- Joined
- Nov 14, 2024
- Messages
- 639
- Reaction score
- 1,881
Behind the scenes I've been working on a lot of little things to, hopefully, make the site better. Not all of them will get done – some of them are downright impossible without writing a lot of added code – but there's been lots going on that many of you, perhaps, aren't aware of.
None of this is possible without you! Whether you're supporting us through Guardians, volunteering to become a moderator, creating and sharing content, or giving us valuable feedback, Websleuths would be nothing without all of you!
Add a "Guardians Monthly Goal" widget to the top-right of the page (on desktop, scroll to the bottom of the page on mobile) so people can quickly see how we're gaining new Guardians. It's a little bit manual right now, meaning every new member won't make the mercury crawl up the thermometer immediately. I have to count the number of new Guardians and manually update the code. A bit of a pain, but I'll try and get it automated one of these days.
Simplify site rules. This is a big one I'm hoping to roll out very soon! Our rules are very difficult to understand, especially for new users. A lot of how we operate comes down to a cultural awareness of what is allowed and what is not. I think they can be distilled down and simplified, and make them easy to find. The mods are working on that distillation of the rules now.
Case Hubs. This is another big one that's going to take a lot of effort to roll out, but I have some volunteer Websleuths members working on this with me. Basically the concept is big cases will have landing pages with key issues laid out in an easily browsable format. It will be a fresh new direction for Websleuths content which will look amazing, and get more people involved in making Websleuths the go-to destination for True Crime.
This would not replace forums and threads, this would just be the front-door for people visiting the forum or thread for the first time, or searching for the distillation of the thread.
This content would be maintained by volunteer human-beings, so when we build out the infrastructure to manage this, we'll be looking for people to start building out these pages. DM me if you're interested in helping out.
Make use of our tagging feature to make posts more easily groupable, and generate landing pages for those tag-groups. For example, a map of the world where each country, and states / territories / provinces etc are clickable and users can see all posts tagged with your geographic area.
Or mix and match; create your own search page to show you missing persons cases that were kidnappings in California in 2003. With tags, we can do that.
We have several upcoming projects with True Crime documentary production companies which will be announced soon. Some of these cases you may already know about, but will be SHOCKED at some of the new twists that have been uncovered.
Automate our Weekly Newsletter email with content pulled from our Most Popular Posts from the Last Week forum.
Refactor our Black-Orange code to use variables for our color-scheme instead of it being hardcoded
University of Criminology at Websleuths. This is an idea that came up during one of our recent Guardians-Only Zoom Calls. We have a lot of experts here who wish to share their knowledge, and we thought we'd offer a way to get access to that knowledge.
Ultra-minimal theme
Cyber-punk theme
Spiral-notebook theme
None of this is possible without you! Whether you're supporting us through Guardians, volunteering to become a moderator, creating and sharing content, or giving us valuable feedback, Websleuths would be nothing without all of you!
Completed
Add a "Guardians Monthly Goal" widget to the top-right of the page (on desktop, scroll to the bottom of the page on mobile) so people can quickly see how we're gaining new Guardians. It's a little bit manual right now, meaning every new member won't make the mercury crawl up the thermometer immediately. I have to count the number of new Guardians and manually update the code. A bit of a pain, but I'll try and get it automated one of these days.In Progress
Simplify site rules. This is a big one I'm hoping to roll out very soon! Our rules are very difficult to understand, especially for new users. A lot of how we operate comes down to a cultural awareness of what is allowed and what is not. I think they can be distilled down and simplified, and make them easy to find. The mods are working on that distillation of the rules now. Case Hubs. This is another big one that's going to take a lot of effort to roll out, but I have some volunteer Websleuths members working on this with me. Basically the concept is big cases will have landing pages with key issues laid out in an easily browsable format. It will be a fresh new direction for Websleuths content which will look amazing, and get more people involved in making Websleuths the go-to destination for True Crime.This would not replace forums and threads, this would just be the front-door for people visiting the forum or thread for the first time, or searching for the distillation of the thread.
This content would be maintained by volunteer human-beings, so when we build out the infrastructure to manage this, we'll be looking for people to start building out these pages. DM me if you're interested in helping out.
Make use of our tagging feature to make posts more easily groupable, and generate landing pages for those tag-groups. For example, a map of the world where each country, and states / territories / provinces etc are clickable and users can see all posts tagged with your geographic area.Or mix and match; create your own search page to show you missing persons cases that were kidnappings in California in 2003. With tags, we can do that.
We have several upcoming projects with True Crime documentary production companies which will be announced soon. Some of these cases you may already know about, but will be SHOCKED at some of the new twists that have been uncovered.Not Started
Automate our Weekly Newsletter email with content pulled from our Most Popular Posts from the Last Week forum. Refactor our Black-Orange code to use variables for our color-scheme instead of it being hardcoded University of Criminology at Websleuths. This is an idea that came up during one of our recent Guardians-Only Zoom Calls. We have a lot of experts here who wish to share their knowledge, and we thought we'd offer a way to get access to that knowledge. Just For Fun
Ultra-minimal theme Cyber-punk theme Spiral-notebook theme
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