introducing Somerville Voices

[barry-rafkind.livejournal.com]

Dear Davis Square friends and neighbors,

The new Somerville Voices blog is about connecting residents across our city, sharing stories and news, and creating a forum for diverse perspectives on issues that matter. Please visit us today and add your voice to the discussion. And check out the recent article about us in the Somerville Journal.

Sincerely,

Barry Rafkind
Organizer and Web Designer
www.SomervilleVoices.org

Comments

[jspazzer.livejournal.com]

That is some godawful web "design."

[firepail.livejournal.com]

that was designed?
[eyes bleeding]

web design

[barry-rafkind.livejournal.com]

Could you be more constructive with your feedback? What elements of design do you find unappealing and how would you change them?

Re: web design

[jspazzer.livejournal.com]

Constructive? I constructively recommend that you not introduce yourself as "Web Designer"

[ron_newman]

What exactly do you not like about the page layout?

[lena-a-mermaid.livejournal.com]

Barry is not a professional web designer, he does this as a volunteer so don't give him too much snark. I'm sure if someone here has some ideas on how to make the web site prettier, he'd be happy to listen and accept your help.

Still...

[somertricky.livejournal.com]

...anyone who's spent more than ten minutes on line in their life could come up with a couple of suggestions.

A) there's too much white background. The dashed boxes "Login to Post or Comment" "Poll of the Day" etc. - try making these light blue for starters.

A.1) either try something besides a white background, or change the font, which doesn't seem to work against the background at that size.

B) flip the two main columns: put "Latest Posts" on the left, where people will "see" it first, then "Editor's Picks" on the right.

Re: Still...

[firepail.livejournal.com]

I second that.

Too much white background, maybe make your header have a background color (maybe use the blue you used for "Somerville" and then make that word white?) , put a lighter or darker version of that color behind your navigation bar, get rid of any dashed lines, change the font or maybe adjust the font size for headers and sub-headers as everything seems to be the same size. You might want to use some neutral background colors in key areas to give the site some visual structure as a pure white background makes one, me at least, see the text as a jumble.

Re: Still...

[barry-rafkind.livejournal.com]

firepail, thanks for the great suggestions! Let me know if you have anymore ideas.

Re: Still...

[firepail.livejournal.com]

=)
happy to help!

Re: Still...

[barry-rafkind.livejournal.com]

somertricky, Thanks for the suggestions, but no thanks for the condescending remark.

As lena_a_mermaid mentioned, I volunteer my time on this project. I am not a professional web designer but I'm fairly proficient with web programming. With my limited volunteer hours, I have focused on adapting an existing WordPress design into something functional that works, but admittedly have not concentrated as much on the layout and aesthetics. So, I appreciate your feedback and will try to improve the UI the next time I get some free time to work on it. Thanks and let me know if you have any more ideas!

Re: Still...

[somertricky.livejournal.com]

Thanks for setting up the site, anything engendering constructive, thoughtful criticism re Somerville is needed and welcome, especially given that Neanderthals are coming out of the woodwork (fueled tenfold by Bob Trane's candidacy against Carl Sciortino) at the SN site.

But hey, don't be so prickly on design issues. If you hadn't identified yourself as the "web designer", you wouldn't have picked up the constructive criticism. Best of luck with any changes.

Re: Still...

[barry-rafkind.livejournal.com]

I'm glad to hear your support for this project and hope you'll register if you haven't already. Our all-volunteer team feels similarly that there's been a lack of civilized thoughtful public discussion in our city, so we hope the blog provides a forum for all people and perspectives to be heard.

I'm not sure what you mean about me being prickly on design issues. I think "web designer" is an accurate term describing my role as the person responsible for developing and maintaining the website. What term would you have preferred instead?

I'll repeat my "no thanks" for your condescending remark. But I do appreciate the constructive feedback.

Re: Still...

[somertricky.livejournal.com]

How about "Web Master" then? I think we're arguing about technical ability vs. aesthetics here. I'll sign up this evening, and hopefully will have something to offer once in a while.

But I'm trying to hold off Trane's Cavemen Brigade over at the SN site right now...

Re: Still...

[marylu.livejournal.com]

you know, I don't think calling anybody "Trane's Cavemen Brigade" contributes much to civil public discourse in Somerville. It's not a huge step up from "Princess Rebekah".

Re: Still...

[teele-sq.livejournal.com]

What is the SN site?

Re: Still...

[ukelele.livejournal.com]

I also have trouble with the four-column layout. It's just too much; I don't know what my attention should be drawn to, so I ignore it all and close the tab as quickly as possible. It also squishes the posts into very narrow columns...if I wanted to read articles an inch and a half wide, I'd grab myself a really stodgy newspaper, not the internet.

Re: Still...

[barry-rafkind.livejournal.com]

Hey ukelele, I'm guessing you use a lower screen resolution than me (I use 1280x1024) and this causes the screen to squish into thin columns for you. I'll be looking into ways to get the display right in different resolutions soon and will respond when it's ready. I should also do more cross-browser compatibility tests. I know there might be some display bugs right now, so please be patient!

Re: Still...

[ukelele.livejournal.com]

I use Firefox on two Macs -- an iBook G4 (1024x768) and a MacBook (which undoubtedly has a higher resolution which I don't remember offhand).

I don't think I believe in four-column layouts in general, though; most if not all of the blogs I read are 2 or 3.

I did stick SomervilleVoices into Google Reader, because of course RSS makes everything readable, although I think SV only gives out the first few lines? So I guess I have to click through to read the rest, which means those first few lines have to really grab me.

Disclaimer?

[tomchampion.livejournal.com]

Barry and Ron:

Good luck with your new online publication. Just one suggestion:

I looked for and did not see a standard disclaimer statement to go along with your moderation policy. I'm no lawyer, but it occurred to me that you might want to add something in the "About Us" section along the lines of:

“The opinions and statements expressed on this website represent the personal views of individual contributors and commenters, and are not endorsed or verified by Somerville Voices unless so stated. Somerville Voices also assumes no responsibility for the content or information contained on sites linked to the Somerville Voices website, nor does Somerville Voices exert any editorial or other control over other sites. Hyperlinks to other organizations do not represent an endorsement or approval by Somerville Voices. Somerville Voices is not to be held responsible for the content of any website connected via hyperlink to the Somerville Voices Website. Somerville Voices reserves the right to regularly review and modify any and all links to other websites, and to remove any links to sites that it believes are inconsistent with the mission and goals of Somerville Voices.”

Or perhaps something simpler, such as

“The opinions expressed on this website are not necessarily the opinions of Somerville Voices. We do not assume any responsibility for any information posted on this website and in no event will we be liable for any damages of any kind arising out of the use of the information contained on this website. Your reading or posting comments on this website constitutes your acceptance of the terms of this policy.”

(For more ideas on protective language, check out LiveJournal's very own Terms of Service document at http://www.livejournal.com/legal/tos.bml )

A disclaimer will allow you to provide the fullest possible range of opinion, and frees you from having to deal with the factual accuracy (or lack thereof) of such assertions as "With a strong mayor there are patterns of cronyism, family relations, and kickback, no-show, and mistresses on the payroll" which some people might consider undocumented, inaccurate and grossly offensive – although you have a perfect right to publish them.

With a disclaimer, you're covered.

Re: Disclaimer?

[barry-rafkind.livejournal.com]

Thanks, Tom! I'm not exactly sure what you mean about having to deal with certain assertions. The statement you cite is clearly a generalized opinion about the office of the mayor and not specific to any particular mayor. I'm not sure why anyone would find it grossly offensive without reading into it beyond its face value.

Not being a lawyer myself, I'm not sure how important a disclaimer is for a community blog, but it seems like it could at least be a protective step with no down side. I'll discuss it with the team. Thanks for the suggestion!

Re: Disclaimer?

[tomchampion.livejournal.com]

Let me put it this way: If someone wrote "With public school teachers there are patterns of incompetence, featherbedding, and a tendency to shirk responsibility," would you argue that such an assertion was "clearly a generalized opinion about the teaching profession and not specific to any particular teacher?"

That's not to say that you shouldn't publish such opinions -- of course you can and should. On the other hand, you wouldn't want to get stuck defending them or taking responsibility for them. Teachers are better organized than mayors; they have a stronger union; and there are a lot more of them. :)

Re: Disclaimer?

[barry-rafkind.livejournal.com]

Yes, actually I would say such opinions are clearly generalized and not specific to any particular individuals.

I'm not sure how I'd get stuck defending the opinions of other people who write on Somerville Voices. I'd think it would be strange for someone to ask me to do that.

By the way, I wasn't aware that mayors are unionized. Is that true? Hey just for kicks, imagine if there were as many mayors as teachers, that'd be wild!