Looking Forward

[Robert]

Apolyton,

First of all we thank Firaxis and 2K Games for the spectacular news about the upcoming release of Civilization V. We can't wait!
We are all expecting another great game in the series, although we are worried about the amount of nights that are going to be lost getting to know the latest greatest from the stables from our favorite game developer.
The news we´ve heard so far is inspiring: pearls like improved diplomacy, new graphics, a redesigned combat system and, our personal favorite, a better integration with the community.

In this avalance of new it is hard for us to stun you all with some news of our own. We're going to try anyway.
To bring you the ultimate Civilization V community experience we're going to offer you community articles, access to the latest news, organising all kinds of multiplayer games, community and game integration, following the developers tweets and download the latest mods, scenarios and Sid knows what else...

We have acquired the latest software and a brand new server. We are exploring ways to integrate our society with the game. And we have teamed up with two professionals. All of us are very eager to make this happen.

Thanks to all of you for being this community and a special thanks to all you moderators who have spent time to keep Apolyton going.

The Apolyton Civilization Team

[Ming]

As I mentioned in the other thread, this all sounds great, and I look forward to all the great things you are planning. It's good to see that you are commited to the site and civ franchise. It is even better to hear that you have some new software, new server and some professionals to help bring Apolyton to forefront of civ sites and to provide your members with the best experience you can.

However, please don't make the mistake that most companies make... which is to wait until all the i's are dotted and all the t's crossed before you make any changes. As anybody with experience knows, that can take time and usually takes more than expected.

You need to crawl before you can walk, and walk before you can run.

PLEASE don't make the same mistake that others have made in the past and not do the simple things now.

Yeah, anything you do know will be just a waste in the long run. But unless you plan on executing big changes tomorrow, you are missing major opportunities TODAY.

There are so many simple things you can do now that will have an impact, and yet you have done none of them. Why not mention Civ V ANYWHERE on your home page. Why isn't there a news story on it.
Your last news story was from LAST YEAR. Isn't this the biggest news the Civ community can get, and you can't even take the time to just reprint their press release.

Even if all the wonderful things you are promising are planned for the near future, you still need to think about the present, because who knows when the future will be here.

Frankly, you have promised a lot of changes in the past, and the only real thing seen so far by the members is the forum restructuring. Anybody that understands the problems you inherited knows why this is the case. But that's no excuse for not covering the biggest story in the civ community with your current site design.

Again, I appreciate all you have done to continue providing us with this community...
And I hope to be stunned when the changes are put into place... but just saying you are going to do something didn't stun me at all.

[Robert]

I hear what you are saying and I do agree with you.
But there's a 'but', we don't know the ins and outs of the current environment and cannon easily create new sections, etc.
We are using the news system and the forum system. But there's indeed not yet a civ5 official section. I'm looking into this though.

[Ming]

Your current system allows for at least a news story... that is simple and easy and something you have done in the past. Also, why not a Civ V icon that takes you to the Civ V forums... This is also something you have been able to do in the past (3.19 patch download) so it is in within your capabilities.

These two simple things that are possible would at least show that you are covering Civ V on your home page.

[MikeH]

Ming, there are CivV news stories, currently under miscellaneous. They just can't work out how to create a CivV news category. Clearly not ideal.

Dunno if it's possible to hard code a link on the home page, ought to be even if it's hard coded html on the template? But I've never seen the template.

[Ming]

Dunno if it's possible to hard code a link on the home page, ought to be even if it's hard coded html on the template? But I've never seen the template.

It must be possible since they have already done so in the past. They have a link for the 3.19 patch which was added after the transiition.

And the "news" is buried in the MISCELLANEOUS section.

[Robert]

Hmm, someone else did the patch thing for us (DanQ?).

And indeed, I am writing news stories, and self biased has volunteered to also write news stories. I am exploring the possibility to create a civV section for now. Placing some stuff on the front page should be possible as well. It's just very time consuming. Fortunately I'm not the one installing/configuring the new server.

[Ming]

Yeah... it's time consuming. But they still have to be done

Just keep thinking along these lines and do the best you can and as soon as you can. The window of opportunity here is not a large one. It's too bad you aren't in a position and have the resources to optimize the site for search. Hopefully you will in the future. As mentioned in another thread, at least you come up number 5 for "Civ V"... too bad that is not the case for "Civilization V"

[MikeH]

In an extreme case, you could write a page of static html with links to the main areas on it and use that as the home page. You'd have to update news feed manually, by editing the html, but it couldn't possibly look as bad as what's there now and might even be quicker to update.

[ZEE]

If this helps at all, when i was a news editer for Dan i had to use a 3rd party site to enter the html code, and was somehow magically transferred to the front page news section, and this was before the VB upgrade. It wouldn't surprise me if Dan didn't even tell you about the basics of how this scrapheap junkpile of code for a website operated and what tools he used to do so.

[Asher]

I hope you're going to ditch whatever you're using now and find a real CMS?

[ZEE]

what i would seriously do is keep the basic information like user data, important links, and forum structures then destroy the whole site and start over. Since you have a new server i would start there.

Destroy this whole backwards-coded abomination and start over fresh and streamlined.

[Robert]

We use Keld right now for news indeed.

[Dale]

Robert, I believe it was Snoopy who setup the Colonization news section for me when I was posting all the Civ4Col news coming out. Maybe you can get an answer there? I know it involved a new section of php code in a new CMS category to pull the filtered news stream out of the Keld database. aside from that....... NFI.

[Grandpa Troll]

We use Keld right now for news indeed.

Same one we used at least 5 years ago