Truemors
New Channel and Feature Pages
Channels and Features
Welcome to the next step in NowPublic's evolution: the newly-redesigned Channel pages.
Previously, these pages were just boring ol' columns of headlines. This is no longer the case: our main Channels are now like topic-specific front pages, showing off the newest and the best stories, photos and videos.
If you are passionate about a particular element of the news world, you can tune in more specifically than ever before, keeping your finger on the pulse of the news cycle and getting your info custom-delivered.
Of course, different topics attract different types of coverage. A hurricane is best described in pictures, whereas a tech review requires lots of words. Our channels can be configured to reflect this, and bring out the best of our content.
It's about more than just looking pretty, though: during breaking news, events unfold quickly, and we can be ready and waiting. When a hot-button issue gets discussed, the comments come in with alarming speed... NowPublic never sits still, and neither do our users. Since things move so fast in the online news world, staff editors can now manage these Channel pages more fully, from featuring original content to drawing readers' attention to a particular discussion. Also, we will soon be asking some of our guest editors to take charge of these channels from time to time, if they are so inclined.
Topic-based ticker-tape? We can do that.
Selected video? Yeah.
Channel-based polls? Yup.
In addition, we can now create event-specific Channel pages when the need arises - our Beijing Olympics page is a current example.
The new Channel pages are your homepage away from home.
But that's not all. We are also proud to introduce...
Scan
What's hot and what's not? Now you'll know, thanks to a new feature called Scan. Main Channel and selected Feature pages now have a Scan tab, which reveals a set of tools for monitoring and filtering the ongoing live chatter of the Internet. We can now contextualize and even geolocate microblog entries from places like Twitter, Pownce, and Identi.ca, separating out the newsworthy from the what-I-ate-for-breakfast posts: readers will be able to follow a story as it develops in real time, covered by the people closest to the action. Furthermore, these newly-contextualized snippets are then vetted by you, the user. Ever wish you could good-stuff something from another site? Now you can.
When a newsworthy event is mentioned on a microblogging site, it will appear in the Scanner. Should a topic be mentioned in a location-specific manner, a pin will appear on the map, so you can visualize the where and when like never before. When news breaks, you are taken to the scene of the event, and you will also see which NowPublic contributors are based nearby.
When events are unfolding quickly, keeping your ear to the ground has never been easier.
at 15:14 on August 11th, 2008
Jordan, the change will take some time to get used to but I like it.
On another note, have you guys thought about having a NowPublic navigation bar? I was looking through TechCrunch the other day and saw that they had their own nav bar and that anyone can create one. The company that does the nav bars is called Conduit. I like the TechCrunch nav bar and am sure NowPublic can get some good use out of their own nav bar as well.
Keep up the good work buddy.
at 22:18 on August 11th, 2008
It is a change, that is for certain, I cannot say at this point if I like it better or not!
What has not changed though, "World Posts" are still in Environment and "Cultural Post" are still in World and vice versa and some Post are all over the Place as usual!
Can we get the Post in the category they belong!? We do have one choice in the category and that is where the Post should be! Now we could have a general window with all the latest post in order regardless of their category, yet when it comes to the Environment page and finding there Politics does not make any sense, especially not if the Post has absolutely nothing to do with Environment, not even remotely! Same goes for all other Pages! I think it is frustrating to find any thing! Not so much because of the lay out, but because of Post being every where in all categories!
Is the index coming soon? It does look good though and as other have said maybe getting used to! I personally like Al Jazeera their lay out as well as the CGBC their lay out, easy and for any one to find every thing even though CGBC could make some changes!
Sorry, if I am not all that enthusiastic about it! I would be if the same Post would not be in all futures, unless it does actually cover all futures, wish would be rare I think!
at 22:41 on August 11th, 2008
Hello Jordan,
When a may give some suggestions to improve NP:
1. Give every channel one colour, like you did with the Olympic Channel (red)
2. I have seen every channel has now an own lay-out. That confuses me. On every channel you have to look where is what. So my suggestion is: choose for one lay-out for all channels or do that anyway for the top of the page.
3. Uploading videos is hard (i mailed about that with Rachel); suggestion, make a field where you just put in the title of the video or the url of the video. Makes it a lot easier to upload videos.
4. Although we have at our office a reasonable fast connection, it takes a lot of time working on NP. I have to wait a lot of time.
5. Don't know why, but after the change of lay-out opening of the channel-pages takes some time. Longer than before. May-be because of the slide-shows.
Keep-up the good work. Erik van Erne (Milieunet)
at 22:56 on August 11th, 2008
In reply to #2 Paschen at 22:18 on August 11th, 2008
I agree with you. Posts are everywhere and someone should reorganize that. Supereditor?? What is with the channel local. Many posts in other channels are really local issues and are no worldnews at all. That is of course always difficault. Someone reports and is enthousiastic about the won story and you want to show that to the whole world. So a supereditor should moderate the posts in the right channels.
I should like to see an index of all recents posts in all channels. Now you have to go to all channels to see all posts.
at 10:29 on August 12th, 2008
In reply to #3 Milieunet at 22:41 on August 11th, 2008
Oh yes, I agree. Index and archive would be just about ultra-fabulous! Since Im new here, its so hard to find old posts which I may have interests in, and since Im not familiar with the authors yet so its pretty cumbersome for me to backdate (like what I'm doing now actually).
However, there are some new shimmy additions that makes things so much easier than before. So thanks . *winks*
at 15:41 on August 12th, 2008
Hello
Many thanks for all your comments - there are some great suggestions here.
I thought I'd address a few recurring themes that have come up here:
- Stories appearing in the "wrong place": Stories appear in channels if they have been tagged with the name of that channel. When you create a story you can only choose one channel as its "home". However, sometimes members add to the tags to give the story more than one channel. This *can* sometimes be appropriate - eg if a story were about a famous person staging a campaign to save the rainforest. That would be relevant to the Environment channel, and also of interest to the Culture channel.
Having said all that sometimes members add channel tags so their story gets seen in as many places as possible - even if it doesn't makes sense for it to be in the channel. This isn't right, it confuses the channels, and we try to delete irrelevant channel tags wherever possible.
- Channel layouts: The aim is to be able to tailor the channels according to what kind of content works best for each. Just as an example, we might have some great photos of weird stuff in the Strange channel. So we want to prioritise those. On the other hand, we might have some great commentary in the World channel, so we would want to showcase the best of the stories. In view of this, the layout might be different in each channel.
Having said that we realise that there needs to be some consistency in the channels so that members know where to find things, so we will aim to make sure that you can always find some of the content in more or less the same place in each channel.
- An index of stories: I'm not too sure what is being referred to here, BUT... We already have a couple of ways of viewing all stories. Right now, you can see a list of "Most Popular good stuff" via the homepage, or from this link. http://www.nowpublic.com/developing?filter=news
You can also see the most recent stories that have come in on the site via this link:
http://www.nowpublic.com/developing?filter=news&order=recent
All stories are available in the archive - you can find them by doing a full text or tag search.
- Local channel: For sure - we want to be able to root stories in a Local category, rather than people having to define them as (eg) World and then appear in Local. Hopefully we will be able to introduce this soon.
- Channel download speed: We will definitely look into these concerns about the new channel formats taking longer. In the meantime, if you just want to see the stories but don't want to wait around, you could always bookmark the "headline" view of a channel, to see it in its previous format.
Please keep the feedback coming.
Rachel
at 01:51 on August 13th, 2008
Thanks Rachel for your information. It is good to see that our comments landed at the NP-team. Every change need some time to get used to. So let's see how it is going.
I still think some moderating of the channels is important, there are too many stories on the same subject. Second, third and more stories on a subject could better be added as a comment to the first story.
gr Erik van Erne
at 06:18 on August 13th, 2008
Thanks Erik. About the moderating of the channels - each channel has an NP team member responsible for it and you can see who that is by looking at "Feature Manager" displayed in the channel. I know what you mean about repetition of stories - right now we are a bit hamstrung by the functionality but it's something we are looking at, and will hopefully be able to address in the next phases of the channel development.
Many thanks for your comment.
at 07:40 on August 13th, 2008
Hello Rachel,
I have seen that every channel has a NP team member. I don't say it is an easy job, but it will make NP better than before.
at 19:56 on August 26th, 2008
Hope this is in the right place....
I have a concern with the Polls placed on channel pages. Though I don't want to say they are bad, but recently the poll I enjoy participating in, seems kind of generic and basically leads the viewer. There appears to be 1 correct answer at the top, with the additional answers declining in attractiveness as you read down the list. I think most people will pick the answer that makes them feel the best, when the rest of the choices appear skewed in a particular direction.
I know creating polls isn't on the top of the TODO list, but its just something I have noticed. Maybe this isn't experienced in every channel, but in the one I primarily view, they have been average. (Sorry if you spent hours creating it). I would rather see average than nothing at all, but it may be an area to address next time someone tries to bail out of work early cause its been a slow day.
at 20:10 on August 26th, 2008
In reply to #10 PlanMyGreen at 19:56 on August 26th, 2008
Are you talking about the one on the environment page?
at 20:21 on August 26th, 2008
In reply to #11 amyjudd at 20:10 on August 26th, 2008
A bit :) Not saying I could do better, just kinda bland.
at 20:32 on August 26th, 2008
In reply to #12 PlanMyGreen at 20:21 on August 26th, 2008
Not only there, just the one I have been consistently looking at.
at 20:53 on August 26th, 2008
In reply to #9 Milieunet at 07:40 on August 13th, 2008
Very true, its nice to know there is some personal attention, and I think the channels are looking pretty nice.
at 23:16 on August 26th, 2008
In reply to #10 PlanMyGreen at 19:56 on August 26th, 2008
I second your comment here PlanMyGreen. I see the polls as leading of miss leading . Not as Objective at all. This is the case in all Futures though. No offence meant nor intended here Amy.
at 19:30 on August 31st, 2008
I had problems with 'Firefox' recently and after fixing some issues found out that I lost my 'Highlight' toolbar and I am unable to reinstall it.
Any suggestions
Serge (the Concierge)
http://www.sergetheconcierge.com
at 19:36 on August 31st, 2008
In reply to #16 leconcierge at 19:30 on August 31st, 2008
Hi Serge: Sorry to hear about that. Have you looked in the Firefox menu at Tools>Add ons? Is Highlight one of the add-ons appearing in there? If it says "Enable" next to it, click that and reboot Firefox. If that doesn't work, please send me a message with details of the version of Firefox you're using, as well as your computer, and I'll do my best to help you get it fixed.
Thanks, Rachel
at 19:50 on September 4th, 2008
In reply to #11 amyjudd at 20:10 on August 26th, 2008
Great job on the updated Polls, Amy. I can definately tell you have thought hard about the topics on the environment page. Hummm, who to pick on next......
at 12:17 on September 5th, 2008
In reply to #18 PlanMyGreen at 19:50 on September 4th, 2008
Thanks for the praise on the poll!
at 20:44 on December 13th, 2008
My experience with your new site this weekend is that it is a mess! If I click on my stories,photos and videops, I get all the drafts Ive made this weekend, and it vtells me thyat 43 people have read my raft even though I cannot get it to publish it myself! Each time I click on the tags, it says no tags found (Ive put my own on!) and then wipes off what Ive added and tells me to put on tags! Will it ever stop repeating itself, and allow me to publish the four pieces Ive not been able to so far! This seems a right royal mess to me!