Where should we take the site?
Published 12:00 am Monday, April 3, 2006
It was just about a year ago that we launched this blog. My thought in doing it was simply to try to add a little original content to suffolknewsherald.com. Up until then, it had merely been an after thought, of sorts. Just some scraps picked out of the print edition and though our intention was to update it daily, it was typically just when the editor felt like it.
We take the site a lot more seriously now. And while it remains more or less just a rehashing of the major items in the print product, it is now updated daily.
As for the blog, I was a little nervous about it first, not knowing whether anyone was reading it, but after a while, that fact came to be liberating. Slowly, my postings got to be a little less inhibited, it’s been fun.
At the time the blog started, we made some other cosmetic changes to the site which, frankly, have not worked. I don’t like the site.
So fresh off a redesign of the print product, we’re set to begin work on a redesign of the site, and as members of a dinosaur media company, it would be nice to get some input from more savvy techies about what they would like to see at newsherald.com.
Topping my wish list is making the site more interactive. We were about six or eight months into the blog when we added the option for readers to comment on what was written here. I think that’s been a tremendous enhancement, despite the fact that much of what is written there is critical of me. That’s OK, though, I’m a big boy.
What I’d like to have is more of a community forum-type site where instead of just me, we had several people writing about what was going on in Suffolk, sort of like Huffingtonpost.com, where I go daily.
I know it’s a big lib site, and some of the stuff written there is way, way out, but Huffington has come up with a wonderful concept. I think about half the appeal of the site is just going there to see who wrote today. It’s also got news headlines n all with some liberal spin on them, but it’s just a fun site.
So, as we begin this process, I’d appreciate it if you would share your thoughts, and if anyone is interested in being a regular newsherald.com blogger, please give me a call at 934-9611 or email me at andy.prutsok@suffolknewsherald.com.