05/30 20 Types of Blog Posts and where's my ring?

(Note: I was sitting here typing and suddenly noticed I'm not wearing my wedding ring, which I very rarely take off. I'm really concerned but a cursory search of the house has turned up nothing, so I am hoping I took it off at work while I was repairing a white board. This is really upsetting to me, so I'm turning in kind of a half-finished entry tonight. If anyone reads this, I'd appreciate some good thoughts as I really hope it isn't lost.)

(update - found it! yay! I moved a chair and plop it landed on the floor. It's not funny but it's funny how I don't notice it very often but when it's gone I literally can't think of anything else. I am also a little disturbed at this twice-yearly ritual...one does think of Alzheimer's...)

So I was trying to find a way to formalize the content, so I would be filling in an outline instead of staring at a blank page and fighting the Idea Demon for a scrap of inspiration. I googled a little and found a couple of really interesting posts about different types of blog entries:

Original list (Darren Rowse) : He's just got an interesting site period, but this post inspired me to try and use this structure for the 30 day project. All idea credit for this is his.

Challenge (bunnygirl): She was going to write one post of each type and keep track of it, which she did.

So what if I am eighteen months late to the party. I am going to do it anyway, besides it will get me through the next 20 days and by then I should either be rolling on my own or off watching Tivo and wondering why my life still sucks.

Here's the list - I stole the HTML from bunnygirl's site, tablefied it, and added a space to link the post once I have it written. I took the initial definitions from Darren and tried to rewrite into something I can understand. I also tried to group related types of posts.

She struck the posts as she did them and I will do the same:

The 20 Types of blog posts are: (Why is Blogger's table handling so sucky?)

Type	Definition	Post
Contrasting Options	contrast products, services or approaches that outlines the positives and negatives of each choice.	Pending
Informational	Define or expand on a concept. Will either be a literature review, a research, a link or a rant.	Pending
Instructional	Tell people how to do something. If you include items from somewhere else it's a link or literature review.	Pending
List	Brief list of phrases or sentences around a theme or question, and develop each into a paragraph or two. Must be your own content. Probably a instructional or informational at heart.	Pending
Literature Review (Darren called it a Collation Post, some people call it a sling blade...)	Like research but more semantic than empirical. Identify a question, but instead of empirical data, research what others have written/said. Collect everyone’s ideas (with short quotes) and tie them together with a few of your own comments to draw out the common themes that you see.	Pending
Research	pose a question that can be empirically answered gather data (if you are reading and quoting from other people's work it's a survey, not research) assemble the data into a usable form make inferences, find conclusions	Pending
Inspirational	Tell a story of success or paint a picture of ‘what could be’.	Pending
Interview	Interview (1 or 2 questions, you are not Playboy) or a guest post.	Pending
Profiles	Do some background research on an interesting person. Point out how they’ve reached the position they are in and write about the characteristics that they have that others in your niche might like to develop to be successful.	Pending
Hypothetical Posts	Pick a something that ‘could’ happen down the track in your industry and articulate implications.	Pending
Memes and Projects	Suggest an idea, offer a poll, solicit a memetic sense of a topic or situation.	Pending
Prediction and Review Posts	Doesn't have to be December 31 - this would be fun to do the night before your birthday or anniversary. Review what happened this year Make predictions for next year (good time for a list)	Pending
Critique	Find positives in what others do and make constructive suggestions for improvements.	Pending
Debate	Between two people, between a blogger and ‘all comers’ or even between a blogger and themselves.	Pending
Link	link to a post/article but add your own commentary & insight so you don't get flagged as a spammer (which my old blog did repeatedly)	Pending
‘Problem’ Posts	Review negatives of a product or service, along with suggested solutions/workarounds.	Pending
Rant	sound off, one two, sound off, three four...	Pending
Review</dt>	Share your opinion and ask readers for their opinion. Opinions are conclusions based on provable facts. Rants are attacks in the form of opinions based on other opinions, or data which cannot be sourced.	Reviewed Cormac McCarthy's "The Road"
Satirical	See The Onion.	Pending

6 down, 24 to go. I hope I find my ring.