Neither of you are speaking out of turn. There's no heirarchy here, we're a community, and communities speak to each other.<br><br>The neglect of the society website is largely my fault. I haven't updated the website, or posted the meeting information, because I greatly underestimated it's use. <br>
I was intending on carrying on with the plans set in place back when Arron set things in motion to develop a new, or heavily modify the old website, however I've let things fall by the wayside, and all I can do is apologise. <br>
<br>This is now at the top of my list of things to do, and I'm about to make some calls about the Domain name. (I knew it was due for renewal, but I was informed last meeting that it was under control, and that we'd purchased it for another year)<br>
<br>I'll post back again within the next hour with an action plan, after making a few telephone calls.<br><br><br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Sun, Feb 21, 2010 at 2:08 PM, Rick Moynihan <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:rick.moynihan@gmail.com">rick.moynihan@gmail.com</a>></span> wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">Scroll down for reply:<br>
<div class="im"><br>
On 19 February 2010 11:27, Arron M Finnon <<a href="mailto:finux@finux.co.uk">finux@finux.co.uk</a>> wrote:<br>
> Its a shame that no one has done any updating on it, i mean if you looked at<br>
> it you would think that the society died after software freedom day.<br>
><br>
</div><div class="im">> I understand that there are plans to change the site, but as someone<br>
> mentioned to me "if you where a bank designing a new site you just wouldn't<br>
> shut up shop on the old one whilst doing it". I have to agree. I fear in<br>
> fact the lack of anything happening on that site may actually damage the<br>
> linux society. If you looked two weeks ago for linux in dundee and that<br>
> popped up you'd think the linux community in dundee may have died. Which<br>
> isn't the case.<br>
<br>
</div>Agreed! Visiting the site today I see that the domain registrar is<br>
now displaying its page and the site as it was has vanished. What<br>
happened to the old site?!?! I think as a society we need to take the<br>
website seriously and not use it as a place for playing annoying<br>
javascript tricks on our users. Personally I think hacks and tricks<br>
such as this betray the whole community, and give a poor impression of<br>
us as a community trying to engage with the wider public.<br>
<br>
Aside from this, I think it would be a good idea to get the old site<br>
back in place as soon as possible. Dead inbound links negatively<br>
affect a sites page rank. Once in place content and pages should<br>
exist as stable entities and we should take care not to lose them<br>
(creating deadlinks). If we ever need to move pages then we should do<br>
so with redirects. The site previously appeared to enjoy a reasonable<br>
page rank, it could take months or years for a new site to restore it.<br>
<br>
The worst thing we can do is start afresh... We need to build on what<br>
is there already and respect the old site along with the majority of<br>
its content. If we need to move to another CMS, then we should either<br>
import all the old posts into the CMS and setup redirects if their<br>
URLs change, or leave the old CMS up in place, with its old content<br>
moved under a subdirectory (with redirects again put in place).<br>
<br>
If there are no plans to immediately replace this site, then as a<br>
stop-gap we should at least redirect to the Dundee LUG wiki, which<br>
Gordon setup. This is IMHO an excellent start at a community site and<br>
very under-used.<br>
<br>
As Arron says though... Content is King, fixing the content is most<br>
important... Only when this is fixed should we consider fixing bugs in<br>
the site or switching CMS's.<br>
<div class="im"><br>
> I don't want to speak out of turn but really if its going to be left like<br>
> that, then my 2 pence worth is please pull it down. Otherwise please do<br>
> something with it, the layout is not always critical, without being rude and<br>
> as the media says its 'content stupid'.<br>
<br>
</div>Agreed. And incidentally I don't think you're speaking out of turn.<br>
You spent a lot of time writing content and setting up the old site,<br>
it's only fair that this effort should be respected going forward.<br>
<br>
If anyone is speaking out of turn here, then it is doubtless me...<br>
But as an active, paid member of the society I feel that the website<br>
represents the WHOLE community. I'm sure I'm not alone in this.<br>
<font color="#888888"><br>
--<br>
Rick Moynihan<br>
<a href="http://twitter.com/RickMoynihan" target="_blank">http://twitter.com/RickMoynihan</a><br>
<a href="http://delicious.com/InkyHarmonics" target="_blank">http://delicious.com/InkyHarmonics</a><br>
<a href="http://sourcesmouth.co.uk/" target="_blank">http://sourcesmouth.co.uk/</a><br>
</font><div><div></div><div class="h5"><br>
_______________________________________________<br>
dundee GNU/Linux Users Group mailing list<br>
<a href="mailto:dundee@lists.lug.org.uk">dundee@lists.lug.org.uk</a> <a href="http://dundeelug.org.uk" target="_blank">http://dundeelug.org.uk</a><br>
<a href="https://mailman.lug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/dundee" target="_blank">https://mailman.lug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/dundee</a><br>
Chat on IRC, #tlug on <a href="http://irc.lug.org.uk" target="_blank">irc.lug.org.uk</a><br>
</div></div></blockquote></div><br><br clear="all"><br>-- <br><br>Nick Walker<br>President : The Linux Society<br>UAD Ethical Hacker<br>