Thanks for visiting our site today. AnnArbor.com is getting ready to go live this week, and we now expect to launch our Web site on Friday.
Under our most ambitious scenario, we had hoped to launch today. But we're still addressing a number of bugs, and we need to finish testing to ensure the site can handle the volume of traffic we're anticipating.
We're ready to go on all other fronts - with plenty of content, advertisements sold, and community bloggers on board.
So we're launching Friday morning, and the screen shot above gives you a peek at what our home page will look like when we go live. Teams have been de-bugging the system all weekend, and testing continues all week to make sure readers will have a great experience when they visit Friday.
Of course, we know not all the glitches can be caught in advance - so be patient and report anything you find.
In the meantime, we'd like to talk about what you'll find when you visit the site and the kinds of content we're busy producing.
Our editorial side is almost fully-staffed, and we've already been out reporting stories for the past few weeks. Our digital journalists have been at meetings, in classrooms, at events and digging through public records.
Some of the stories the news team is working on for launch:
- Ann Arbor's police chief says residents shouldn't worry about their safety, despite the loss of nearly 25 senior officers to recent retirements.
- Ann Arbor area hotel occupancy dropped in the first half of the year, yet a hike last March in the county room tax means that local tourism officials have nearly $318,000 more to spend this year to market the region as a travel destination.
- Poor students in Washtenaw County continue to graduate less often any other group of students, new graduation stats from the state show.
- Current Motor Co. hopes to soon begin manufacturing electric motor scooters in Scio Township.
In sports:
- A national recruiting expert says Rich Rodriguez is on the right path.
- Nick Sheridan works for another shot at starting at quarterback for Michigan.
- Local canoeists prepare for the Au Sable River Canoe Marathon.
- Freshman tackle Will Campbell 'has a lot of work' to do, Michigan defensive coordinator Greg Robinson says.
In community:
- Peggy Lampman writes about recipes like cracked wheat pilaf with seasonal vegetables in her daily "dinnerFeed" blog.
- Beer and restaurant writer David Bardallis introduces his beer blog, "All the brews fit to pint."
- Pam Stout shares her insights into "Parenting and beyond."
- Nicola Rooney offers her "All-time favorite summer reading suggestions."
And in entertainment:
- Popular local radio personality - and AnnArbor.com columnist - Martin Bandyke recalls his first experience as an enthralled audience member at a major arts event in Ann Arbor.
- Jennifer Eberbach takes a look at the Vault of Midnight - the wide variety of events it hosts makes it a lot more than a comic-book store.
- Kevin Ransom previews the upcoming David Lindley concert at The Ark.
- Jordan Miller writes about drinking fancy, drinking cheap in The Deuce.
So come back Friday morning to check out the new AnnArbor.com and let us know what you think.
Ummm, if you are working on those stories for the launch now (i.e. Monday 7/20), then they'll be old news by the time you launch. I have a feeling this is going to be LAME!
Shelly,
I understand your concern – obviously some news stories have a shorter shelf life than others. Enterprise and investigative stories take much longer than daily news, so we've been using the time before we launch to prepare stories on issues and topics that are relevant and still will be a week from now. You won't find week-old city council coverage when you log onto our site Friday. You'll find a good mix of current enterprise and daily stories.
I note in your recent mailers that you do not include editorials and letters in the Thursday print product. Why not add this back in to the Thursday paper - it is one of the best ways of keeping current with what we're all thinking about current events.
Linda, in the Sunday paper there will be a two-page opinion section. The Thursday paper is smaller, and there are a lot of things we need to get into it. For instance, it will contain the religious news that traditionally has run on Saturday. The print newspaper, like the Web site, is just a beginning and it will grow and add new features once we're up and running. Adding an opinion page to the Thursday paper is something we'll gladly consider. Ultimately, the content of the Thursday and Sunday paper will be what readers want it to be.
Some thoughts: This screen shot looks like an aggregator, like Digg or Reddit. Is that intentional? I appreciate the clean design but in the screenshot you can only see 3 stories and one ad. It's very sparse. Seems like the space isn't being used in the most efficient way. Also, I for one love to see big glossy pics with my online news. I noticed you never advertised for a photographer, so maybe original photography won't be a priority?
Shannon,
That screenshot is just the top of the page – you'll see around 11 stories on the homepage when it's live. We just wanted to give you a little flavor of the site in advance.
We did advertise for and hire videographer-photographers, and original photography will be a priority on our site and in the print product.
This is a revolutionary design? Is the whole design going to be click down, read, click back, click down, read, click back, click down, read...? Where are the stubs? Do you at least have scroll-over stubs or something?
Thanks for the preview. I had been out of town and was anxiously anticipating both the launch and the new design. This is enough to whet my appetite.
I like Nick Sheridan, but Forcier is the man! :)
Shannon – for all practical purposes, annarbor.com is an aggregator. Unfortunately, from what we see in this screen shot its not “something we’ve never seen before”…. which is fine, except they went out of there way to hype it as something much more. I do predict public dissatisfaction with the lack of impactful photo/visuals. It will be curious to see the functionality – though the bar is set real low in comparison to Mlive
There won't be room in the Thursday paper for an Opinion Page?
This is troubling news. You really should rethink that decision.
Deeday,
AnnArbor.com will certainly aggregate content from other sources, but we're not primarily an aggregator. We have a newsroom of 30-35 staff members who are doing original reporting and producing content for our site.
Larger photos please! Even if you fall for the "Google likes small images" line of thought, there are ways to hide a small photo for Google and show your readers a larger, more compelling one.
I don't know, it looks rather plain, but I like the focus on community/local news. But, I really don't see much difference from the current Mlive.com design. I'm particularly concerned how local advertisers will find "real value" for their monetary investments. You note that there are 35 news reporters, I bet you're going to need at least that number of advertising sales representatives to bring in online revenue. That's a conveniently missing personnel statistic. If you're going to make it, you need a lot of people to sell (on the phone, I assume) the concept to local business owners, that's where you need 35 new employees, good luck.
I noticed that you have not posted the hires for photography and video. Also, will you have graphic artists and designers? Besides writers who are your other creative people?
Joseph,
I think there are a total of 30-35 employees – which includes sales. Annarobror.com has done a good job in letting the community know about the reporters but it would be nice to hear from whoever is in charge of sales / marketing and what the value proposition to business will be?
A couple of answers on staffing. The figure of 30 to 35 employees is for the newsroom. There will be a similar number of people working on the business side in ad sales, marketing, event planning, etc. Most of our ad reps have been hired, but we're still hiring, and the ad sales staff will be announced together when everyone is hired. We also still are hiring photographer/videographers, and will have at least three on our staff. I should add that our home page design allows for large photos or small photos. The fact that you don't see any large photos on the small slice of the home page that is posted above doesn't mean that large photos won't be part of our home-page presentation. They will.
Looks good so far. I *am*, however, quite curious to see how well it reads on mobile devices such as the iPhone.
pmb
I agree that the presentation looks very simple but not very content rich. Referencing some critiques (http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2008/02/11/award-winning-newspaper-designs/) I think you would want to use the space a little more?
I am not looking for another freep/detnews.com busy site or a site like the Toldeo Blade online. I also didn't like mlive.com's need to have to scroll all the time to find content.
I guess I like the content sections listed on the right, just hoping there still was a 'front page' concept to highlight the top 6 stories of the day. Maybe that should be an option....
May want to edit the 3rd paragraph that reads: We're were ready to go on all other fronts
Thanks. Fix made.
What about HS sports? I can read about UM sports in lots of places.
We're staffed to cover high school sports at a high level. These are stories we're working on right now for our launch on Friday, but as high school sports gears up, we'll be ready, with a team of eight full- and part-time staffers devoted specifically to high school sports.
Yay! I'll be watching...sounds great.
When they show the people that will actually be in the advertising department, I doubt that any will be local. They'll probably be "professional telemarketers" but have no connection with the local community. There are several online publications now in Ann Arbor that have excellect sales staff that I'm sure will never be hired by this company. If they actually put online bios of the advertising sales staff that they eventually hire, I doubt anyone local will be hired, except former Ann Arbor news classified or display staff that couldn't convince business owners to pay for their declining customer base. If they really want a local paper, they better hire local sales professionals that know the community, but I don't think they'll do that. Without that connection with the community, they won't make it. I know of severral individuals who applied for account representative sales positions that live in Ann Arbor--none of them have received interviews. That's what "local" is really about.
If I want a news website, I can get that with my email, or go to a national news site, like CNN. What I liked about the Ann Arbor news was that it was something I could read anywhere. Now, I have to drag a computer or laptop around. Also, the Ann Arbor news had editorials and comics. From what I see here, both of those are going to be cut out. I liked reading different opinions, and learning about issues in our community through people passionate about them to send in a edtioral. Plus, the comics were a fun part of the newspaper, a good way to kick back and relax. It seems to me that the News is losing all the things that make it likable, and devolving into just another thing I feel I need to check everyday.
Just to clarify, there will be comics in the Thursday and Sunday newspaper, and the daily comics also will be available daily on our Web site, beginning July 27.
Will there be a daily SUDOKU at AnnArbor.com? How about one that can be printed or downloaded?
Yes, we'll have the daily Sudoku puzzle on our Web site, the same one that will appear in the Thursday paper. It will be printable. It won't be interactive online, although we probably will add an interactive version in the near future.
Wow - 30 to 35 employees for the newsroom alone? How many FTEs?
I'm impressed by this level of staffing. How many newsroom FTEs did the old AA News have?
Of the people we've hired so far, it breaks down into 23 full-time people and five part-time people. Several of our additional hires will be part-timers, particularly in the area of high school sports. At the end of last year, The Ann Arbor News had about 65 employees in its newsroom, although I don't know what the FTE count was.
Your statistics are a bit misleading ...
Not sure you can actually call your part-time sports people, yet-to-be-hired, "staff" since you won't be paying them a living wage according to Ann Arbor City Council's determination.
How about some transparency on what kind of financial hits your digital journalists are taking compared with doing the same job at the News? I think the public, especially in this town, would be outraged.
And it seems like the News had over 80 newsroom staff members just 3 years ago.
The city ordinance defines a living wage as $11.96 an hour. Our part-time employees are being paid significantly more than that, and are eligible for benefits. For our full-time employees, we're paying wages that reflect what's happening in the industry right now. A number of our employees have taken pay cuts to join us; others are being paid as much or more than they earned at their previous newspaper.
The site looks like a facebook knockoff. Yes, Facebook is trendy and everyone is doing it, but does anyone remember Myspace? – It’s close to bankrupt. My point is that social networking services shelf life is less than 5 years. It’s quite possible that by the time annarbor.com is actually up and working and that more than a handful of people actually know it exists – the platform will look stale and outdated.
The Wall Street Journal is rapidly growing their online subscribers (alone with print- by the way) not because they have a site “like nothing you’ve ever seen before” but because they pay and maximize top journalism talent. Did the Ann Arbor Snews do that? Will annarbor.com that? You can’t sugarcoat substandard journalism with bells and whistles and believe the consumer will stick with you for the long haul – sadly that’s been proven.
The suspected dismal pay scale (besides the executive level or course) will force top talent to move on to better opportunities - simple laws of economics.
You say you have 30-35 people on the staff. When it was a newspaper, I think you offered internships to high school age aspiring journalists. Will the website offer that chance? Getting youth involved and interested in journalism, or any career, is very important. Also, an internship is generally coveted because it's work experience, which is a requisite on any decent college application.
We currently have an intern – a graduate student who joined us last week and will be with us for about a month. We've also been recruiting local high school students to write for The Deuce on our site and plan to expand the opportunities for high school and college students to get involved. After we launch, we'll explore a more formal internship program.
I think you're making one mistake that a lot of sites make - your banner, logo and menu are wasting a lot of space. Look at all that unused, blue real estate up there, and how big those menu tabs are. This is going to occupy at least 25% of some screens. This is a typical mistake because it usually comes from the marketing crowd ("we need to show our logo and corporate identity"). You should consider trading-in some of that "look at us" space for content space.
No Crossword puzzles these past few days in the "Old" AA News! Will you have them in
the "New"?
will you also include the crossword puzzles with the on-line version?
Jan & Roy,
As a crossword puzzle fan myself, I am happy to say that there will be crossword puzzles in both the Thursday and Sunday print editions. The daily LA TImes crossword puzzle will also be available to download from AnnArbor.com as a PDF document.
Can't wait to read Jennifer Eberbach's coverage of the Atelier Dreiseitl waterscape proposal.
I wish that the look of the new AnnArbor.com were different on two counts, 1) the online "look" or view should resemble a newspaper as much as possible. The Detroit News and the Detroit Free Press both have a wonderful system that can be customized by the viewer. A) Al typical online look, much as Mlive is now and teh New AnnArbor.com seems to be, B) a small picture (similar to a pdf) of a page and if you click on it, the article shows up in the right-hand column, or C) a total pdf look where the viewer can see a single pare, two pages, and them zoom in to read it.
2) Why not keep the nice name and look of the Ann Arbor News.The name has worked for 174 years. " AnnArbor.com" sounds like some trendy name that will seem dated in a few years.
I agree with Jim about the name. Giving up a brand name that has been used for more than 100 years is very questionable. Also, it's not a graceful name to say. it you tell somebody you read something at AnnArbor.com it sounds like you're stumbling over your words. A dot-com is not a company or a news source. It's just a place; an address. Would it have made sense for the Ann Arbor News to be named "340 East Huron St" instead?
I think it's very disappointing that there will only be editorials and opinions on Thurs. and Sun. What about the rest of the week? I always enjoyed reading the opinon page in the Ann Arbor News. We're thinking about letting our subscription run out and won't be getting the paper on Thurs. and Sun.
Does your acorn logo have anything to do with the activist group ACORN?
It's exactly the same
No, we have no connection to that group.
What made you choose an acorn for your logo? When I think of Ann Arbor, I don't think of acorns. That image goes up north with squirrels.
Mimi, we discussed our logo in a previous post you'll find here:
http://annarbor.com/2009/06/annarborcom-introduces-logo-that-reflects-both-tradition-and-a-new-beginning.html
Your letters to the editor and opinion sections have always been my favorites. Its great to READ WHATS ON PEOPLES MIND. How about having it on Thursday as well? How do I get a letter in? Please let me know how to submit my piece. Thanks.
You can send a letter to the editor to:
Letters
AnnArbor.com
310 E. Liberty, Suite 700
Ann Arbor, MI 48104
or e-mail it to:
share@annarbor.com
I like the look.. it is a good thing to be able to quickly scan the articles and then get more detail if interested..
I had heard about the singing @ the city council meeting, so it was fun to see the video.
Looking forward to the first edition.
Jim Carty, was right. This little adventure is going to be a disaster.
I'll hold my design / content commentary until the site launches. Regarding the "banner/logo takes up too much space" comment, I think your proportions are right on the mark. The eye needs a place to start and a place to rest. Fill the whole viewport with content and it becomes a readbility nightmare. Best of luck, i'll be back on friday.
Yeah, but Carty's blog hasn't been updated in at least a month. I know, I know, law school takes precdence.
Hoping he returns for some comment once the AA.com site actually launches tomorrow.
I'm shocked at how people are responding to an inevitable transition in news media. Technology has made newspapers and magazines obsolete for obvious reasons and nothing can be done about it. What is the point of lashing out at Mr. Dearing? Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but let's have a little respect and dignity for Pete's sake.
Reading the comments and responses, it is unclear to me just who is doing the responding and in what capacity. I cannot tell for sure who is staff and who are commenters - seems like comments should be answered in a different "official" section where we know the answers are coming from staff
Good luck guys, I will be supporting and checking into this site regularily. Please keep the tradition of the A2news alive and report the many great storys to come in this enhanting city.
@Dee-
What is there to respect? They killed a 175 year old newspaper, and are now replacing it with a blog. And the staff of AnnArbor.com will most likely disagree with me about that, but this is just a blog, nothing more. Next thing we know, they'll kill this and give us our news through Twitter. I hope this site goes under, and Booth Publications learns their lesson. Hopefully Heritage Newspapers, or some other publisher will create a new Ann Arbor News.