With or Without CAPTCHA?

Hello my amazing followers and lurkers, hope you guys are all doing great. I have an important question to ask you. What is your opinion about CAPTCHA?

Don't know what CAPTCHA is? CAPTCHA is that image that you see with scrambled letter and/or numbers whenever you are going to post a comment in most sites nowadays. It is used to verify that the computer through which the comment is being made is handled by a human instead of a bot. This, in turn, helps to weed out spammers from actual followers. But it seems that it also deters people from commenting at all.

The wonderful ladies at the Vampire Book Club were asking their followers to voice their opinions on the matter. Apparently, the topic on how much people dislike this feature has been doing the rounds on the net with an impressively big number of bloggers, articles and videos on how to get rid of this feature. I'm sorry to say that I was oblivious to it, so thank you Chelsea for that great post.

Some CAPTCHAs are simpler than others, some are almost impossible to read. I have to admit that when the CAPTCHA is too difficult to read I give up on commenting altogether. My question is, do you?

For the time being I have disabled this extra step from my blog to see if it makes any difference when it comes to new comments. Still, I will love to know your honest opinions on this feature and whether or not you are happy to see it go. Please answer the following poll and express your opinions on the comments section below.

Poll:

Is Captcha Stopping you from Commenting?
	Yes, I hate captcha!
	Sometimes, depending on the captcha.
	No, I comment regardless
pollcode.com free polls

Polls During April

Hello my followers and lurkers!

For a while now I've been considering adding a newsletter to my blog. Something simple that maybe runs on a monthly basis, or when necessary (like when I make changes to the blog or such).

But before I embark on making a newsletter I will love to have your opinions on the matter. So, during the month of April I will be running two polls on the matter. You can find them both on the sidebar.

UPDATE: This poll has been replaced. The poll remains but the images are different.

The first poll (the one on the top of the image on the right) is on whether or not you'll join the newsletter if the option were to be available. Would you? Would you not? Any other thoughts on the matter?

And The Winner is…

The tally has already been done and finally the Goodreads Choice Awards results are in, my most sincere congratulations to this year’s winners!!:

Winners per category:

• Best Favorite Books of 2011 
• Divergent by Veronica Roth 
• Best Fiction 
• 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami 
• Best Mystery & Thriller 
• Smokin’ Seventeen by Janet Evanovich 
• Best Historical Fiction 
• The Paris Wife by Paula Mclain 
• Best Fantasy 
• A Dance with Dragons by George R.R. Martin 
• Best Paranormal Fantasy 
• Shadowfever by Karen Marie Moning 

Final Round – Goodreads Choice Awards

The final round for the Goodreads Choice Awards is open; the top ten nominees per category are gracing the voting polls one last time and it’s up to you, the reader, to choose this year’s winners!

You get to choose between the top ten options from the previous round. This final round begins today and ends on November 30, 2011.

You can vote through here: http://www.goodreads.com/award/choice/2011 or through the widget on the right.

Semifinal Round – 2011 Goodreads Choice Awards

The semifinal round for Goodreads Choice Awards has begun. The top 15 votes per category from the first round have been combined with the top 5 write-in per category giving you a new set of options. The second round commenced today November 14, 2011 and will be open until November 20, 2011. This round will narrow down the competition in half for the next and final round. Vote for your Favorites! You can access the voting page through the widget on the right side of the blog.

The Categories are: