New bakersfield.com homepage

We launched a redesign of bakersfield.com's homepage today, laying the foundation for greater changes sitewide in the coming months.

I've posted a separate work blog post detailing the changes that is receiving generally good response. But here's a quick overview: 

• Goals were to clean up a cluttered design that had been patched way too many times, make more money and do more to promote other sites in The Bakersfield.com Network. 
• Add more "white space."
• The content mix is powered by a library of "drag and drop" widgets that can be adjusted on the fly or set to automated dayparts. I've been through a few redesigns in the past, and the second we launched, fixed code meant the design was obsolete within seconds. The beauty of drag and drop is we can quickly make changes, whether to match reader interests or to reflect a huge local story that demands a single-story focus.
• More ad positions. We were turning away money with our old design, so we added another leaderboard, a skyscraper and three smaller banners to meet demand. We're swimming in house and remnant ads as a result of the changes, but we expect to sell that inventory quickly.
• A "carousel" that highlights our growing Bakersfield.com Network of local sites. We still have to add widgets for key sites that include Bakotopia, Bakersfield Life and Northwest Voice, but what we have live now gives you a peek peak at our family of sites.

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Virgin's "Project" raises the bar for digital publications

After skimming the debut edition of Virgin's iPad lifestyle magazine "Project," I was immediately struck  by two things:

1. Why couldn't a company like Virgin, which exudes passion and energy, come up with a better name for what is a dynamic digital app?
2. The "Project" cover displays dynamically in portrait or landscape mode"Project" captured my attention and imagination like few magazines have done before. In the infant age of tablet publications, it's reset the bar for digital magazines and publications in general. That's saying something when magazines like Wired and Popular Science are doing innovative things. But "Project" is so well-packaged and executed that it's at times breath-taking. 

Unless you own an iPad, it's hard to describe all that "Project" is (although the video above offers a glimpse). I don't say that to be elitist -- there are millions of iPads after all -- but to reinforce the fact that touchscreen tablet computers will dramatically reshape how we view and interact with content. But here are some things about "Project" that knocked me out:

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We've entered a revolution in web design

The Twitter redesign is just one bit of news this past week about new website or app designs that focus on how to better present dynamically generated content in fresh and indigent ways.

I heard on This Week In Media that MySpace's redesign, set for launch in October, draws inspiration from Flipboard. If you're not an iPad user, check out the video below on how Flipboard works. It has revolutionized the concept of serendipity in packing packaging personalized content in new ways. Facebook, Twitter and some of my favorite RSS feeds were already sticky but Flipboard makes them moreso by pulling in images that you or others linked to, but did not directly publish.   

iPad apps like FLUD and Pulse draw similar inspiration in allowing one to add their own mix of RSS feeds, and have the apps surface the content in attractive ways, and often more intuitively than their original source. So what once were heavy text feeds now come to life with rich images and integrated social-media connections.

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