Well, the poll had a few days left on it, but I'd been watching the results, and they weren't changing percentages much at all over the last few days, so I killed it early. I must say, I'm a bit shocked at the results; I figured more and more people used a feed reader these days, though as I said in the previous poll post, I didn't really give an option for hybrid viewing (like I do), where I might start in the feed reader and go directly to the post for commenting purposes.
So much for those email subscriptions, eh? Glad I dumped the dedicated widget for that and went with the lone link at the bottom of the page.
Speaking of changing things up, it's been a couple weeks now: how say you on the site re-design? I've given you some simple answers in the new poll; if you have specific constructive criticism (or constructive compliments), air them here. Hopefully, it's seen as a major improvement. (And yes, the LAMB will be getting a makeover in the near future, too. Maybe sometime after the LAMMYs end.)
7 people have chosen wisely: on "Poll results; new poll"
I don't even know what a feed reader is. As for the redesign... I preferred scrolling through the posts rather than having to change pages every time. This post, for example, is having a really hard time loading correctly.
Hey man - it ain't my fault you're on a whack computer.
Seriously, though, there's no reason it shouldn't load pretty quickly. Don't know what's up there.
I know that, if anything, the Read More vs all posts on one page thing would rub some people the wrong way. I see it as a very minor inconvenience that's in service of a larger aesthetic plus to the site. They've never bothered me all that much on other sites. What if I had a Recent Posts widget in a sidebar, though? Then you'd only have to click to a post page once (and go from post to recent post using the widget from there).
As for a feed reader...get a blog. You'll quickly learn. If you don't read a bunch of blogs, though, you needn't worry about it.
There's nothing wrong with my computer, especially since I'm at work. I'm having similar issues with this particular post again right now. Plus, I can't read any of the side-crap with the gray text on the blue background.
No, I'm not a blogger and I don't read any blogs regularly, but I do surf the internet a LOT, and I can tell you that I'm MUCH less likely to read something when more clicks are required. Sure, a widget might help, but the crap on the side has officially taken over your blog now. I come here to read your posts, and don't really care about lambs or lammys or twitter or facebook or recent commenters. No offense.
I guess the question is, who are you trying to appeal to, fellow bloggers or typical web-surfers?
Wow. So I take it (Christ, I hope) you're the Nay vote?
Ok, I was just leaving work before. I have time for a longer response now.
(First of all, for anyone else reading this: Buffett35 is my best friend, so if I'm a little loose or flip with him, that's why.)
I still say something's up with your computer, or at least browser. Perhaps your work computer has some sites blocked (like Twitter or Facebook), which I could see might cause the page to load slower (if those widgets aren't loading properly). But I haven't heard anything else like that yet.
"I can tell you that I'm MUCH less likely to read something when more clicks are required"
Maybe a feed reader really is for you then. For sites that you read that have an RSS feed (which is most any site these days), it serves as an aggregator. In other words, you can read all the shit you want on one page, and you'd only have to leave if you wanted to make a comment or something else that can only be done directly. You can also subscribe to my posts (or again, any other RSS feed) via email. I'm subscribed to mine just to see how it looks, and it's one email for each day that there's posts (if there are 4 posts in a day, one email then). There's a button on the bottom of the page if that sounds interesting.
"the crap on the side has officially taken over your blog now."
I have some news for you: I haven't added anything in terms of the sidebars. And the main content column is the same width as before, if not a little bit wider, so I don't get where that's coming from. It's all the same stuff, just in two shorter sidebars rather than one long one. I think it looks better; you obviously disagree.
"I guess the question is, who are you trying to appeal to, fellow bloggers or typical web-surfers?"
Hopefully both. I realize my site might be a bit more "LAMBy" than others, but being the creator of that site, I figure I've earned a pass on that.
Fact is (I'd wager), most readers are also bloggers, or were at some point. I kind of wish that weren't the case, but it just is. The social media-ish stuff I do is similar to what you'll find on any (good) blog these days, and I think I've got a nice mix of bloggy and non-bloggy (i.e. this site-specific) things around, and is there to hopefully garner more readers, bloggers or not, which in turn makes the comments sections better and so on.
Actually, no, I am not the "Nay" vote. I haven't voted. Oh, and thanks for the disclaimer on how loose you are :)
We do have an older version of Explorer here at work, so that could be it. Nothing is being blocked, it's just taking a while. I'll look into this feed reader business, and probably do the email thing too. Thanks for the info.
Sorry I called the right side of your blog "crap." I didn't mean that it's all crappy stuff, I just meant that there's a lot of it, and none of it is of interest to me specifically (although I do enjoy the sequels). Besides, I cancelled out any insults by saying "no offense" at the end. Whether it's the same amount of stuff or not, it seems more prominent now, like all the widgets are swallowing up the meat of the blog. I'm sure there's a joke in there somewhere...
Obviously I'm not your target demo, because I'll be reading regardless of how it looks. I'm just trying to be constructive from a non-blogger pov.
You did say "no offense." That clears it all up. ;)
And I actually do appreciate the comments, even if they're not positive. As you might notice, I added a Recent Posts widget. The text is showing up as all bold, which I can't figure out how to change, but it still looks ok and ought to help.
Additionally, I dumped the Twitter widget (and might do so with the FB one as well). Still moving stuff around and figuring it all out.
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