[NCUC-DISCUSS] New website launched in Durban

[Tapani Tarvainen]

On Jul 19 16:21, Milton L Mueller (mueller at syr.edu) wrote:

> Thanks for taking the initiative and getting something accomplished.
> On the whole the site looks good.

> A few random comments:

Thank you. This is the kind of feedback I like.

> It's a bit weird that one sees the Twitter feed only if one goes to
> the "Contact Us" page. Any reason for that combination? Why not put
> Tweets on a more prominent page?

No good reason I can think of (I guess primarily because I've not been
active tweeter and hadn't even noticed it's there at all).
But yes, it deserves a better place.

> One of the good things about the prior Ning site was that anyone
> could contribute content - if they were a member they had a login

Actually, they didn't. After being admitted as members people had
to join the Ning site separately, which resulted in no end of
confusion. And there never was much member-contritbuted content.

> In the new site, I see no mention of where or how to login. I see
> "recent posts" by members (e.g., McTim) but have no idea how they
> got there or how someone else might do so without permission. Can
> you clarify this?

We are still in the process of evaluating various ways to handle
this, make it easy for members yet reasonably safe against spammers
and crackers. I'm afrait it will take several weeks at best before
we have it properly set up (in particular as I'm traveling up to
August 3 or so, presently in Kigali), but in the meantime it only
works so that admins (me, Wilson, Brenden, Dave) can create logins
manually for people - just ask.

> The top header graphic has "Noncommercial Users Constituency (NCUC)"
> over a line that says "the home of civil society organizations and
> individuals within ICANN's GNSO" Those two lines are too close
> together. They crowd each other graphically - it doesn't look good.
> You need to move the second line down a few points.

Agreed. That should be an easy fix.

> Really like the inclusion of policy documents. Keep that current!

The plan is to set up some very easy mechanism for people who
actually write policy documents to upload them there as well.

> Indeed, the challenge will be to keep content current, who is
> responsible for it? E.g., now that the Durban meeting is over what
> will be next big graphic to take the place of the Durban meeting
> venue? Although it is vibrant and nice to have the front page
> display timely things like that, as a design choice it commits you
> to constant updating and if that lags, it will start to look bad
> (e.g., someone who encounters a web site which prominently features
> a graphic of a meeting that took place 6 months ago will convey an
> impression of neglect).

Agreed, again. We are going to use a calendar tool that'll
automatically move event info from current to past as the date
passes, and it could work even for the front page image,
e.g., substituting a generic picture when the meeting is over
until one of the next meeting is available.
(As a side note, the member counts in the map slide are automatically
updated from member database, so they keep current.)
That way it would not, eh, rot too quickly even if maintenance
lags a bit. But this is still work in progress.

Of course it'd still need updating and in particular new
real information frequently enough to remain interesting
to people - no pretty exterior can substitute for substantive
content.

-- 
Tapani Tarvainen
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