Expanding the alternative news box!

irjO

The Living Force
FOTCM Member
Hello i was showing yesterday the SOTT page to someone who works at a news company here in my city.. we were chatting about some news there and he pointed out something that i think has a good point (i could be wrong of course) and is about the "Lastest alternative news" box on the right side..

the thing is that i think there are very interesting news that many people miss because most of the time our eyes always focus the most striking area first which is the center of the page (the sott focus articles, best of the web articles etc) and sometimes people (who don't known much the page or who's visiting the page for the first time) don't realize about the news on the right side (alternative news box) and i have an idea about it: is there any way that you could make that box a little bit bigger? maybe including a miniature of the picture of that article along with the tittle of the article? so that it can highlight a bit more! of course this is only and idea what do you think?
 

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If you make that box bigger, then the central feature would get smaller. I like the central focus on the latest SOTT article.

The half-dozen links in the "Latest Alternative News" box may well be interesting, but even so they are only a small snapshot of all the recent news linked to on the site. I think the present size of the "Latest Alternative News" box is a good compromise. The Latest Alternative News links are repeated further down the page in the themed news sections. A casual browser might not scroll down the page that far, but a repeat browser will probably find those themed sections at the bottom of the page a more convenient place to find news of interest to them.

I think giving too much extra prominence to a secondary part of the page would make the overall page seem more complicated. But I am not a web-designer. There are probably dozens of different potential lay-outs everyone could argue for or against. Maybe "If it ain't broke, don't fix it" applies?

"Trying to determine what is going on in the world by reading newspapers is like trying to tell the time by watching the second hand of a clock."
- Ben Hecht, American film director, writer, Zionist (1894-1964).
 
Mal7 said:
I think giving too much extra prominence to a secondary part of the page would make the overall page seem more complicated. But I am not a web-designer. There are probably dozens of different potential lay-outs everyone could argue for or against. Maybe "If it ain't broke, don't fix it" applies?

Well, this has always been kind of an issue: how to convey a whole lot of links and info in a limited amount of space - especially on lower screen resolutions (1024 x 768).

And then, we have the mainstream media take, which is to do lots of big images, very little text, and lots of flashy-flashy stuff.

At one point, I actually contemplated making SOTT look more like a mainstream site, like CNN. But then I quickly realized that would be a huge pain, because what do we do with all the sidebar content? And then would we lose the category listings at the bottom of the page, which provide a lovely snapshot of all recent news, albeit mostly with text?

It's kind of a pickle, especially since news is highly linear, which makes presenting content in a nonlinear fashion somewhat difficult. And then there is the fact that mainstream media does things their way, which is to give people "bite size chunks" of news. Well, that's nice in a certain sense, but in another sense, we also kind of want to force people to think a bit more. This can be encouraged not only by site content, but also site structure. At the same time, we don't want to overload first-time readers, and we want to stay "modern enough". What to do, what to do?

Well, we have a solution for "linear news in a nonlinear way" problem in the works: The "SOTT SuperMap". After years and years of dreaming about it, it's currently being developed... slowly but surely! If I can translate the vision in my head into reality, SOTT will have a totally awesome alternative way of reading the news that will make mainstream news sites look old and busted by comparison. So, there's that...

This will be accompanied by a Topics feature that allows us to subcategorize stories. So, for example, the JFK series won't all need to be listed in the sidebar, because we can have a "JFK Series" Topic page, sort of like the existing 10 categories on the homepage, but customizable and flexible. Articles can be in only 1 Category, but they can belong to multiple Topics. The Topics feature is almost done, it will be released before the SuperMap is ready, and it will be integrated with the SuperMap...

So, all the above is going on in the background as time/money permits... I recently discovered that using the Google Maps API actually costs money IF you get lots of hits. Fortunately, Google also recently reduced the price by a factor of 8, which helps a lot!

Anyway, as for the current topic: For the Latest Alternative News box, all images stored in SOTT include a tiny thumbnail that has never been used for anything before, but we could include it with the title text for each article in the LAN box. That way, we get some little pics to catch the eye in the LAN box, but without making it hugemongous? That's not hard to do.

Also, I should mention that in collecting some stats together recently, I discovered that in 2012, Sott.net had over twice as many page views as in 2011. And so far, 2013 is looking pretty good...

:D
 
"Arts & Letters Daily" is one example of a website aiming to provide daily updates of links to the editors' picks of the most recent literary/philosophical/scientific mainstream news articles.

_http://www.aldaily.com/

It was started by Dennis Dutton, a Philosophy Professor and member of a Skeptics organization. From small beginnings it went on to become a very high traffic website.

_http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arts_%26_Letters_Daily

Personally, I think www.sott.net is a better site. But it is interesting to see that Arts & Letters Daily became so popular, while following a fairly simple formula: daily updates, short text summaries or quotes for each link, a chronological arrangement only (no subject categories). The purpose of Arts & Letters Daily seems to be a one-stop-shop quick-fix for some intellectual stimulation, rather than an information resource, hence the lack of a search box (unless I missed it).
 
Those upcoming changes sound exiting!

I sometimes wonder if it is to difficult at the moment, for a reader of SOTT, who is not familiar with the forum and the standpoint of SOTT, to get the standpoint/view?

There is the SOTT Focus category and Best of the Web category, but those have, for example not a special place at the already existing category box at the left side....

What I'm suggesting is that SOTT's viewpoint could be better pointed out (disigned), so it is easier for the reader to find and understand it.
For example a seperate and easily assessable part of the page wich especially highlights The SOTT Focus articles and Best of the Web articles that the editors deem to be especially important.

In short a easier way for the reader to get up to speed with the viewpoint of SOTT.
 
Pashalis said:
Those upcoming changes sound exiting!

I sometimes wonder if it is to difficult at the moment, for a reader of SOTT, who is not familiar with the forum and the standpoint of SOTT, to get the standpoint/view?

There is the SOTT Focus category and Best of the Web category, but those have, for example not a special place at the already existing category box at the left side....

What I'm suggesting is that SOTT's viewpoint could be better pointed out (disigned), so it is easier for the reader to find and understand it.
For example a seperate and easily assessable part of the page wich especially highlights The SOTT Focus articles and Best of the Web articles that the editors deem to be especially important.

In short a easier way for the reader to get up to speed with the viewpoint of SOTT.

There are some places where it is a bit described, i.e. the about page gives some hints, plus the Sott exclusive articles and in-depth investigations lists at least all focus articles by author, also when a bit hidden. Eventually at the "about" page some sentences could be added what is the best of the web category about.

Mr. Scott said:
Anyway, as for the current topic: For the Latest Alternative News box, all images stored in SOTT include a tiny thumbnail that has never been used for anything before, but we could include it with the title text for each article in the LAN box. That way, we get some little pics to catch the eye in the LAN box, but without making it hugemongous? That's not hard to do.

Actually, what is hugemongous?
 
Gawan said:
Actually, what is humongous?

Big!

"Hugemongous" is a made up word that is a combination of "huge" and "humongous", both of which just mean "big".

:P
 
I like the idea of thumbnails in the LAN box very much, especially when they would give an indication of the category to which any article belongs.

I may be a rare bird in this but I always start with the LAN box first, to have an instant overview of the very latest pieces. When I have inspected the entire homepage from one category to the next, the LAN box is the only thing I regularly have a peek at -- after refreshing the page first, of course.

After the LAN box my next stop consists of the box on the left, filled with the latest commentary contributions, to learn what is 'hot' at that moment. The list of those might benefit from same or similar thumbnails, as far as I'm concerned.
The other mentioned planned changes peaked my curiosity as I think they will bring great improvement. :rockon:
 
Mr. Scott said:
Gawan said:
Actually, what is hugemongous?

Big!

"Hugemongous" is a made up word that is a combination of "huge" and "humongous", both of which just mean "big".

:P

Well, it doesn't take a Delian Diver to figure that one out. ;)
 
Mr. Scott said:
Gawan said:
Actually, what is humongous?

Big!

"Hugemongous" is a made up word that is a combination of "huge" and "humongous", both of which just mean "big".

:P

:lol: Thanks for explaining. As I searched I found only mongous, but isn't huge :)
 
Mr. Scott said:
Well, we have a solution for "linear news in a nonlinear way" problem in the works: The "SOTT SuperMap". After years and years of dreaming about it, it's currently being developed... slowly but surely! If I can translate the vision in my head into reality, SOTT will have a totally awesome alternative way of reading the news that will make mainstream news sites look old and busted by comparison. So, there's that...

Very exciting! So looking forward to the map! :clap:
 
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