Hey everybody,
I wanted to let you know that the powers that be from SB Nation are updating our blogs. Blogging The Boys is next up on the list and they are planning to do the changes shortly. I'm not sure just how this will change the site so we'll all find out together. I know when sites are changed that you are used to there can be dissatisfaction, but please give the changes a chance. A few other SB Nation blogs have already made the change and the users overwhelmingly like them now.
Here's the list of changes they are making.
1. Ajax Comments
This is the most impressive of the changes. Comments now can expand and collapse in a dynamic way, like is popular on so-called web2.0 sites nowadays. This allows users to see what they want to see, with a less cluttered screen. More like reading threaded (or not...) email replies. Users can choose how they want to display comments, and it should "stick" as a preference for them the next time they read comments.
2. Auto-refreshing Comments
This is very closely tied to the Ajax comments. When users are reading comments in a long discussion thread, say a gameday post, if they have set their preference to "auto refresh", as new comments are posted, the site will periodically redisplay only the new comments, in order, in the thread. This happens without reloading the whole page. It’s very cool when you see it in action. New comments are visibly labeled, so they’re easy to spot.
3. Ajax Story editor
The story editor has undergone some major reworking. It is much smoother, it has buttons to apply html formatting to story text, and the preview before posting happens very quickly without having to reload the whole site. This gives users a nicer experience posting stories and diaries.
4. Ajax Polls
Same goes for polls. They’ve been updated, and display the results in a dynamic, almost animated fashion.
6. Comment preview before post (working on a fix to remove that requirement)
The new editor requires that comments be previewed before they post. This means an extra step for commenters. This is by design, to get commenters to think before they let ‘er rip. But we may provide a change to this in the future.
So expect to see the changes soon, and we'll all learn to use them together. If there are any interruptions to service on the blog, you'll know why, and will hopefully understand until we get it all fixed up.
Thanks,
Grizz