We've gotten
some feedback lately that we should feature more updates on the Xanga frontpage... and re-focus Xanga on its roots as a blogging community (good points,
Dan!). RaVnR even created
this cool logo for us:
It was kinda kismet to read it - that's actually exactly the direction we're moving in! We've been mocking up some changes to the frontpage, and would love your feedback on some of the potential changes we're considering:
1. TURNING THE XANGA FRONTPAGE INTO A BLOG We're considering turning the whole frontpage into a giant blog... made up of hand-selected posts written by you, our users!
Here's how the frontpage works now: we currently feature a post or two every day. It's a surprising amount of work!
- We have to go out and find posts to feature..
- So many sites have Xanga Lock on... we have to ask those users to turn it off (which takes time).
- We often ask permission to feature posts, especially if they are on sensitive topics (which also takes time).
So we're thinking about changing up the model a bit:
- Rather than go out and find posts, we'll create a way for you guys to submit your posts to be featured (so we don't have to ask permission).
- We'll host the post on our own blog, so we don't have to coordinate turning off Xanga Locks (oh my, this will save so much time!)
- We won't have to ask permission, because you'll submit your own posts to be featured.
As a result of these changes, we'd be able to turn the Xanga frontpage into a group blog... updated maybe 10 times a day or so? Hopefully even more!
How do you like dem apples? Please let us know!
2. EXPANDING THE "FEATURED CONTENT" MODULE ON THE RIGHTWe added an orange module of "Featured Content" on the right side of the page a while ago. It links to the post that have the most comments in the last 24 hours or so. It's a great way to highlight posts that the community is buzzing over.
We're thinking about expanding that module, so that we're driving more traffic directly to people's Xanga sites. We display 5 posts now... we're thinking about expanding it to 20/25 posts? Also, we'd like to show the titles of posts as well (we don't do that now), so people know which ones they're likely to enjoy?
That way, we could drive a lot more traffic directly to people's pages!
Of course, sometimes we come across a gem of a post that doesn't have a lot of comments on it. We could always toss that up on the Xanga Frontpage blog
.
What do you think?
3. FOCUS THE FRONTPAGE ON BLOGGINGWe have been featuring a number of things on the frontpage, including photos, videos, and pulse. While we love all of our feature, our sense is that Xanga is first and foremost a blogging community. We don't want that to get lost in the mix.
So while those features are fun, we'd like to refocus the frontpage largely on blogging. We've been meaning to do this for a while, but Dan's post about it really pushed this up on our timeline.
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Those are some of our thoughts on a frontpage redesign. In terms of the look of the page, it would look largely the same. It would just have more blogs on it...
Thanks to everyone for all their thoughts on how to make the site better... let us know what you think!
Comments (202)
This is why you are the best Xanga Team Member, evar (shhh don't tell the other guys). Thanks for letting us hang out here, it's been a blast! The Xanga Team is my new hero.
p.s. first!!
SECOND! if that counts. dang you're fast stewie!
looks like you guys read Theo's blog and are taking action huh?
ah, the digg model. great!
so,
i love the idea of making the xanga frontpage a huge blog where people can have their blogs posted. i think this is a much better idea, and it saves you guys some time and frustration.
i would definitely use these new features you're thinking of adding to xanga.
sounds like a great idea!! i'm all for it! can't wait to see how it turns out!
6th!
Sounds like a great change. Do it!
The only thing about making it where we can ask for our posts to be featured is that there are some great bloggers who wouldn't ask. I know I wouldn't. I have been featured (twice, I believe), and I loved it, but I would never ask to be featured.
Is there a way that the featured blog could also be something a reader recommends? Just a thought.
I like all the ideas flowing out there though. (And I like the new logo.)
--Kristin
whatever :)
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>>>>>>>>>>>>>> I LOVE IT ! ! ! <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
Go go go Xanga! I love Xanga forevar. :)
Hol' on a sec here.
Featured content links to posts that have "the most comments over the past 24 hours or so." And then... drives more viewers to those posts?
The posts that, by definition, are already getting the most views are the ones we want to make sure get some attention paid to them? Is that really what we want Featured Content to be for?
sounds like a fabulous idea.
question: by posting it under your (thexangateam) blog, does that mean we wouldn't see footprints/traffic on our own site? part of the great thing about going to the actual blog is being able to surf their other entries (a way to boost your subs/meet new people outside of the "featured" blog) and yes, watch your own footprints/traffic increase.
that's definitely not the reason i blog, but it's nice to see that people read
Awesomesauce!!!
That sounds awesome!
@MBL76 - that's a good point ... sometimes the "diamonds in the rough" don't get enough attention, while the already well-publicized posts get over-exposed.
Sounds awesome!! Would you automatically feature the content that's submitted to be featured, or would you pick from the ones that were submitted? Because otherwise, you could end up featuring some weird stuff.
Love the ideas though =]
yes yes yes!! i love the idea of us being able to submit blogs to be considered. that way if we do write something possibly feature-worthy, even the meekest of us xangites have a chance to be discovered. (of course, our blogs might stink too, in which case we will have to deal with the fact that our writing is not that good and THAT is why we are not featured. heh heh.)
definitely add titles to the featured content. i was on the xanga main page last night trying to find somebody new to read, but without titles it's just a complete guess. i found one i really enjoyed, one i was lukewarm about, and 2 i'd never be regular readers on. titles would at least give us an idea of where we're going.
i don't mind the pulse, pictures, etc. being on the page, but it'd be nice if they were "below the fold" rather than hogging up space on top.
thanks so much for your continued commitment to the xanga-world. :)
@doraemonxo - Yah Dan posted something similar in March, which was also helpful. We'vebeen experimenting with the frontpages for our other sites, and have learned a lot from that - we're now incorporating those learnings into Xanga's frontpage. I should clarify though - the frontpage will bemoderated by a human editor! So it may look a bit like Digg, but it's human edited...
@Krissy_Cole - Yah we may reach out from time to time to Xangans to ask if we can feature a post! It should hopefully be a minority of posts though. BTW, I don't mean to suggest that this is our new logo. It was just neat to see a logo that communicated our focus on blogging. The logo used to say "the weblog community", so we've definitely been thinking about returning to that.
@BarelyJen - Yah, that's the downside to this approach. But we'll link to the site and give credit where credit is due! Also, this way it will be a ton easier to feature blog posts... so we should feature a lot more sites this way. Oh yah, and we'll have way more direct links to blog posts on the right side of the page!
@laurenmaureen - Heh, we would def screen what gets published to our frontpage .
I think all of this sounds great. The one suggestion I have is to limit the amount of featured content to a little bit less of what you are considering. If you have too many in the featured content list, it may overwhelm the page and make the page a little less attractive. Otherwise, I like the direction you guys are heading on. You all rock!
Sounds great.
Full of good ideas. =)
-ray leeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
Remodel the frontpage with the blog (thats a really good idea!), but keep similarities to the old page if you can. People like familiarity sometimes
I never thought I'd see the day when Dan's posts actually influenced Xanga, but then again I've see a lot of crazy in my day.
I think that it is a good idea to drive the traffic to the blogs. Yes Xanga is a social-networking site, but it isn't Facebook or MySpace. It's about the content. If someone wants to do a photo album, they should get a Flicker account or go to MySpace. Xanga should be about what is written. To me, your competition is not MySpace or Facebook; those tools are built for an ADHD generation. Xanga is about writing and connecting to people via thoughts on issues. Xanga is not a gossip rag or a touchy-feely site. It's about the issues and hitting them head on. In a way, Xanga is LiveJournal for a younger generation.
I do have a question about the idea of Featured Posts: let's say that someone does want to feature a post and they submit it. The whole point of featuring a post is to say, "Hey, blogger X had something good to say about subject Y. Here's what (s)he had to say." You reward the bold thoughts with traffic. In this way, you give that post much more exposure not only though the front page but also on the search engines since there are now more links to the post.
But you say that people have to submit their posts to circumvent Friends Lock so you can post it to a community blog. I think this is a bad idea and doomed to be an EPIC FAIL as re-posting the content to a community blog will drive traffic away from the original poster's site as people will click the links on the front page and since those links don't point back to the original post, they will not see the additional traffic from search engines.
Let me help you with a thought: change the modus operandi.
When someone submits their post to be featured, one of the conditions should be that if they have on Friend Lock or whatever that if their post is featured, for that post and that post only the links on the front page will go directly to the post bypassing the Friend's Lock. This will mean changing your API a bit and could become a way for someone to hack a person's account, but it would be a much more elegant solution. When they submitted their post for Featured Content, they would have to check a box indicating that they agree to have the Friend's Lock circumvented and waive the right for the post that they are submitting.
Of course, you could always have a requirement of being featured as not having Friend's Lock, but that has negative consequences too. I would also recommend that you also include some explicit content on the front page too. This can be done tastefully, perhaps through the usual means of saying, "Hey, there's filtered content here, log in and verify if you want to read it."
I bring this latter point up because I don't think that it would be fair to not give racier sites a change to have traffic. Now, I'm not suggesting that the Xanga homepage turn into a jump page for p0rN and I can see how there could be legal issues in linking to adult content, but there are always exceptions to the rule.
Consider the movie Requiem for a Dream. It is a very intense, abstract, artistic film. I think that it is a very important film for both those who are members of the industry and it is also a film that has a potent message for the general public. Do I think that it should be shown to eight year olds? NO. But I do think that it would have been ludicrous to slap an NC-17 on the film and keep it from playing in theaters and making the DVD harder for the general public to get their hands on.
Like I said, there would have to be guidelines for featuring mature content, but I think that there is some content that would be above the threshold for the general populous, yet very relevant for some and I would hate to see those authors punished for daring to discuss topics that are edgy.
I also encourage you to highly re-think your idea of a community blog where traffic would not be directed back to the original post. If the whole point of redesigning the front page is to drive traffic to content, you need to actually build the front page in such a way that it accomplishes that goal. If you don't, I'll be here to impugn and lambaste and--though it pains me to think it--unite with Dan on this issue.
Thanks for taking the time to ready my two-cents worth.
@john - oops. I should read closer. haha!