The Automotive Blogosphere seems to be filled with fan sites, empty content, and snarky comments. I have been as guilty as anyone in pushing the type of babble that permeates the big name websites, and almost all the sites have the same formula, well except this one that is. You know the drill at other sites, features on Exotics, LOL Cars (FAIL, That will buff out, Exotic Wrecks, etc.), Video Features, Top 10 lists, Caption Contests, Question of the Day, Recaps, Ebay and Craigslist car ads, and on and on and on. You get the picture, right? Sometimes, you have to ask yourself is there anything else? Make the jump…. There are two unique automotive blog sites that come to mind: Hemmings Blog, and one that I’m heavily associated with, Automotive Traveler. I was tapped to become a columnist for Automotive Traveler by the managing editor, Richard Truesdell, when I filched an image that I used for an article I wrote at another site, without giving him credit. What is interesting is that I apologized, gave him credit, and he liked what I was writing about (Obscure Muscle Cars) and the rest is history. My column is called Ramblings because I was doing just that, rambling around the Northeast when I was a manufacturers representative for an Import Truck Distributor. I would write about some obscure Roadside Discoveries while I was driving around New England, or I would think about particular model that was just discontinued, or zero in on a vehicle I found that was for sale in a series called “Not Found on Ebay”. The other contributors on the site are pretty diverse as well. Instead of content based on just Cars and Trucks, there are articles on where to travel, places to stay, traveling with children, and if pets make great traveling companions. That’s where the Traveler in Automotive Traveler comes into play. The writing is superb (if I say so myself), and the content is aimed at a slightly older audience than your typical car blog. It is also a much more balanced blog because more than half of the contributors are women, something that is rare in the male dominated automotive sector of the blogging community. If you would like to take a look at how different an Automotive Blog can be, follow this link. It is a site that you can recommend to your parents, without having to explain anything. It may not be up to the minute as far as breaking news, but it is full of interesting postings. After bookmarking Hooniverse, this should be the site you should bookmark next.
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