Release Notes
There's a lot of stuff in this week's release, so we're going to get right to it.
Who Else Voxed This?
Updates to Your Blog Sidebar Modules
There have been several changes to the modules in your blog sidebars.
As a reminder, you can turn sidebar modules on or off, head to the Design tab and click on "Customize your sidebars". Check out the changes:
- New Recent Additions Module
The new Recent Additions module shows the last five audio, videos and
books that have been added. If you choose to display the Recent
Additions module, you might want to turn off any of the separate
modules for books, audio or video so you're not showing redundant
additions.
- Recent Photos Module
We've redesigned this module so that it now displays a 3x3 grid of photos.
- Displaying Your Profile Photo On Your Blog
We've added your profile photo above your About Me module in your blog
view. If you'd like to upload or change this photo, choose one that's
no wider than 150 pixels and then click on Account > Profile to update it.
- Archive Module
We've made the blog archive module more compact so that it displays the
five most recent months with content, then links to content by year.
On the yearly archive page you can click through to view your posts by
month.
And There's More...
In response to feedback and in the ongoing effort to streamline, we've
made a few tweaks here and there. Here's a quick overview:
- Quick Link To Add Photos
Look, up there in your top navigation link -- we've added a link to Add
Photos! It will open up a Compose page and put you right into the
Insert Photos module.
- Excerpts in Email Notifications
We're changing the way we do email notifications for comments and
private messages. So far, our content in emails have been kind of
uneven -- some have just a link, others have excerpts and others have
all the text. Keeping in mind the feedback that most of you'd like
your notifications to give you an idea what somebody actually said,
we're moving to the same kind of excerpt in our notifications. For new
comments, replies to comments, and new private messages, you'll get a
single, streamlined email with the first 100 characters of the message,
along with handy links for replying or reading the message in its
entirety on Vox. Simple!
- Streamlining the Recent Updates module
We've made the Recent Updates module on the Home page smarter so that
you won't see repeated entries of the same action (such as noticing
that one of your friends changed their theme five times over a ten
minute span).
- Sharing Improvements
When you're viewing a post or asset, we've folded the "Email" link
under the "Share" menu. So if you'd like to email a post, click on the
Share link to be taken to that option. Just hovering over the Share
link will reveal the list of options to bookmark it on other sites.
Similarly, we've added that list of bookmarking options to the share
pages you see after you save a post or when you click through to the
Send to a friend screen.
- Vox This!
We've updated the way that the Vox This
tool functions. We heard feedback that there was confusion over
whether "Vox This" will add an item or create a post. To fix this
problem and make Vox This more flexible, you'll be able to choose
whether you want to add what you entered as a Post or only as a link
asset. Now when you make a post with Vox This, the item will be added
as an asset into your library and a new post will instantly be created
using the same title, description, tags and privacy you entered. If you'd like to add more to your post, you can instantly click through from the confirmation page to edit it.
New Themes!
As always, there are beautiful new themes to choose from:
Whew, that was a lot of stuff. If you have questions or suggestions, please let us know via our Feedback link. We hope you enjoy these additions and changes!
Comments
Nintey-Five percent of the time I don't have access to Vox during the day and rather enjoy seeing the comments in my email throughout the day.
Do you have any idea how frustrating it is to see a comment that says "...I disagree but..." then not be able to see the comment for hours? Very.
How about making something in user options?
I agree with matokie...that second gigantic picture of my avatar is both repetitive and annoying. I know I could change it to a different image to remove the repetition, but I'd rather not have anything there. I prefer the minimalist look. I went to "Customize your sidebars" to delete the thing, but it doesn't look like I have that option. Is there another way, or am I stuck with this?
Otherwise, things are looking good and I like the changes.
I agree as well-- repetitive--too large profile photo. I hate it.
My neighbours don't seem too keen on theirs either--there's a slew of profile pic changes going on right now.
This isn''t a change for the better either: "Recent Photos Module
We've redesigned this module so that it now displays a 3x3 grid of photos."
As Irma said, the grids don't match the Videos, Audio, and Books modules.
It's too blocky-looking for my taste.
I'll try to find some things about all these changes to praise when I have had more of a chance to use them. These are the ones sticking out right now.
And yes, I remembered to put this on a feedback form.
Thank you.
I like all of the updates, BUT the profile photo. I just don't like having it there. I think having my picture in my icon in the top left corner of my blog is enough. Is it possible to make this function optional?
but i have to agree with the profile picture on your main blog page-- it's just too busy now. and i have to object to comments being cut off in emails. that was the best thing vox had over sites like myspace and facebook.
I don't know who is telling you that 100 characters is enough to let you know what someone actually said, but in my neighborhood, you almost NEVER get the gist of a comment in the first 100 characters. PLEASE make an option to get full text in an email for comments, replies, and private messages! Some of use can't log into Vox every time we get a comment, but still want to know what's going on.
As for the Recent Updates feature being streamlined...if you would just give us an option to choose what types of updates from my neighbors we want to see, you'd probably see a lot less complaints about anything related to this. You're still giving the bloggers the choice of what to force on others, rather than giving the readers the choice of what to view from others. I'll continue to use my greasemonkey script to filter out this whole section until I have the option to only view "recently favorited", etc and can avoid things like "tag updates" and "template updates" that I care absolutely nothing about.
I greatly DISLIKE not being able to add my own text to a Vox This post - I loved the way it was set up before, because I could add my comments. Now I have to go through and edit it? What a pain......not user friendly whatsoever. I really don't know of many people that just "Vox This" without adding their own thoughts. I know that I never do.
Also, in regards to email notifications, I'd appreciate it if you'd quit being greedy. We all know that Vox (currently) is supported by ads, but forcing us to come to the website each and every time someone comments to a post or our comment is plain greedy and only serves the purpose of driving your ad revenue. I personally, would pay a little for Vox so I wouldn't have to SEE ads and be able to get full comment text in emails.
i am absolutely loving your omission of the ads by google™ which normally follow the first and third vox entries!
i believe this change generates flow, and frees up vital space @ the very core of vox's intended function... the vox itself...
||| integrity |||
[this is very, very good]
When you create your "vox this" link, DON'T select "post this". Instead select "Just Add Link". When you do this, it'll bring you to a success page asking if you want to "view and edit" or "write a post". Select "Write a Post" and you'll be presented with a new post with your link box inserted, just like you used to be able to see with the vox this action before.
Posting of the blog post won't occur until you submit your post off of this page, and you'll therefore have time to edit your text, title, placement of the vox this link box, etc all before you post for the first time.
Now if only they'd add a "Links" portion to the "Organize" and "Insert" pages like they have with photos/videos/etc so I can quickly and easily select one or more links and insert/modify/delete as I choose, without having to go through the more bulky "links" list found through yourbloghere.vox.com/library/links/ . I recommend everyone interested in this submit this as a feedback suggestion so we can get the support of the masses behind this request.
I don't really see the point in the "add Photos" execution of opening the compose window with the add photos window, wow it saves you one click, when the compose window is half an inch away. I thought it would have been a quicker way to add photos directly to your library without going through organize. that would have saved steps, and I would have appreciated that. That was disappointing and confusing to me. But that's me, I'm crankypants. feedback to follow.
1. I'd so much like a preview-this-post option. Photo embedding often doesn't work out the way I intended, and going back and forth with the way Vox loads on an averagely powerful computer on DSL is still very painful.
2. More painful than #1: Please give us better stats.
Right now, I am embedding stats code via the sidebar widget thing. However, due to the way a Vox blog is put together through modules, I have no chance seeing referrals and search engine paths etc.
I never know from where my readers came from, whether someone else blogged about a particular post (and we don't have trackbacks and pings!), or whether people were looking for other things. The only referral URL I get for each hit is the URL of the sidebar widget module.