Adil Najam and Owais Mughal
Regular readers might have noticed that ‘something happened’ to our two side columns yesterday. Essentially, a lot of the material about past posts disappeared. You might also have noticed that we have been having ‘overload’ outages on the page (these are the equivalent of internet load-shedding, I guess; we have recently had days with nearly 10,000 visits/20,000 views). The former happened as a result of our attempt to fix the latter.
Old readers would remember that we started with a fairly simple format and then had a really useful set of inputs from the readers on redesign last August. As a result of these ideas we moved to our own domain and launched a new page with new features in September (with great help from friends like TeethMaestro, BD, etc.). Since then we have been implementing occasional changes (in style, in number of posts, and especially in the side columns). We had hoped to implement some other major changes by our first anniversary, but that was not possible for time reasons.
The essential principle is “Don’t fix it if it ain’t broke.” We believe that MUCH on teh page is ‘not broke’ and does not need to be fixed. So tell us also about what are the things that work for you and should be retained. But then also on things that can be improved or should be dropped or need to be added.
We know that speed is a problem, especially for those without fast connections. Ideas on how to improve this without going too far away from the current ‘visual’ style of ATP.
Is the page too cluttered? Or do you actually like, what one reader called, the ‘candy store’ look of the page?
How many posts per day should we have. We started from about 3 per day. For last many months we were at one-per-day. Is that too little? Too much?
What about the mix of posts. Some like only politics. Some want only cultural stuff. We are committed to having a mix. But the question is, what is the best mix?
What are best ways to incorporate ‘news’ posts and to make them even more interactive.
All bloggers are always worried about how old posts just disappear. We have been very very lucky in that many of our old posts still get significant traffic. People are always interested in the music of Attaullah Niazi, the films of Waheed Murad, the life of Edhi Sahib, the caps of Pakistan, the trains at Bolan Pass and the adventures of Inspector Jamshed. A major interest for us is to provide easy to use ways for readers – especially new readers – to visit older posts that are still of interest to them. Any ideas?
Also, do please tell us which particular posts – or what types of posts – from the past you think we should feature in teh right-hand columns?
By the way, what do people think of start ‘reposting’ interesting posts from the past? There was some great, not time sensitive, posts in the early days that many have not seen yet.
Please, please, please help us figure out how to deal with the few ‘shararti loag‘ who never seem to learn and force us to waste too much time in managing moderation lists.
We know many do not like ads on the page. Please hold your comments on that for now. We will say something on that separately soon. Meanwhile we will try to have fewer but more effective ads in the future.
Not every idea, not even every good idea, may be feasible or possible to implement. Also, we suspect, different readers may want different – sometimes opposite – things. So, readers, please be patient with us and understanding if we are unable to do what you suggest.
We are sure we will think up even more questions soon. But those are a few that come immediately to mind. Any suggestions? On these and other things we should be thinking in redesign.
this is great blog not because of its design or what content management system it uses but because of its content. I would like to see ATP focused on that without adding any fancy gadgets to it.
But maybe a gadget which helps me get every comment added to a post RSS-ed will be a delight, something like YouTube does, we subsribe to a channel, and any video added to it is RSS-ed to us. We can subsribe to a post here, and any comment added can be then RSS-ed.
As for the format, for those who think the page looks cluttered, and I guess for some it is, esp. for the elderly, its better to either re-arrange the columns from 1-2-3 to 2-1-3 or to change the background of the 2nd and 3rd column or maybe just the 2nd column to something other than white.
As for Sharaarti Loag, if I am one of those, I wont know of my sharaarats unless told so.
In school, our madame used to make the most shararti bacha the class monitor, and he used to be the best monitor out there.
I dont think this slick idea can work here. :(
By the way, I like the sense of community that you keep us all informed and engaged in what is happening to the website.
Just the fact that you would ask us for ideas shows a democratic spirit and desire to take everyone with you. Wish our leaders could learn this from you.
Don’t compromise on quality of posts to have too many. Even one a day works good for me. Also I think that lots of writers is very good but we have come to identify with the few regualrs and you should stick to quality in writers also instead of giving space to anyone. Overall keep the focus on quality which we have come to expect in choice of subjects and in writing.
I also think that the long list of reccomended blogs is useless.
Beautiful site, great ideas, good columns, nice language.I have to come back to you for my two cents. Let me do some brainstorming here.As I seem to have opinion on every subject. :)
ATP is an addiction that grows on you and takes you over , i am a victim so i would know .
1. The speed needs a major re-haul even though i have a cable net , it still takes ages for a post that has more then a few additions to it. Perhaps if a post goes with 60+ comments, you could divide the page instead of having all the comments on one page. NOt being a web expert , i dont know if that is possible.
2. One post per day is fine, there can only be one headline per day unless there is a tsunami of a news that needs a post of its own.
3. Most commented and Top Hits is a great idea, the older posts can be put in archives which should be sorted out date/wise so if a reader wants to go back two years to find out what happened , he can easily do so.There is no need to repost old posts only because there is so much happening today in this time strata.
4. Blogs of Note is a waste of space, this could be replaced with links to different happenings/places/fashion houses/music charts/web2sms/websites etc of Pakistan. Easy access to a tourist for example to what is so great about Pakistan and why he should visit. Those links can be updated to, say what is the latest cultural scene in Lahore/Karachi/Islamabad for the local readers.
5.There are two major things that we as readers and you as the ATP admins CANNOT do without so why cry over it. Just take them with a pinch of salt, an irritating headache that might go away or might stay…. its the ads and the “shararti loag” !!
Great job ATP, keep it up. Its a pleasure to visit you every time i log on.