Mysteriousbritain Re-Vamp

We are currently ploughing through the process of relaunching the website with some new features such as interactive maps, integrated forum, online report forms etc. Hopefully we should be able to pull it all together and roll it out sometime later this year.

As you guys are actively using the site on a near daily basis, what are your ideas? What would you like to see on Mysteriousbritain, apart from including Ireland

Well it's a great site as it is, but interactive maps and updated contents are more than welcome! Remember if you need help with Scotland you know where to find me.


I like the colour scheme- it's a refreshing change from the black, black and more black that is common with similar websites. Makes it more professional!

Oh, more piccies?? If possible.

Just keep expanding would be my word on the matter, make sure there's in-depth info on every region.

With the current website each page is individually made with html and updating it is a huge task. Putting a county together takes ages just to sort out the maps etc. That is the main reason for re-vamping, getting a more user friendly management system that allows us to throw the content up quicker. As for pictures, hopefully our lovely readers my donate some more as they have in the past. We tend to get people who are on holiday sending us their photographs which are really appreciated. The strange thing is we have had text book publishers asking us for our pictures, amazing, it's all amateur stuff

I like the site - the curves on the borders especially.

I'm a man of simple likes!

How about a comments feature for after articles? Or link in with the forums?

And what about using some sort of GIS feature so we can start to plot things on the maps you mentioned - keep a track of what ghosts are happening where, when they've been seen, folktales with similarities... Maybe I should take that on as a research project.

Ooh and I've just noticed - change 'sterlingshire' to Stirlingshire.

I'm currently working with Ian and DJP on the implementation of the new site. I want to take the opportunity to say that your comments and suggestions are appreciated, and that they will be taken on board so please do continue to post them up.

Urisk, we plan to remain as true to DJP's original look and feel as possible - curvacious borders and navy blue background.

The new system will allow us to cross-reference content on the fly, and in conjunction with the interactive maps, we should be able to achieve the kind of GIS you're talking about, Agricola.

The comments feature for articles is entirely possible, and a more reciprocal relationship between the forum and the site content is a priority.

Stirlingshire.. check.

Personally I like it just the way it is. The only thing to do is to increase the contents (ie adding more counties and other articles), but I think that time will take care of that.

All i can do to help is supply more photographs from my picture archive, they are old but will still look good. I just need to find my photo box and my scanner, if i can i'll scan the negatives to get a better image. Just need to find the blighters.

The only thing i ask is if anyone approches the site to use photos in future, charge them and use the money for the upkeep of the site, I'm mentioning this because Dan has as far as i know been the man thats paid for it all in the past.

Lee.

p.s. please keep it looking the same but with all the bells and whistles that have been mentioned

The main reason to re-vamp the site is make managing it easier for ourselves and make it easier for readers to navigate. There are whole sections of the site I had forgotten about, such as the bibliography . Whilst we are going through this process it may be possible to add any new features we can think of or you want to suggest.

Finance wise you will have noticed we are introducing adverts that will help cover the costs and maybe fund some fact gathering expeditions some day. We'll probably introduce a store at some time so "Get your Mysteriousbritain Mugs here, roll up, roll up".

Just on the subject of adverts, the adverts on the forum are from the forum hosting company, as this is an external site, they are not mysterious britain adverts. I have noticed they have become pop ups recently.

DJP

I've not noticed any ads on the forum Dan, maybe my popup blocker is doing its job for once

How about a chat room for occasional gatherings?

The only thing that I would like to see - that is the font size of the main website to be made a tad bigger pls. (just up a couple of pts will do, it comes out mega small on my computer) The font size on the forum is absolutely right.

Love the idea of shopping on the site and think you've got some good subject material - v informative.

Quote :

How about a chat room for occasional gatherings?

I've never used a chat room. It might be handy to introduce one for one off occasions, a full time one woul dtake too much moderating. What do the rest of you think?

Font size Mogg-y, we'll bare that in mind. I think whilst looking at the work in progress it is easier to read and more like the forum, so you should be ok. If you struggle with the current format you can increase text size through View on your menu bar.

A small team of have been steadily working away copying and pasting articles into the new website and it is dawning on me just how large the website actually is. Some of the articles are being refreshed with new details and new additional aritices are also being added.

It is also highlighting a few minor spelling errors we have made in the names of certain locations which I am correcting. The funny thing is though that these few wrongly named places are on the web (other paranormal sites that is) with near identical information to that which is on Mysteriousbritain......so, maybe the moral to the story is , if you intend to copy stuff directly from us, make sure we have it correct, just like the new site should be .

when discussing Molly Leigh the Burslem witch on another forum, someone replied to my post with a verbatum cut and paste of an article i'd written on th subject a few months previously! It seems to be pretty common practice on the internet.

Sure does Matt .

Ian wrote:

Sure does Matt .

You should take it as a compliment to the quality of the info you provide Ian.

Yeah, I think a chat room would be a great idea if it's possible

A chat room would be possible, but how much moderating would it require. I think at the moment we have been very lucky with this forum as everyone gets on great and stays polite even if they don't agree. Therefore I think we have had some well balanced discussions and no one feels intimidated...well I hope they don't. It also means that it makes moderating the site really easy and fun. How much more work would a chat room be? I've never been on one so I don't really know. If it runs like this forum then it should be ok.

A chat room is not an essential Ian....It's just like being on MSN if you have that.....and I think your Website is great the way it is really!!.... it runs like clockwork....

Cut and pasting another's work from the Internet is also getting to be common practice for student essays, alas. The spelling mistakes help, though -I can tell a student that i know they've copied the review form Amazon without having to go look it up.

Chat rooms do need pretty constant moderation, even at a place like this; I agree that it's great to be part of a group where everyone makes an effort to be nice.

You could just open the chat room at arranged times. Say Sunday night at 9 for an hour so we could natter about msterious stuff.

I think a chatroom that is open during set periods of time may be interesting. We could maybe announce a certain topic to be discussed before hand and perhaps entice the odd guest poster. I think if it is structured it could be valuable as a good resource, though a good chatroom for the community to get to know each other better and discuss everyday things also has a lot of value and has been great fun here on the forum. Anybody else got any thoughts?