Board Thread:New on Marvel Database/@comment-166-20130415051833/@comment-166-20130711011037

Peteparker wrote: I was a bit shocked by the main page today. I knew the HUBs idea was in the works, but I didn't expect it to so quickly redesign the entire main page.

It feels like this kind of re-design shouldn't have been made live on the front page until it was 100%, and some of the elements that are agreed to be important aren't incorporated due to a lack of space or tab restrictions.

I will admit that I made more changes in this iteration than I had planned. I also admit that I didn't clear them with anyone. I am truly sorry if it was a too much of a surprise.

Peteparker wrote: We really need to continue to provide easy-to-find links to the most popular pages and current comics for people landing on our site from google and sister Wikia sites. This was the primary motivation for the character image links and the comics being at or near the top of both sections when the page was originally re-designed. The re-design was performed utilizing Wikia's Entertainment team click-data information, putting what is of the top interest to our readers at essentially the top of the spring-board page.

I didn't make it clear, but those character buttons are NOT going away. They are temporarily displaced while I find a way to better handle them. They will return.

Peteparker wrote: I found the list of current comics on the extra tab, but that's not easy to find, and would be very difficult for a brand new person, in my opinion. Maybe a different name like 'New Comics' or 'This Week's Comics' instead of 'New Releases' might help, but in my experience, layering content in text-based tabs means regular people don't find it. Which is why the slider idea was developed. As content changes and moves automatically for the reader, they don't have issues finding the things they're looking for.

I originally wanted to call it that, but changed my mind at the last minute. I will put it back to New Comics. Good call.

Peteparker wrote: As a warning, we also have to be very careful when displaying anything through the main page using DPL (which is how the new releases tab is populated). Essentially, if enough people 'load' that DPL at the same time (view the main page? view that tab? I'm not sure), you can inadvertently crash the site. While it looks sweet and is auto-updated, I've been told to keep DPL off the main page by Wikia in the past.

Generally speaking, this is my attitude toward it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Don%27t_worry_about_performance

You should see the crazy stuff I have planned to better integrate our International editions. It will make DPL look like a walk in the park!

Peteparker wrote: I also worry about keeping this amount of content fresh. Where we once had one slider, a list of comics, and polls to keep up with, now we have a slider for each tab, as well as content to provide for each, with that responsibility relying solely on a select few individuals. Without those specific individuals continuing to create new content, we either get the large unused white space we have now, or the long-stale content we historically struggled to update.

This worries me deeply, too. I am back in a big way and I have recruited Halley (a journalist by trade) to help, too. If this initiative fails, I will take full responsibility.

Peteparker wrote: I understand the need for a fresh, new redesign, with highlighting new content being the capstone, but doing something like that should be very deliberately pre-designed before going live. Replacing the existing main page with this one feels very premature.

Again, I am sorry for the dramatic change. I felt that something new and exciting in the days leading up to Comic Con would trump my feelings of anxiety and trepidation. If this goes down the crapper, the nice part is that we can revert all my changes with a few mouse clicks.