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WebWord Weblog Posting Posting Date: May 22, 2003 WebWord Comment -- I'm a big fan of Movable Type, which is a product of Six Apart. Unfortunately, from the Movable Type web site it is almost impossible to find a link to Six Apart. That's frustrating since I want to know more about Six Apart's latest product, Type Pad, which is a hosted version of Movable Type. I've become less and less interested in maintaining my web site, but more interested in working with content. Type Pad could be just what I need. But my frustration goes much deeper. Earlier today I received a Six Apart email newsletter announcing some things about Type Pad. Incredibly, there was absolutely no link to the Movable Type web site, the Six Apart web site, or the Type Pad web site! The information in the newsletter was pretty good and I was interested. The newsletter had a few reasonable calls to action: "Just sign up!" and "We've got screenshots!" There were two links in the email. One link (at the end of the newsletter) was to a Guardian article and the other link was to unsubscribe from the newsletter. Come on folks; come on Anil! I know you are better than this. The software is great; I donated money when I realized I was using Movable Type all the time. The Six Apart blog is pretty good. The staff is excellent. Next time you tease me in your newsletter, you better give me an outlet. Give me links, throw me a bone!
Reader Comments...
John, you raise a completely valid point. The omission of the links was a slipup that came during editing the HTML and plain text versions, and I'll take it as a compliment that you know we can do better. We've got a host of changes in store for the Movable Type website, and more prominent access to our other resources is primary among them. Until then: http://www.typepad.com Thanks for the feedback. I'd love to hear more about what you (and your readers) think about the announcements we've made. Posted by: Anil on May 22, 2003 08:52 PM
I posted my original comment at about 8:45 PM. If you notice, Anil posted a response at 8:52 PM. What unbelievable customer response time. Also keep this in mind: Anil answered my posting after business hours. Impressive, very impressive indeed. Now for another question. Why are so many different web sites used? I'm confused. You've got movabletype.org, sixapart.com, and typepad.com. Can you explain why you've decided to use these URLs? Why not use sixapart.com/typepad and sixapart.com/movabletype or some other similar naming convention? More feedback. Improve your error pages! For giggles I typed in "sixapart.com/typepad" and was dished up typical, ugly error page. You know, The requested URL /typepad was not found on this server. Improve it! (I'm not even a programmer and I fixed mine. Wink, wink.) Even more feedback. I'm confused by something. The company is Six Apart. Yet, when I visit the Six Apart web site, the browser window title is Six Log. I understand that Six Apart is all about web logs (uh, I think) but there is no need to use the word "log" in the window title, is there? The home page is the home page. It should probably be "Six Apart" or something snappy like "Six Apart - Personal Publishing Perfection". Then, link to Six Log, which is Six Apart's blog. (I'm just throwing ideas around here, but I hope you get my point.) The home page doesn't have to be blog just because you sell blog software and services. Think about how you are using Six Apart's home page! Posted by: John S. Rhodes on May 22, 2003 09:41 PM
OTOH, having blog in the title will improve their google results for people looking for blog software... Posted by: alastc on May 23, 2003 04:28 AM
The company is Six Apart. Yet, when I visit the Six Apart web site, the browser window title is Six Log. This is an issue of semantics vs. usability. The W3C recommendation is for titles to reflect the contents of the document, not the name of the website. Yes, I know that the W3C isn't always based in reality, but semantically, it makes sense. Maybe something like "Six Log | Six Apart LTD." would be more appropriate? The home page doesn't have to be blog just because you sell blog software and services. No, but it makes a hell of a lot of sense. Posted by: Joshua Kaufman on May 23, 2003 09:19 AM
I'm surprised you just didn't go for the random www.sixapart.com
Hey, anyone visited http://www.movabletype.com lately?
I must be on the "B" list. I didn't get the message from Mena until today (May 24th), and it was loaded with links. Nevertheless, it did not link to http://www.dollarshort.org/ or http://www.stupidfool.org/. For that, I was grateful. That said, the message was pretty dense, and it took me a few minutes to figure out the point of it, which, I think, was to introduce TypePad. I went to the TypePad website to look at stuff, and, as I am a shallow person, I was put off by the Apple-esque interface. But, other than that, it might be useful as an alternative to blogspot and blogger and diaryland and ... I hope so, and I wish Mena and Ben the best -- and I've actually paid $20 for, let's see, at least four or five installations of Movable Type. Posted by: Lee on May 25, 2003 01:57 AM
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