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Ramblings of a pixel-pushing, barely-sane Sabbatical officer and Meeja Whore 
Plagiarising Warwick Uni's good ideas
By Alex Harries on
Fri, 23rd Mar 2007 at 10:53
When it comes to looking for good ideas for UPSU Media, I don't think there's any shame in taking cues from other FE and HE media outlets. Warwick Uni has a very large base of staff and student blogs on their webpages, with articles ranging from music to democracy and everything in-between. The content is also largely well-written (which makes a change to some of the gumph I spout on these pages ;o). Two articles which really interested me were this one ("why websites don't matter any more") and this one by Holly Cruise, called "No, I don't understand the democracy here, either", which is a very insightful piece about Students' Union elections; well worth a look. Warwick's SU site also publishes "The Word", their equivalent of Pugwash, as a PDF available online; another nice touch. It's not nearly as interactive as I want to go with Pugwash, but it's a good start. More importantly, I think, the magazine also covers forthcoming event listings for the Union, and also dedicates a reasonable amount of space to news and reviews. It's a good read; check it out if you have a chance, and also take a browse around their SU website as well if you have a chance; again, there's some interesting ideas on there I'd love to implement here. Got an idea of your own for UPSU Media, from a news article, feature, or a suggestion on how we could improve things? Send them in to us.
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Search Sign In Directories (massive list) Forums Blogs Weather News Pugwash Purple Wednesdays Social:Life Photogalleries Elections Club and Societies BBC News Although they are defined individually, wen looking at the page they seem to disolve into one another with too much information to take in. Perhaps thats just me but nothing stands out it just seems like a massive bunch of text mushed together ? You were talking about making the site more like myspace/facebook/bebo etc which personally i think is a fantastic idea, but layout wise those sites aren't overcrowded with information, or if they are they have better graphics and well defined sections. Only a few suggestions hope they help, now ur staying as MAPO and after u finished ur disertation u might have time to rework it a little.
Sat, 24 Mar 2007
The problem we have always faced, and which we always will face, is distilling the various forms of site content (UPSU.net is huuuuge) into a bite-sized summary on the homepage. I have some ideas for layouts which I need to start bouncing off other people - I think the first step will be to set up a test bed where everyone can preview a number of different sketch layouts and maybe even comment on which ones they like the most - it might be something as simple as a forum post, or I might try something entirely different depending on how adventurous I'm feeling ;o). I think Warwick's website is a product of good traditionally-based content being shoehorned onto the web; in other words, the content is rich and diverse, but a lot of it comes from their magazine or radio outlets. The downside there is that they probably don't have someone working almost full-time - as UPSU.net does - to maintain the output standards online. End of the day, there's a balance between presentation, content, and available time; it's impossible to make the most of the first two without unlimited amounts of the last one ;o) /al  Alex Harries -
Sat, 24 Mar 2007
about me"Grumpy, geeky old grey-head"
blogroll & links (what's this?)More from me...UPSU stuff...Definitely read this...
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