Behold, NewsDaily! Our newest look uses the NewsDaily theme. It delivers everything we hoped for and more. Unlike previous themes we now have full social media integration. RSS feeds, Facebook, and Twitter are prominent. At the top of the blog and in the left sidebar you can easily subscribe to our Podcast’s RSS feed, be our fan on Facebook, and follow us on Twitter.
Social media integration can be found at the bottom of each article. You can easily:
- Share the article on Facebook
- Tweet the article
- E-mail the article to a friend
- Print the article
Many people use social media in innovative ways to fill diverse needs. We are making it easier to integrate your friends and gaming. Our tweets appear in the right sidebar of this blog; large buttons in the left sidebar facilitate the sharing of information with Facebook, Twitter, and Digg.
Social media is an older buzzword but an important one. Why else would I use it three times so far? Our new look offers more than buzzwords. It projects a cleaner and more professional appearance. That avoids distracting colors and gimmicks that detract from what’s of most importance. The content! You don’t come here to see flashing lights and pretty colors. You come for the articles, the podcast, and the pictures we share.
Great content is important but it must also be eye catching. There are two ways in which we do this. The first is through placing Featured Posts in the top center location of the blog. The most recent Featured Posts are shown here, with pictures, and they transition from one to the next. You can pause the transition by hovering your mouse cursor over the post/image. Or, you can speed things along with the left and right arrows.
The other way is by combing the Recent Posts, Recent Comments, and (condensed) Tags in the right sidebar below the Search bar. Recent Posts, with thumbnail, are shown by default. Click on the Recent Comments tab to see those along with the commentator’s Gravatar. Then click on Tags to see a condensed tag cloud. Don’t worry because the full Tag Cloud is further down below the Calendar.
These are the main features of our new theme. It continues to have a Search bar so you can easily find what you’re looking for. Our new logo (click it to return to the blog’s main page) is prominently displayed near the top of the blog. The menu at the very top includes our Editor’s Choice Awards, Podcast, and how to Contact Us. Another menu below the logo makes it easy to access our Contests, Announcements, and Featured content.
The sponsors are in their usual spot on the right and friends further down. But, our Gaming Stats have moved into the left sidebar along with the Sign In for the blog (termed Meta). You used to log in with a link near the top of the right sidebar. We moved it down and to the left sidebar so that more important content takes center stage.
As always you can find our Creative Commons License at the very bottom of the blog in the footer. Over several days we tested this theme on our test blog. Everything worked perfectly! As far as we can tell things are copacetic here. But, maybe we missed something. As you get used to the new layout please contact us with questions and comments. Maybe you can’t find something you used all the time before. Or maybe something isn’t working for you. Just let us know and we’ll iron out the kinks.
We believe this new theme will improve your experience and will make it easier for us to share the content you want.
Very nice! It’s shiny and better.
I dig the new format bro.
I waited a while to comment here, but I must say this new format is great!
Cort