More on the Redesign

We appreciate all of the passionate feeback regarding the new design very much – it’s very gratifying to see how much people care. Besides a steady stream of suggestions since the site went that we move to a horizontal format, the immediate catalyst for the switch was the addition of the new DIY and Review Links sections – we just couldn’t squeeze in any more columns vertically.

I understand the concern over marginalizing the categories that fall farther down on the page but here is what I find myself doing already: I look at the spotlight box to see what the newest posts are for each category, then I use the jump links to go to each category and see what the newest several posts are to make sureI haven’t missed anything.

In other words, I have started to think horizontally about the front page, and see each section in terms of starting all over again: each section is a new beginning. I don’t think it will take readers too long to start using the front page this way and that will hopefully allay fears that one section will get more or less attention than the others.

Please recall one other thing: many people come to the site via a link to a specific story, so the key to getting them to further explore the site is to make sure they are aware THERE IS more to the site, which Phillip has done nicely with this little blurb that will appear at the bottom of all posts:

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Thanks for caring.