Monthly Archives: February 2009

Now Using Hybrid News Theme

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If you noticed the new look on the site, I recently changed to the Hybrid News theme (from Theme Hybrid).  I began using the MNML theme exactly a year ago today  (total coincidence, really) and I loved it the whole time.  MNML is a beautiful theme that allows for integration of asides along with regular posts.  But lately development on the MNML theme has fallen by the wayside, and it hasn’t supported many of WordPress’ new features (gravatars and threaded comments come to mind).

I’ve been looking around for the past, well, months for a new theme, and I’ve finally decided on Hybrid News.  It is a great looking theme, it’s very professional, and I hope everyone here likes it.  And if you don’t, let me know.

If you notice any problems with the site, please PLEASE please contact me or post a comment.

I’m going to mention what I customized after the jump. Continue reading →

NYT Could Save with Kindle 2

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Interesting statistic of the day, from the Silicon Alley Insider: It costs the New York Times about twice as much money to print and deliver the newspaper over a year as it would cost to send each of its subscribers a new (second generation) Amazon Kindle electronic book reader. And they’ve heard their estimate of the Times‘ printing costs is really low, so the savings would likely be higher.

City Saves Using WordPress for Website

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I had this link sitting in my RSS reader for a while, thinking about a follow up to my earlier post about good looking government websites.

The City of Albert Lea, Minnesota (more on Wikipedia), recently updated it’s website’s look and converted to using WordPress (open source software that runs this site and millions others) as a content management system.  Head over to their site, it looks great.  Staff at the City of Albert Lea estimated that they would have to spend $20,000 for a new website, but a city resident volunteered to do the work for just $720.

There is a really good article in the Albert Lea Tribune about the move to WordPress.  A good quote:

It is a Web-based content management system that allows officials in each department to change their pages without needing much knowledge of Internet language, said Teresa Kauffmann, the city’s public information coordinator.

And about the ease of updating the new website:

The old site was created in 2004. Hosted by Austin-based Southern Minnesota Internet Group, it left city officials several hoops to jump through for basic changes. Basically, SMIG had the keys. The new site’s host is an Internet company called 1&1 but because of the CMS nature of WordPress templates, Kauffmann and city officials have the keys. No more calling Austin. Now, they simply go to a special administration site that manages the main site.

And the most important part is that they aren’t finished yet:

She said she will head focus groups comprising Albert Lea citizens. She said she seeks members of all ages, backgrounds and computer skills. People interested in being on a focus group for the city Web site can contact Kauffmann at 377-4380 or tkauffmann@city.albertlea.org.

This is really great.  I’m going to keep a lookout for more local government websites using WordPress.

H/t to Ma.tt.

NY Times on Uninsured Young Adults

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The New York Times has a good article about the growing trend of uninsured young adults (h/t Lifehacker).  This is a big problem, especially for freelancers, grad students, etc.  Our society has attached health insurance to employment, which I don’t see working so well in the near future (internet generation, self-employed, consultants, etc.).  As a scary side note, I know of a friend who was told by his/her parents’ insurance company that he/she would be dropped from the health insurance plan at midnight the day of undergrad graduation.

Great Looking City Government Website

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While doing some research at work yesterday, I stumbled across the website for the City of Lexington, Kentucky.  And what a surprise!  I look at websites for a lot of city and county governments (research for work and also job hunting), and Lexington’s is the best looking website I have seen.

Usually websites for local governments look drab, are rarely updated (making the information outdated), look bad in non-Internet Explorer web browsers (try Firefox, Safari, Opera, or Google Chrome), and overall have pretty poor usability.

The site for the City of Lexington isn’t perfect: on many pages the content is pushed down the page in Firefox, but I bet that is a problem with old formatting in the information being displayed, not necessarily the CSS.  But the site looks great.  It has rotating images on the homepage that are interesting to look at, updated news items, real-time traffic updates, access to GIS,  trendy buttons, a unique favicon (although the favicon doesn’t match the site design, it is so much better than a default server favicon), a sitemap, and a contact page.  All with easy navigation.

The City of Lexington, Kentucky, has the caliber of site that all local government websites should strive to meet.  But people in government oftentimes don’t seem to understand how having a usable website allows for easy communication with their citizens.

Directory of Government Agencies Using Twitter

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While extolling the virtues of using Twitter to update your status (instead of Google Talk/GChat), I discovered this list of government agencies and public servants that use Twitter.

If you don’t know what Twitter is, see the video from Common Craft explaining Twitter in plain English.

Some that communicate information in unique ways include food recalls (care of the FDA), pandemic flu updates (care of the CDC), road condition updates from the Kansas Department of Transportation (for specific metro areas like Kansas City, Topeka, Wichita, and Garden City), National Terror Alert Response Center, and earthquakes and tsunami warnings.

Some big names (and agencies) include the Transportation Security Administration, Department of Homeland Security, NASA, Supreme Court, several states (Colorado, Idaho, Kentucky, Maine, Nebraska, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Utah, and Vermont), the Israeli Consulate, and CSPAN, among many others.