[squeakland] on having two squeakland websites

[Timothy Falconer]

Given that people are asking for a separate "section" with a separate  
navigation structure and look, some of my ten points are moot, but  
others still apply.

On Sep 2, 2009, at 10:45 AM, Timothy Falconer wrote:

> 1. etoysville.com would siphon away a significant number of visitors  
> from squeakland.org
>
> The single biggest boost in squeakland.org website traffic will be  
> the public showcase, because of its social networking potential.   
> When everyone can upload Etoys projects and easily email their  
> friends and family and post on facebook and myspace about it, etc,  
> our traffic numbers will grow exponentially from what we're  
> experiencing now.   IMO, it is to the benefit of Squeakland that  
> these new visitors come to squeakland.org, where they can see  
> "download", "contact", "about", "tutorials", "donate", etc.  They  
> will be much more likely to click such links than they would if  
> there was a single "squeakland" link from etoysville.com back to squeakland.org 
> .

While the domain won't be different, the new navigation will by  
necessity obscure some of the "official" links we want people to see  
and click, like download and donate.


> 2. squeakland.org will be able to have callout boxes around the site  
> with random public projects
>
> It's very easy to have projects appear on the home page and perhaps  
> even within a sidebar on all pages on the official website.   This  
> will draw people to the showcase and keep the site looking fresh and  
> alive, which is always a good thing.  The more people see fresh  
> content, the more they will return to the website.  Yes, we could  
> achieve the same thing with RSS between sites, but there's two  
> problems here.  First, clicking the link draws visitors away from squeakland.org 
> , which decreases the chance they will click "donate", "come to  
> squeakfest", or any of the other links we want them to see.  Second,  
> clicking such a link and finding yourself at a different website  
> with a different look & feel is confusing to new visitors.  Remember  
> that our target audience is largely non-technical.  We could make it  
> somewhat clear from the callout box, but my first point still applies.

The callouts will be just as easy, but the confusion point still  
remains . . . click a callout and "why did I change to another website?"


> 3. "squeakland" as a name is already well suited to connote community
>
> From the start, I've always seen squeakland.org as a shared website  
> for everyone, not just the sandbox for arbitrarily selected team  
> members :)    Having hundreds of new voices scattered throughout the  
> site is a very positive move.   It will generate a strong feeling of  
> community for anyone that first visits the site (and we want first  
> time visitors to show up where the "download" and "donate" links  
> are.   Put another way, I want squeakland.org to resemble New York  
> City more than Los Angeles .... the former has lots of people  
> walking the streets, the latter has almost no pedestrians in  
> evidence.   I *want* to see the people.

The name isn't an issue now, but the separate of "official" and  
"community" still has the same problem . . . I want the official site  
to have the messy stuff too.  I want to *see* the people throughout.


> 4. having *lots* of fresh, compelling content is good PR for  
> squeakland foundation
>
> As we try to raise money from corporations, government  
> organizations, and individuals, it would hurt us to have the  
> "10,000+ projects" number located on another website with a  
> different look and apparent group.   If there's two sites to choose  
> from, there will always be the "who should I give money to"  
> confusion, or more likely, "I don't need to give money because it  
> looks like they're volunteer community is much stronger than their  
> official representation."  One of the most impressive things about  
> the Scratch site is the "number of projects" box, which simply says  
> "SUCCESS" to new visitors.    Their large number of projects, and  
> the way it's integrated into their main site, is IMO a big reason  
> for their success.  People see people using it, and so they say,  
> "neat, I'll try it."

Mostly moot, but the clickthrough counts will fall without the same  
nav throughout.


> 5. having the showcase allows us to integrate with other squeakland.org 
>  functionality
>
> Everyone who creates a showcase account has an option to subscribe  
> to our newsletter.  The more subscriptions to our newsletter, the  
> better our ability to keep Etoys in people's minds and promote  
> events like Squeakfest.   My plan was to have a weekly "best of"  
> email that goes out to interested people that contains five or so  
> new projects from the showcase.  This can already be done with the  
> current website.   Also, anyone who clicks through such emails will  
> go to squeakland.org, not etoysville.org, which means we're driving  
> traffic to the site we want action from, not a separate site.    
> Other functionality includes the ability to make multi-language  
> descriptions for all projects, etc, etc.

Moot.

> 6. having two sites will make ongoing maintenance more difficult or  
> less likely to happen
>
> People tend to improve what's right in front of them, so if the bulk  
> of the time from our community is spent on a separate community  
> site, then they'll spend less and less time on squeakland.org, hence  
> they'll be less likely to volunteer to improve content, see typos,  
> or whatever.   Also, there will be a natural "us vs them" vibe that  
> gets started, where squeakland.org will be seen more as the "suits"  
> site that's not really the real volunteer site.  (as with OLPC)

Mostly moot, though less time will be spent on the official pages,  
though this would likely happen anyway with just a showcase section.

> 7. duplication of content is inevitable with two sites
>
> Splitting efforts like this generally leads to duplication of  
> effort, where, for example, someone down the road decides to add a  
> community blog on etoysville.com and it ends up drawing attention  
> (and life) from squeakland's blog, etc.   As much as we say "we  
> won't compete, we won't duplicate", it's pretty much inevitable,  
> particularly when the new site gets several orders of magnitude more  
> traffic than the official one.

There will be less duplication, but still a "why isn't this on the  
official pages" tension.  My desire is to have the "official" site  
*be* the community site.

> 8. it's just confusing to have two sites
>
> People will always end up on one site or the other, wondering where  
> something on the other site is.   People won't know which site to go  
> to, or where to put content, etc.     You can say, "this is the  
> project server" as loud as you want, and there will always be people  
> who get confused by two sites.

The confusion will be the same.   What's under "community", what's  
under "tutorials", what's under "resources"?

> 9. the new site will draw google rank away from squeakland.org
>
> With google, who links to you is what determines how high up on the  
> list you place.    Having LOTS of people linking to their projects  
> on their blogs, facebook, etc, will help squeakland's google rank  
> immeasurably.   You'll be able to type "educational software" in  
> Google and actually show up in the first or second page.   Not so if  
> we split the sites . . . the community one will always win.   Also,  
> having two sites makes it confusing for other sites when determining  
> which site to link to.   Schools will want to link to their group on  
> the project server . . . requiring them to put both the squeakland  
> website and the community site is cumbersome, and won't always happen

Moot. Though if we really make them seem like different sites, people  
will feel compelled to link to both, or just one.   Google will still  
like us though.

> 10. having one site helps us enforce a simple & clear navigation  
> structure
>
> One of my primary roles at my work is warning clients about making  
> their site architecture & navigation too cluttered.   The general  
> trend is always to add this page, and this section, and this other  
> thing, all of which sounds like a good idea at the time, but people  
> forget the big picture . . . the first time visitor.    I force them  
> to keep things within the "rule of fives", where the top three  
> levels of navigation must fit within logical groupings, so that  
> there's only so many misclicks before people find stuff.   Usability  
> is the "art of the obvious", and it's HARD to imagine how people use  
> a site.  You need hallway reviews, and stats analysis, etc, etc.     
> With a separate community site, there's a greater danger that it'll  
> turn into the OLPC wiki, where it's much too hard to find things of  
> value.   Yes, you can say, "the community committee can enforce  
> usability", but I'll just point you back to #6 above.  They can help squeakland.org 
>  too.


This is still my biggest complaint.   What people are essentially  
saying is, I want a place to a whole new nav, with a bunch of new  
sections and pages.   This is still a loss from a usability standpoint.

My solution was to put *one* extra link "public", to a section that  
works exactly like the "featured" section.  Both sections work  
identically, within the same website design and navigation structure.