The Initial Design

Notes:

(1) Show the abstract and pic of the latest feature only, over the whole width of the column, but a limited abstract with links moved into the full article.

Right Column:

(2) Keep an open newswire. Keep the 'publish area' as it is, except for getting rid of the promoted marking and the 2 links. Shorten the newswire so only the 50 latest posts show, and aim to get newswire and middle column similair length.

Left Column:

(3) Keep the upcoming events box, although try linking to article in future instead of lots of external links, thus box will become shorter

(4) Get the regions, topics and major reports in a drop down menu. Current major reports move to a section in the middle column, this year's mojor reports in the drop down menu in the left column, older ones on the (current) seperate page.

(5) Projects box stays

(6) Security box stays in the left column, but moved right to the bottom as it's already linked from the top

(7) Move the global imc list into a drop-down menu (many imc's have that now and thus have a shorter startpage)

Middle Column:

(8) The middle column is divided into 2 columns: the left one for the promoted newswire.

(9) The right column will show the 5-6 previous features (only title and date).

(10) This section shows a promoted post from each specific medium: audio, video, photo and text. This as a way to give more prominance to specific work in the field of videomakers, photographers, radio groups and good writers. Articles selected manually and by proposing to imc-uk-features. Will stay up for a minimum of 24 hrs.

(11) The regional sections. The middle column is broken up into sections from regions and topic pages, showing the most recent 5 features in each featured section. The sections shown here depend on where the most recent feature was published. The sections of regional collectives show a small thumbnail to give them more prominance, as they have whole collectives behind them.

(11a) An interactive map is being made to select regions and be forwarded to their websites. The idea is to include this on the startpage, next to the regions and will be quite small. Working page: ImcUkRegionsMap (a design should be available late Feb 07)

(12) The topic sections

(13) A selected photo is shown here with a caption that links to the original article.

(14) This is a section that lists the latest newswire posts or features from the current major report. This changes as most major reports are reporting on events for a limited time period.

(15) The last section lists a number of posts from the 'Other Press' topic page.

Other thoughts on designs

Design #01 - This design will show the 1 most recent feature article at the top of the page, in the right corner of the middle column. In the left corner of the middle column will be the promoted newswire, running along the feature article and the titles of previous features, which we can find just under the feature article. Under the feature and promoted newswire are 3 articles which can be selected for their high amount of comments, the outlining of a specific issue or action or to draw peoples attention to something like a link to a video recently published. This feature can be found on the NYC and San Fransisco Indymedia sites. The links and symbols to these 3 articles cover the full width of the middle column. Under that we find headers of region, topic and action pages, with titles of its current articles. The headers of pages with most recent articles would show.

Design #02 - Design #02 is very similar to #01 although the '3 selected articles' in the middle column are not there. Also this design shows 2 features on the startpage. The titles of previous features can be the full width of the middle column, or just under the features, with the promoted newswire running along the left side of it.

Design #03 - In this design (#03) things are moved around a bit. Here the 'upcoming events' box has been removed as now a new calender is used for announcing events. Possibly another place can be found for nit on the startpage. Anyway, the promoted newswire is moved into its place, in the left top corner of the page. Next to it is the main feature article which shows on the full width of the middle column. Under the feature article we can find the titles of other recent features. Under that we can see 2 things: firstly a link and symbol to an article which could be selected/promoted due to its 'high amount of comments, the outlining of a specific issue or action or to draw peoples attention to something like a link to a video recently published'. Next to it is the feature of showing a photo with a small sub text linking to an article about a specific event or action. This feature can be found on the NYC and San Fransisco Indymedia sites. Under that we find headers of region, topic and action pages, with titles of its current articles. The headers of pages with most recent articles would show.

All designs aim to draw people to other pages (regions/topics/action pages) as much as possible as well as braking down the 'newswire and features relationship' by creating a more diverse way of promoting articles: by having the promoted articles in a more prominant place and adding a more central link to specific articles (Designs #01 and #03) and or by linking through a photo (Design #03).

-- WietsE - 09 Dec 2006

-- WietsE - 18 Jan 2007

-- WietsE - 11 Feb 2008 (created this page)
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