Happy Wednesday! 
As you can see, I've changed the style again! Got a little tired of the pink and the hearts, hehe. There is now also a style switcher on the top of the sidebar! Feel free to customize your visit. 
There is a pink one you can choose if you liked the last style. Also, if you have any suggestions for colors or changes I should add, let me know!
Tomorrow a new episode of the :podcast: UCF Digital Media Podcast will be recorded and hopefully up for download by the end of the night! I've already planned part of what I'm going to cover for my segment. The last couple episodes I have mainly just talked about WoW and leveling and I would like to get away from that for a while.
So this week I will be talking about link exchanges, clubs, cliques, TCGs and fanlistings! I consider this to be an entirely unique world on the web that mostly attracts personal websites. The thing that is so cool about certain link exchange clubs is that they are interactive. Instead of trying to mindlessly promote your site through top site lists or button rotations, you can actually get involved in the web community.
This is not to say that top sites and rotations aren't effective or good; I list my site on a few. I am only saying that your experience as a site owner will be enriched if you become more involved. If you want to look at it purely from a "numbers" perspective: my experience, as an owner and a visitor, is that websites whose owners are personable and active in the community are more likely to attract greater numbers of visitors and keep them, as opposed to an anonymous-type blogger who randomly posts information. I would like to think that your website is like an extension of yourself, your "home" away from home on the Internet. You must be inviting in some way and also encourage interactivity for your visitors.
Some examples of this kind of community: Quilting Bee, Star Jar, Fanlistings, and TCGs.
I'm not going to go too much more into detail or I won't have anything new left to say for the podcast I'd love to have more opinions from people on this subject though, so please let me know what you think! With your permission, I may quote you when we record our show tomorrow. Woot!
I still use LJ too for friends, etc, so I know what you mean. I just meant you get mucho kudos for visiting my site to comment instead of leaving them on my LJ feed. 
Thank you, Irish!