Mitsubishi Monday afternoon Badminton notes

OK, can we move the Twitter feed to the right side, now, or do we have to wait until after Jersey Fresh?

Hey Retread, that's a good question. I had a poll up about that for one day last week and moving the feed to the sidebar had an early lead, but it ended up being like 55%-45% which I didn't feel was a strong consensus.

The idea for the twitter feed is that we will put up links that are not big enough for a full post but some people might enjoy looking at. It's a very fast system, very real time, and I like that. The question is just where to put it.

I'm with retreadeventer - can you please move the Twitter feed to the side? Please?

I'd like to see a good instructional video on how to tie a stock tie. The ones on YouTube are rubbish last time I checked.

And the Twitter feed is very distracting at the top. I'd like to see a side tab that one can click if one wants to see the twitter feed - an option. I don't always want to see it and prefer to see the latest from John, Visionaire, videos etc. See www.philipbloom.co.uk for an example of an optional twitter feed.

The only thing I HATE (and the only thing I would ever ever complain about...I really love EVERYTHING else on here) is the twitter feed. I'm not a bird, I don't "tweet." The optional twitter feed would be glorious.

So far, the Twitter feed isn't getting much defense, but the objectors are usually much more vocal in these situations.

-First, let me say that I intend the Twitter feed to be a source of real time news rather than just an extension or publicity of our Twitter account. That said, the issue taps into a question that I ask myself a lot: what exactly do people want from Eventing Nation? Do our readers care that Princess Haya is being challenged for the FEI Presidency or do they just want more about Badminton, or just more amusing posts about random stuff?

-For example, I couldn't justify burying our Badminton coverage for a quick post about the FEI Presidency, so the Twitter feed felt like a good option to quickly post a notice and link to the story. I also prefer the Twitter feed to waiting to post the link until our next random news post because that is just so slow. We had around 75 clicks through the FEI Presidency link tonight, which I think shows that some people are using the feature.

-Clearly everyone enjoys different things about EN and the beauty is that we can fulfill many different desires with our real time blog format. Theoretically I like the idea of making the Twitter an optional button, but that coding will require some serious javascript that might be beyond my website design ability right now. I will look into it.

-->What about eliminating the scrolling? What about slowing down or speeding up the scrolling? *What about putting it in the sidebar and eliminating the scrolling? I love the recent visitors map because I feel it really integrates the 'nation' component of EN, and I hate to bury the map under the Twitter feed, but that seems to be what folks want right now.

Honestly, I don't know what course to take right now, perhaps a full post asking a few quick questions about the direction of EN is in order, but for now the responses on this post will probably determine the fate of the Twitter feed. As always, we make EN to serve our readers.

Note: If it's not obvious already, I was the Anonymous post at 6:00PM--for some reason it didn't register my login.

John, can you explain what you intended to point out about his reins?

(FWIW, I like the scrolling feed at the top...)

I have a small screen and the feed takes up 1/3 of the picture. I'm getting old. This makes me squint.

I really like the feed, and click on it often. Leave it where it is.

AEM-I was just pointing out how they are secured to the bit using the metal loop rather than the conventional buckle or whatever you call that thingy...4H did teach me how to mate rabbits so I don't want any Pony Club elitism now.

I like having the twitter feed- I usually click on quite a few of the links you post! I like having it on the top, but having it on the side would be fine with me too.

I love the twitter feed, but on some older (evil) computers, the scrolling makes the screen bounce. Maybe moving it to the side would work better? I do love the scrolling though. The twitter feed has kept me from studying for finals, so I would consider it a success!

I like the feed too - right where it is :)

I love it!! It lets me know the latest updates...and has links!!

I like having the Twitter available for smaller news, etc. But it does make my screen jump when I visit EN throughout the day on my smartphone, which is quite frustrating when I am working my way through a 'normal' post. I agree..don't bury the visitor map. I think EN needs to go whatever direction YOU prefer. We will continue to enjoy reading if you continue to enjoy running around in soggy jeans to bring us news so that we can live vicariously through our fellow eventers even while we sit behind desks so we can afford to ride our own horses!

Just to keep in touch, I am absolutely reading these comments about the Twitter feed. Right now, I am thinking about trying it in the sidebar and seeing if people like it there, perhaps scrolling, perhaps not. I just really hate to push the map down *sigh*

I don't enjoy it where it is. Too distracting. Makes me want not want search for the fun stuff down below. It is like the moving ads attached to emails which I also dislike!

Please move it to the side. I like the content, and have clicked quite a few links, but it's distracting and annoying to go to the home page and only see the feed and the title of your newest post on the screen.

I don't find any benefit to the "recent visitors" map - it usually just has me, "arrived from different EN page 15 seconds ago" at the top. It annoys me because it's inaccurate, too (43 km and several city boundaries from my actual location).

Definitely like the content but I liked it better as News & Notes...My only internet connection is usually an iphone, and often in a non-3G area, so I have some of the problems people described above, and if I look away and then catch a new tweet out of the corner of my eye and it's like playing whack-a-mole trying to click on it before it's gone. Yes, I know I can scroll and get it again but that doesn't work very well with an iphone. So I've started checking EN's tweets directly at twitter and not at EN! But the content is great!

Alright, well the consensus that I see from the comments is that people either like the twitter feed or like it and want it moved to the sidebar. So, I'll try it on the sidebar and see how that goes. NO PROMISES THAT IT WILL STAY THERE. Maybe we will have twitter feed visitation like with my divorced parents when I was a kid-sidebar except on every other weekend and Wednesday nights.