On the plus side, this site is actually quite pretty. Yeah, it’s stereotypical black, but the white text on the background is easy to read, and the moon graphic that’s used for navigation is quite lovely. On the downside, the front page is too long. And there’s burning times stuff about actual folks that were killed. (Didn’t click, but I hate those things since the majority of the people burned/hanged/etc weren’t actually witches. And I’m just plain sick of burning times stuff.) Also mention of Tempest Smith, which, while quite sad, isn’t something completely unexpected. But here’s a good thing: they actually seem to value copyright and make mention of Fair Use.

Let’s take a look at “What is Wicca”. *headdesk* The Rede is Law?! It most certainly is not. Rede means “advice”. And if you read the whole thing, instead of four lines (which is an improvement from the usual 8 words…), you’ll realize that it doesn’t say anything about what you can’t do. Just what you can. (If it doesn’t hurt anyone, do whatever you want. However, there’s no injunction in that lovely poem about if you can/can’t do something that does hurt someone.) There is no rules? So, does that mean that Wicca is whatever you want it to be, and if you worship the toilet bowl, you can still claim to be Wiccan? Feh.

“You choose what works for you and spit out the rest”?! The problem with this is that you end up with these rabid bunnies who attempt to call… say, Kali and Eris into the same circle. There’s so much cultural pillaging and god-shopping that one ends up with a hopeless mess that makes no sense and can actually be offensive to the gods. Not to mention the fact that the one who cobbles this mess together learns nothing beyond “this looks kewl!” without understanding the how’s and why’s behind it.

Fluffy. Very fluffy.

It is now with great trepidation that I click on “What is Wicca”.

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First thought? Oooh, pretty…. A couple of years ago, Red Cedars reviewed this site. Back then, it was on a free server.

Now? Desiree has sprung for her own domain. And it’s beautiful. The splash page (which I typically hate) is a thing of beauty and simplicity. When I went into the main wing (which is the only part that I’m reviewing), it stayed beautiful. Only downside? Something’s off in the code. Mozilla Firefox keeps telling me that it’s transferring data from the site even after the page is complete.

There’s this little iframe thing going on in there that’s so lovely to look at, I could cry. The content is original, it’s fresh, and it’s written by someone who knows what she’s talking about.

I can’t say enough good things about this site. It’s beautiful to look at, it’s easy to navigate (with beautiful navigational tools), with marvelous content.

Desiree’s old geocities sites were pretty, especially considering that she was in high school when she built them. With her own domain, she’s created a site that is not only truly a beauty to behold, but also reflects the maturity that she’s gained over the years.

Score: 10/10
Link: Desiree’s Musings
Reviewed by Enyo Perseus

Hm. Shadow Master’s World. Not really sure how I came across this one, but I thought it was worthy of review.

Starting with the front page…. It loaded almost instantly on my broadband. The background is lovely. It’s not distracting. It’s not hard to read against. The color of the text against the patterned background is lovely. Only downside is, the title graphic doesn’t fit with the background. I don’t think the Celtic knot horizontal rule serves any real purpose, either, but it just doesn’t fit.

First page content: Not bad. The author points out that Wicca does not equate witchcraft. Only quibble I have (aside from the odd typo here and there) is that she says “Most Wiccans are Witches, But there are many Witches who have never been part of Wicca Practices.” I would have said “All Wiccans are witches, but not all witches are Wiccan.” But, then again, I also periodically get called a pagan fundamentalist. (more…)

Maybe it’s because I’ve been sick and I’m starting to feel better. Maybe it’s because I’ve got a really cool RSS feed. But for some reason, I’m feeling the need to review a second site today. So, here I am at a Geocities site. I don’t recall how I found this gem, but it was tagged in my bookmarks for review.

Let’s start with the URL. http://www.geocities.com/wiccen06/page1.html. Okay. “wiccen06″? What’s up? Were there already five other users who don’t know how to spell “Wiccan”?

On the first page, I am informed that “The site that has information that will help you on your path to becomming Wiccan.” I’m not even going to touch the spelling error in there.

Background? Purple satin-y texture. Very five years ago. I’m always surprised when people are still using it. Ho-hum. I’ve also been challenged by the web page: “So, you wanna be a Wiccan or a Witch?…
Enter if you dare…”

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Hmm… I swear, this site didn’t look like this when I marked it for a review. Oh, well.

Now, it’s a PHPNuke site. Just like Paganetwork used to be. In fact, it uses the exact same theme that Paganetwork used to use. This is exactly why Paganetwork doesn’t use Nuke anymore. Too many other sites use it and look exactly the same.

I’m kind of peeved with the first article. It tells me how to use the site. Now, come on. If I need to be told how to get around your site, then most likely you a.) think your viewers are stupid and need to be hand-held or b.) have a poorly designed site and your viewers need help getting around so they don’t get lost.

It’s a nuke site, for gods’ sake, so it’s not like it takes a lot of design effort.

Unfortunately, most of the site is locked down to members only. And what I’ve seen isn’t enough to make me want to take the time to join.

Ho-hum. Another beginner’s site with spells and stuff, only this time put in a content management system. It’s pretty much a yawn site.

Link: White Wicca
Score: 3/10
Reviewed by Enyo Perseus

At first glance, it’s not too heinous. Okay, so it’s got a black background. Negative points for entering into the cliche. The text is centered and has no margins, which sucks, because it’s hard to read. The text reads more like a “Wicca” infomercial, which tells me right off the bat that this person is not an initiate. I’ve only seen infomercials from eclectics.

But scrolling down? Now that just pissed me off. What do I see? This: Important Note: I strongly encourage all visitors to my site who wish to purchase books and other products about Wicca and Paganism to shop on Amazon.com directly from my site, as the commission I receive will help me keep this site up and running. That section of my site, linked below, can also be reached here. Each book and other product available on that section of the site has an accompanying mini-review that I wrote, and all are highly recommended by me. Or, if you regularly vistit my site and also regularly shop online at Amazon.com, please shop there via the general link down below (directly above my Dreambook). Thank you for supporting my site!

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I first reviewed this site over two years ago. I figure, you know a lot can change in two years, so maybe it’s time to review it again. Especially since I didn’t give it a good review two years ago, and when I was checking links, it had a different look than what I recalled.

The “entrance” page is definitely different. There’s the pretty purple door, which is (IMO) entirely overused. (Why would you use something that you have to instruct visitors on to get into your site, anyway? Wouldn’t you want to make it easy to get around? Hint: if you have to *tell* me how I can see the rest of your site, chances are good that you aren’t doing this.) There’s a poorly spelled disclaimer. There’s an excess of graphics scrolling a long way down the page which do nothing, really, for the content of the site itself. Can’t understand why it’s even there, really.

You go inside, and then you get the “Wicca” page. Okay, first off, they say that Witch Craft, Wicca, and Paganism are the same thing. No. That’s wrong. Wicca is part of paganism, but not all pagans are witches. All Wiccans are witches, but not all witches are Wiccan. So much for giving valuable information. (And it never bodes well when the first paragraph annoys me.)

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This is a site that I’ve been meaning to review. And, clearly, someone wants me to review it, because it keeps showing up in my logs as a search. Sadly, I’ve not done it (until now) because I wanted to be able to give it the review that it deserves. Fact is, it’s a huge site. And I can’t look around a site of this size in ten or fifteen minutes and give it the kind of review that it deserves. So, unlike the normal review, which I do in a day, this one’s taking several days.

But it’s worth it.

Looking at the first page, I can see that I like the lay out. The colors are neat, clean, and subdued, which, IMO, is the ideal for a content driven site. The only fusses that I have about the front page is that the boxes could have a bit of space around them. The text gets too close to the box and then feels claustrophobic. Also, I find the front page a bit too long, but this site is more like a printed magazine, I think, than a journal. It’s even complete with a “letter from the editor” section and a table of contents bit. And you know what? It’s different. It’s cool. I’m also quite pleased with the search engine feature at the bottom of the page. For huge sites, it’s handier than Hel. (In fact, I’ve been thinking about doing one of those for WarGoddess in general, since right now, the only thing that’s search-able is what runs off of the Movable Type structure, but that’s neither here nor there right now.) Suffice it to say, search engines and site maps on huge sites are good. And the journal offers both.

(Note: this is long, so click the continue reading link to see the rest of it.)
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