OurTown Site Update

Listeners of the World,

The month of May was suppose to be the great month of reveling the new OurTown.com. This month has also posed many obstacles and hard decisions. We have gotten behind on the project and miss-timed some of our projections. It saddens me to say that we will not be able to produce the new site this month. However I will be producing many new test URLs for our local editors to be able to go in and see the site and how it is suppose to be set up. We will be sending out a newsletter after the holiday to provide more details about the project. Please stay tuned for my next post where I will go into detail about why we are having this unplanned delay!

Your OurTown Superhero,

Chris

Month of May!

Listeners of the World,

It is now the middle of May and we still do not have a new site to show which is very disappointing to everyone involved. We have been working around the clock to get this site finished and we have run into many different road blocks. My programming team has informed me that we will have something before this month is over. It looks like the overall project will be a month behind when everything is said and done.

We are still working on fixing different problems with the old site and making sure that each of our local editors has everything they need to be successful. We are also working through some server issues which another team will have worked out by the end of this week. We are going through a very busy and exciting time and we thank everyone for their patience!

Your OurTown Superhero,

Chris

New Site Update!!!

Listeners of the World,

Well I am here to update everyone on where we are with the new and improved OurTown.com! Our programming team has informed me that we are a little behind on the project and that hopefully you will be seeing something next week. We were hoping this week would be the week, but we have to wait due to some unexpected road blocks. Once we release the new site it will be incomplete for about a month. We are rolling it out in waves!

The first release will be of the main site. You will be able to see the new look and layout of the site including the Home, log on, sign up, search, and local portal. These pages will include most of the functionality along with them as well.

After the first release will come the second release which will include the new "AD Portal"!!! This release will open up the new ad system so that our local editors can start making more money! Along with this release will be our "facebook connect" and new "twitter integration".

Now remember with these releases we will have different bugs throughout the system that we will be fixing nonstop until they are gone! Also some pieces might be missing over a period of day due to different fixes or add - ons that our staff will have to do.

So please be patient and enjoy once we have everything up and running!!!

Your OurTown Superhero,

Chris

The Month of May!

Listeners of the World,

It is now the great month of May, 2010! That means the new OurTown site with all of its helpful functionality is right around the corner. We were shooting for a "soft launch" at the end of April, but it seems that the team is behind due to unexpected road blocks that took just a little longer than expected to work out. Now that we have worked most of the problems out I can expect the "soft launch" of the site to happen very shorty!

The plan is to launch the site with most of the functionality working with some functions missing. We want all of our local editors to get a glimpse of all of our hard work that we have been doing since last December. There will only be a few things missing and unfortunately one of them will be the new ad system. The new ad system will be following the soft launch very shorty along with some minor features.

We hope that the new site will make it easier for the local editors to focus in on writing new stories, posting pictures, and events. While the set up of the page, input of the media, and obtaining of the ads will become very easy with the new set up. This will also make the site more attractive to the viewers as well hopefully helping the repeat visit rate for all of our local editors!

So all in all here is to hoping that the next post will be able the re-launch of OurTown.com!!

Your OurTown Super Hero,

Chris