevertheless, when he became a shinigami, he still felt unsatisfied even though his mom had smiled. - Again, wrong use of tense. Also, you need to clarify the second half of the sentence. His unhappy childhood and dissatisfaction is not a cause for his sadistic and pessimistic shinigami nature since he had no memories of his human life.
- Izumi is under a “curse”: he can’t believe anybody’s feelings for him. - This sentence is repeated two sentences later with a different wording.
- Unfortunately, nothing of the sort happened. - Spelling error.
There is also a general problem with Izumi’s profile format. This page should be about Izumi’s character, not a synopsis of what he does from beginning to end. Try to focus more on his character. For instance, explain his suspicious character and recall his suspicious and misleading incidents when he first appeared in the series. Every once in a while Izumi displays amusement and humour (in the anime). Since you claim Izumi’s character to be well-developed, explain how he developed as a character; sadistic and cold at the beginning to less intimidating and a sense of other’s awareness at the end. Your thoughts of Izumi are primarily based on whom he loves and who loves him. I think this is best moved to a page where you can back up your support for Mitsuki and Izumi. Your thoughts should focus on Izumi’s character in general. The image of Miru Meiku is rather small and low in quality. Try using a better scan and/or link the thumbnail to a larger version of the image.
Now onto Mitsuki’s profile:
- When she was 3, she became an orphan. - Transitional verb.
- Right after Eichi left on the plane - Wrong use of preposition and spelling error.
- At age 12, she met two shinigami, Meroko and Takuto, who old her she has one year left to live. - Tense confusion.
- Hearing this, Mitsuki ran to a singing audition, but before she can get in, Meroko and Takuto came and stopped her. - Wrong use of tense (transition from previous sentence) and unclear distinction between passive and active noun (eg. “a” store versus “the” store). The tense confusion carries on for the rest of the page (abrupt change from past tense to present tense).
- She was only 10 and didn’t understand love. - Wrong use of tense.
Similar to Izumi’s profile, this page is more like a synopsis of Mitsuki’s role from beginning to end. Focus on her character. Explain why she became an orphan, why she is insecure but optimistic, her determination as a singer, etc. Also, from a personal perspective in contradiction to your thoughts, even though Mitsuki may not have reached puberty (for all that we know), she is still capable for feelings of love. There are many different categorizations of love: parental love, sibling love, friendship love, and intimate love. Mitsuki could very well have loved Eichi but she learned to move on, and found love in Takuto. If Mitsuki truly loved Eichi, she would live her life completely by moving on and finding someone else to love (if the right person came along) because this is probably what he would have wanted. Eichi wouldn’t have wanted Mitsuki to live a lonely life in denial. When using images alongside profiles, make sure they are consistent in size.
The titles for the different moments are not informative and too ambiguous. For instance, the first moment would be more appropriately titled “First encounter” or of some sort. I like the format of this page and the extensive research you have dedicated to the page. However, make sure you reread over what you have written or ask someone to edit your writing because there are numerous grammar mistakes, ideas are unsynchronized and meshed together randomly, some ideas were repeated in a following paragraph worded differently, and there is not structure or cohesion. You should follow some sort of format like describe situation, explain/interpret, and author’s comments. Make sure your comments are separated from the rest and located at the end of each description. A clear note should be awarded at the top of this page that all information on the site pertains only to the manga version of the series. The anime actually takes a different twist, and Izumi’s character takes on a more prominent role in the anime.
I am not too fond of your distinction between Takuto and Meroko’s current life as shinigami and their previous life as human life as you did for V3, ch11. Although it makes sense, I think referring the life before their death would be best as “when s/he was alive”. Technically shinigami is a role rather than a species so Takuto and Meroko are still considered humans, human spirits. Please elaborate more on Mitsuki’s illusion in V4, ch15. I am not too sure if you are referring to the illusion of Eichi being alive and the chance of meeting him again, or using the illusion of Eichi being alive as Mitsuki’s excuse to continue living life. The manga screenshots are of random images depicting nothing of the moment described. Some of the images like the ones for v5, ch20 are of really poor quality. If you are going to provide image screenshots, make sure they are: 1) related to the description, and 2) are clear and of reasonable size. Also in the same moment, the word ‘nosy’ appeared five times in one paragraph, three of which are used fairly identically expressing Mitsuki’s lack of nosiness.
The fourth paragraph to V6, ch24 contains too many errors. The entire paragraph sounds awkward from the way it was written. Rules to remember: always start a paragraph with a specific noun (eg. Izumi versus he) to clearly distinguish the primary subject, reframe from starting sentences with conjunctions (most commonly and’s, because’s and but’s), brackets are used to include or elaborate the subject and not as word substitutions, and make sure the subjects and nouns are properly defined.
Normally Izumi feels ashamed after showers because of the beautiful sky left behind by the rain. However, he did not feel ashamed that day where he shared his past with Mitsuki at the railroad crossing. Mitsuki’s soul - purity - made Izumi’s darkness - his sin - lose its colour much like how a single light bulb can brighten up the darkest room. [When you try too hard in using adjectives to describe a noun, it becomes farfetched. For instance, how can a lightbulb be pure? Pure glass? Also be aware of the differences between a potential structured sentence and a definite structured sentence such as ‘can’ versus ‘will’. ] If you love a person, you will enjoy being with this person. Mitsuki’s company on that day gave Izumi so much comfort that he didn’t want the moment to end. This could be interpreted as love according to my philosophy above. Memories of Mitsuki helped Izumi get through his pain and suffering. He is confident he will made it back to the living world for Mitsuki (”I will return to that world…”).
There sure is a lengthy page to defend your reasons for supporting Mitsuki and Izumi. In the introductory sentence, “IzumixMitsuki is a wonderful couple that people rarely notice just because it’s not canon“, do you mean ‘common’? To avoid confusion, I would leave out the other pairing examples provided from other series; stick with the pairings from this particular series to further enhance your point. There isn’t any kissing because this series target audiences primarily between the age 8-15. To top it off, the main character of the series is only 12 years old so I highly doubt Mitsuki will engage in anything more than blushing and the occasional hug. Like the previous page, this one is riddled with numerous grammar mistakes in each and every sentence. I have lost count how many times you switch from present tense to past tense then back to present tense all in one paragraph. There are so many contradictions to your reasoning. For instance, there is claim that Mitsuki does not make random comments to Izumi in an attempt not to hurt him, but this is contradicted further down the page in that Mitsuki spouted off random things to Izumi during their first several encounters. There are certain sentences on this page that are directly copied and pasted from other pages. Although there is no crime in copying your own writing, try to be a little original by rewording the sentence. It is boring to read the same sentence across three different sections.
This ending page seems more like a ‘Full Moon relationships’ page. There is a paragraph at the top of the page that explains why Mitsuki doesn’t die and a sentence stating who ended with who. The rest of the page is a rant of the pairings that Tanemura-sensei created intentionally. Although you certainly put a lot of effort into supporting Mitsuki and Izumi as a couple, I find most, if not all, of your reasons and support unreliable and uncreditable. Of course, something like this is clearly personal interpretation. However, the reasons don’t hold any truth. If Takuto did not respect Mitsuki, he would not have used Negi-Ramen’s powers to transform Mitsuki into Full Moon so she could at least try to accomplish her dreams before her death. Had Takuto not respect Mitsuki, he would not have tried so hard (and quite stupidly) to help/force Mitsuki to move on and let go of Eichi, who is obviously causing her pain and restraining her from living her life to its fullest. If Meroko did not love Izumi, she would not have gone back to him at the end. Meroko may be emotionally unstable and has low self-esteem when it comes to love relationships, but she isn’t cheap enough to degrade herself to find an “alternative” to her real love. The anime takes a really different turn from the manga, and I highly suggest you watch it. Takuto gave up his life to ensure that Mitsuki lives, and Izumi confronts his feelings to Meroko quite throughfully in a full episode.
I do not like the format of the mother or son page. The page is structured with rhetorical questions where the answers lies within the question itself. You try to make a good argument, but in the end, you make a good argument against yourself.
The way he acts towards Mitsuki isn’t the way a child would act towards his mother. Izumi said that Mitsuki carries the shadow of his mother, so Mitsuki only reminded him of his mother because of their similar appearance. He doesn’t actually think of Mitsuki as his mother. Although he does tell Mitsuki something that troubles him (past), he doesn’t say it in a whiney voice. He doesn’t act like a child who is complaining to his mother about things that trouble him.
Izumi did not specifically state that Mitsuki resembled his mother only in appearance; he only stated that in general terms. Izumi has been dead for a long time, he carries a lot of burden from his life when he was alive, and his tale is sad and depressing. I highly doubt anyone in his place telling a story like his life story would do it in a whiney voice. When a child goes to his/her mother with troubles, it isn’t always done in the manner of a complaint.
Does that necessarily mean that he wants comfort from a mother or someone he likes? No, it doesn’t. If a child is sad, he might seek his mother, but isn’t is also possible that someone would seek his lover if he were sad? Another example would be the romantic relationship between Takuto and Mitsuki. When Mitsuki was in distress, she wanted to be with Takuto. That’s the same thing as Izumi wanting to be with Mitsuki when he was sad.
Each and every person has their own reasoning for seeking out a person during their troubled times. Izumi never explicitly state what he wanted from Mitsuki besides comfort and understanding. This can be obtained through confessions to a friend, a family member or a lover. The fact you are warping your reasons to one possibility is very biased. Recall that Izumi never said the words ‘I love you’ to Mitsuki. There is a difference between a companion and a lover. As a response to your conclusion, there are definite references from the manga that indicates Mitsuki and Izumi’s relationship as one of mother and child, and you don’t have any strong references to indicate any other.
Media
I like the idea of colouring pages but the only one you have is of really poor quality. On a scale of 1 to 10, I would rate it a 3. The pixel lines are not sharp and well-defined. Some areas of the image is really blurry. If permission is required to use this on another webpage via email, please link the email. I like the fanarts drawn by you. They are really cute. I especially like the icons, the first and last one. I would love to see more of these. There are quite a number of scans but this image gallery certainly is not the place where I would go for scans. There are plenty of sites that I can go to for full higher quality scans. When scanning images, make sure the resolution of the scanner is set to high for both size and colour. It brings out the best in details.
Site Related
I like pages like the about page. I always find it interesting to read about the origin and history of a site. However, I don’t understand why you always refer to Mitsuki and Izumi’s pairing as ‘canon’. I keep thinking that the word you’re trying to use is ‘common’. If contact information is going to be provided, at least have the emails linked. The link to the livejournal blog should open in a new window browser. All the links on the linkage page are working properly although Lost Lenore is linked twice underneath ‘credits’. I like how the reviews sites are also linked, although the title of our review site is wrong. We are called Faltered Heart Reviews, not Frozen Rain Reviews. You might want to look into your guestbook because there is an awful lot of spamming.
Final Statement
For a shrine dedicated to a pairing that isn’t meant to be a lover-pairing, Silently Howling doesn’t show a lot of effort in supporting the couple. The information on the website is very biased and rather warped. Most of your explanations are not supported by arguments, much less strong arguments. The entire site is riddled with grammar mistakes, making everything hard to comprehend. The site is primarily composed of written content so communication is a prime factor. The site is lacking in cohesion.
10 Comments to “Silently Howling”
Emeryl Says:
December 17th, 2006 at 6:31 pmCanon is a term used in fandom for a pairing that is well-defined in the actual show.
For example, Sailor Moon + Tuxedo Mask would be canon. They’re definitely supposed to be together according to the show (as far as I remember, anyway).
Sailor Moon + Sailor Uranus would not be canon, because it’d be a couple that fans threw together for the fun of it.I’m surprised you never heard the term, it’s pretty common.
Sanosuke Says:
December 17th, 2006 at 9:10 pmAnd it’s the website owner’s job to clarify any terms that may be fandom-specific. Just because it’s ‘common’ in a specific community doesn’t mean it’s ‘common’ in all communities.
A website owner should never assume people know a specific term just because it’s popularly used by the community. Fansites not only cater to people who like the fandom but also people who want to know more.
Misao Says:
December 18th, 2006 at 12:46 amDue to the amount of slangs created on a daily basis to define certain aspects of anime and manga, it is best to clarify so within the site in case of confusion.
My job is to review the site from my perspective and inform the owner of errors and rooms for improvement. The fact that I have never heard of this term means that there are people in the online community (and in the fan community) that also may never have heard of this term. It is not the reader/visitor’s fault for not understanding the term, it is the website owner’s responsibility to make sure his/her visitors are well informed. Hence, the reason for fansites.
Emeryl Says:
December 18th, 2006 at 12:59 pmIt’s not really that slangy though. It’s an actual word that has become used a lot to describe pairings.
Straight from the dictionary:
“the works of an author that have been accepted as authentic”So “canon couple” = “authentic couple”.
I don’t think she needs to start defining normal words for people. If it was something made up, like an acronym or something (OTP = One True Pair, or something), I could understand. But this IS a word.
I think it’s more strange that you’ve reviewed so many sites and don’t know what it means. I definitely don’t think it’s something she needs to define. This is the first time I’ve ever heard anyone even question what it means.
To me, it’s just one of those things that somehow you managed to never see it before, and less that she’s using a strange word that no one will understand.Before you call something internet slang, you should really check yourself first. I’m a little surprised you made the assumption that it must be slang just because you didn’t know it. Especially when I pointed out how common it is, still not checking a dictionary…?
Canon isn’t only used commonly, but it’s a real word. I think that one is your mistake, not hers.
Sanosuke Says:
December 21st, 2006 at 7:38 amI looked the word up in my dictionary at home and got meanings that dealt with religion and the Bible. It’s a word, it just wasn’t originally adapted to the meaning you and dictionary.com gave.
You’re part of the community that uses it in that form, we’re not. There are a lot of people who don’t know what “yaoi” means, and that’s in dictionary.com as well. And I’m pretty sure yaoi’s used more commonly than “canon”.
Emeryl Says:
December 21st, 2006 at 5:02 pmA lot of our words have religious origins, just like a lot of our laws have religious origins. That doesn’t make it less of a word.
Canon was originally used to refer to what was considered the “genuine” scriptures.
Even if you look at it only in a religious context, it still has pretty much the same meaning. What was considered “genuine”, “authentic” or accepted as what was true to the original work. Looking at my dictionary, from 1967, which doesn’t even have the word “computer” in it yet, it’s still the same. It’s just used for more than one book now. That argument is like saying that “gay wasn’t originally used for what you use it for now”… We don’t live in the past, so it doesn’t matter much.I wouldn’t call “yaoi” bigger than the word “canon”. Yaoi is a niche market. “Canon” can be used for anything that has an author. I have never joined any “community” for using the word “canon”, it’s just a given that they do because most communities are talking about something that has an author. That’s a hell of a lot of stuff. It’s used for anime. It’s used for non-anime. It’s used in popular comics (there was even a pun recently on 8-Bit Theater, which is immensely popular http://www.nuklearpower.com/daily.php?date=061219).
It’s used for regular TV shows. It’s used when talking about books. It’s used for religion… In other words, it’s not fandom-specific. It can go for an enermous variety of things. It can even be used to describe anything from yaoi (and is).
But basically, it comes down to this. There are two viewpoints when someone is looking at a webpage.1) The author of the webpage. The author has no way of knowing the extent of your vocabulary. If you tell the author they should do something, it should hold true for other webpage authors. And if every author starts writing a definition of “canon” on their website, the suggestion will soon be, “Everyone and their dog has that on their page, so you don’t really need it”.
2) The visitor. As a visitor, if I -didn’t- know what “canon” meant, I would rather look it up from a reliable source like a dictionary than from a random webpage author, whom I don’t know, trying to describe it in their own words.
I think it’s completely unnecessary for her to define words that can be looked up unless it’s something like technical jargon (such as medical terms, that can be confusing even if you do look them up). And I think it’d be better to just say, “Oh, I didn’t know that word before, but now I do” than be obsessed over it.
(BTW, Yaoi is only in acronym finder. It’s not a word, and it’s not even used in Japanese. So dictionary.com has a correct listing of yaoi as an acronym, so it doesn’t discount the legitimacy of the site. Use “ボーイズラブ” if you want to find anything in Japanese. It’s kind of ironic that people use “yaoi” over here and in Japan they all say “boy’s love” or “BL”.)
That doesn’t mean the whole review is bad or anything. But if you give opinions you should be open to receiving opinions, too. I think I listed some good reasons to disagree
1) Authors can’t know what vocabulary other people have.
2) Visitors would probably be better off checking reliable sources than a teenager’s website for definitions.
3) It wouldn’t work as a whole. “Provide unique content that you made yourself” would be good advice for any author. If you asked everyone to define the same word, though, it would end up wasting space. It would end up looking like when people copy and paste e-mail forwards onto their sites. Don’t reviewers often say, “Everyone has those”?
Defining acronyms might work if it was off to the side somewhere, but having everyone site define a word wouldn’t work as a whole.I hope you don’t take a disagreement as a personal attack. I think your review is fine as a whole, but the owner is permitted to more than one opinion. If she thinks it’s a problem like you do, she should put it on her site. If she doesn’t think it would be a problem for her viewers, she shouldn’t worry about it. Webpages often have a target audience of people interested in the same thing as the author.
Souji Says:
December 27th, 2006 at 9:19 pmEmeryl, I don’t know where you learned “canon” from, but it just generally rude to assume people understand the same terms as you do.
From dictionary.com:
1. an ecclesiastical rule or law enacted by a council or other competent authority and, in the Roman Catholic Church, approved by the pope.From MSN Encarta:
1. general rule: a general rule, principle, or standardNeither of them mentions anything like the defintion you gave. Please don’t just assume that “the dictionary” is the same for everyone. I set my dictionary as dictionary.com and follow that as the standard. I know what canon means, but if I didn’t, I’d be clueless, and as the creator of the site, it’s her responsibility to inform the visitors. More information never hurts. As a visitor, your have to assume her information is reliable to begin with, otherwise, visiting a site is absolutely pointless.
It is her job, not the visitor’s job, to provide information about the subject she is dealing with. She doesn’t have to know what the visitors do or don’t know; it is, after all, the purpose of having a site. If everything in itself was obvious, she wouldn’t have to argue the case for her couple at all.
And yes, implying reviewers are ignorant for not knowing what canon despite it being a “common term” is indeed a personal attack on their intelligence. Please refrain from being rude from now on.
Also, I don’t see how your defining yaoi has to do with anything about the review itself. Why… did you go on a tangent about that?
Emeryl Says:
December 28th, 2006 at 5:32 pmI didn’t call anyone ignorant. Everyone has weird words that they never hear, then they learn them for the first time and suddenly notice it everywhere. It happens. There’s no reason to get flustered about it.
If you want to know about why I replied about yaoi, you should look at Sanosuke’s post. I certainly didn’t bring it up first.
Dictionary.com is full of several definitions. Why did you purposely pick one that makes no sense for the context? As a translator, I still lack a huge amount of vocabulary, but when I look up a word I go with what makes the most sense. That’s just logical.
The second definition goes with exactly the context it IS being used in, so I don’t know why you quoted that. Think of this:
“Standard Couple”
That makes sense, doesn’t it? I would know what it meant.Canon is still a real word. It’s not a phrase or acronym or anything special associated with a specific fandom. Someone would have no reason to assume that you DON’T know the word.
I don’t know why you guys are so ruffled by this. I’ve asked third parties if I was being reasonable (because if the other side gets so flustered like this, I always ask people un-related to the subject if I’m being unreasonable). I even asked someone who I found that didn’t know the word “canon”. And no, they aren’t my “bestest best friends”. One person is just another moderator from a forum, and I’ve only had a brief conversation with him once.
No one thought I was being unreasonable in any way, so I think you guys are just over-reacting. It’s not that big of a deal.It’s just that by your phrasing, I’d have to start defining normal words on my page. How am I supposed to determine what random reader #33 thinks is normal? By those guidelines I’d be making random guesses, and the next person who views her site might know what “canon” is and not know what “manga” is.
But since “manga” is in your vocabulary, it’s not even mentioned although you could say it’s more of a niche word than “canon”. Should we start defining every word on the page?
To me it’s not just “canon”. You’re asking her to define words that people “might not know”. But she has no idea what words people don’t know, because people are all going to have a different set of vocabulary.
Naly Says:
December 28th, 2006 at 5:54 pmI’m afraid I have to -strongly- disagree with the posters above who argue in favor of visitors having the meaning of a word spoon-fed to them regarding a term that may not be familiar to them.
I’m a technical communications major who authors websites and regularly moderates content, presentation and navigation as part of my day to day job. Ten, even five years ago it would be commonplace to assume that the standard visitor to a site would have the information retrieval skills of a wet paper sack but that just isn’t the case today. Even young children in our public schools are taught how to operate engines such as Google and at the very least how to use those most ancient of information sources…books..in particular, dictionaries and thesauruses.
My point being, people today know (or should, if they have any business being online at all) how to look up and clarify words and concepts that puzzle them. Especially within a particular ‘niche’ of material.
For example, someone looking up fictions with a boy love content wouldn’t expect the term ‘canon’ to relate to biblical passages. No more than a baker looking up a recipe would expect a cup of nuts to refer to a container of metal parts meant to fit around a bolt. The English language has multiple definitions for many of its words, that is where common sense has to come into play. If I’m expecting to read a story about a standard couple in a series and someone uses the term “canon” pairing, it’s ridiculous to assume they mean there are biblical passages being paired together for a romantic entanglement.
Besides that minor point, the argument could be easily made that in defining one ‘unfamiliar’ term…what sets the standard for ‘unfamiliar?’ Many individuals who use the Internet do not speak English as a native tongue…so if an author is responsible for making certain the viewer knows every little term used on their site or in their work, where do they draw the line? I’m certain there are people out there who don’t know the meaning of words such as “a” or “the” or even “and” …so in that case, should an author utterly destroy the logical presentation of content just to offer definitions of each and every word on their page/site? Or perhaps offer citation after every word linking it to a dictionary definition? That seems a little ridiculous to me and I think it would make things extremely difficult to read for anyone else who would, in fact, know those words…but that seems to be your points on the matter, if taken to the extreme.
The information is out there for anyone to look up. Instead of pelting the author of a site or work for not spoon-feeding the ignorance of the masses, give them a little credit for assuming the viewer is intelligent enough to have a) found their site to begin with and b) capable of looking up (and deciphering the meaning of) any word they use on sheer context of use.
Misao Says:
December 28th, 2006 at 11:21 pmEmeryl, you’ve stated on your opinions on whether a site should take responsibility in defining words that people “may not know” and we have started our opinions on the same matter. You have your own viewpoint on the extent of a website’s responsibilities and we have ours. Keep in mind that this a review. The site owner requested a review from us to make suggestions on what she can do to improve her site and point out errors that she may have missed.
I, as the reviewer, did not understand the use of ‘canon’ used throughout the site, and thus pointed out the simple fact. Everything in this review is a suggestion to the website owner on what she can do. Even though the owner of Silently Howling has requested a review, she is not obligated to take any or all of the suggestions to heart. Therefore, she can choose to ignore the suggestion. This will be her decision, not yours or ours to make on her behalf.
As far as what the vocabulary ‘canon’ means according to context, I think we have all made it pretty clear. Therefore, I don’t believe any further elaborations on the extent of an individual’s vocabulary is required.