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Updates and an announcement from LWN
LWN prefers to report news from the Linux development community over news
about itself. But there have been some requests recently for a status
update. Beyond that, we have some important news to pass on to our
readers. So please bear with us for a brief exercise in journalistic
self-examination.
Toward the beginning of this year, we announced our desire to bring in another author/editor with the goals of making the operation more robust and, eventually, expanding our content mix. That process seemingly came to an end with our announcement that Nathan Willis was joining the staff at the end of April. That whole process has gone better than expected, and LWN is better for it. But there is a part of that story that we have not been able to tell until now. We had a surprising number of strong candidates for the position at LWN. In the end, it came down to two people, either of whom would have been an outstanding addition to LWN's staff. After agonizing over the decision for a while, we realized that the skills of the two candidates complemented each other nicely and that what we really needed to do was to hire both of them. Causing that to happen took a while — our second candidate is a busy person who needed some time to make a change — but things are finally falling into place. Thus, we are pleased to announce that our other new editor will be Michael Kerrisk. Michael describes himself this way:
Michael is a software engineer, writer, and trainer who started
using UNIX in 1987, and Linux in the late 1990s. Since 2004,
Michael has maintained the Linux man-pages
project and has been one of its most prolific contributors. He
is also the author of "The Linux Programming Interface" (see Jake's review). Michael
is a New Zealander, based in Munich, Germany.
We have big plans for Michael; he'll be supplementing our kernel-oriented coverage and helping us to expand it in a number of related areas including, possibly, embedded systems and software development. Expect to see his work showing up on LWN's pages later this month. This move is a bit of a risk on everybody's part for the simple reason that LWN's current cash flow is not sufficient to carry two new editors. The good news is that we have been able to set aside some reserves over the last couple of years, so we have plenty of time in which to ramp things up and get back to a sustainable operating condition. Getting there will definitely require that we find ways to increase our subscriber base, though. We have a number of ideas for how that might be achieved. An expanded and broader content mix, we hope, will appeal to a wider range of readers. LWN's "new site code" just celebrated its tenth anniversary; it's no secret that it could use updating in any number of ways. We need to find ways to provide additional value to the subscribers who keep us going. There are some interesting related ideas that we wish to pursue, once time allows. And we could maybe even try actively promoting the site rather than just sort of hoping that readers will find and appreciate us. Certainly something needs to be done. In the last two years, the number of individual subscribers has leveled out and even declined slightly—not the sort of trend we were hoping to see. Group subscriptions have been a little more robust, fortunately. Special thanks are due to our "Supporter" subscribers who exist in sufficient numbers to make a real difference. Supporters: none of you have yet exercised your unique privilege to have the beverage of your choice at LWN's expense at any conference where we are present; we may yet find ourselves having to resort to sending you yet another laptop bag instead. If we have learned anything over the years, it's the nature of businesses that something always needs to be done. It's a rare business that just generates the money needed to sustain it without constant adjustments. It has been almost exactly ten years since we posted The end of the road, wherein we explained our conclusion that the time had come to shut LWN down. Things have improved a lot since then. We are confident that, if we think and work hard toward the creation of a site that brings more value to our readers, things will continue to improve. LWN's greatest strength is one of the best reader communities out there. We do not thank you all anywhere near often enough. But we'll say it now: thanks for your solid support for this site since its beginning in 1998; we wouldn't be here without you. And we are very much looking forward to making LWN better in the coming months—stay tuned! (Log in to post comments)
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 3:40 UTC (Thu) by pest (subscriber, #76936) [Link]
While I find the current website layout quite comfortable and utilitarian, I think the very basic look and feel of the site is probably one of the biggest hurdles you have to gaining more mainstream acceptance from your potential reader base.
Put simply, at first glance it's hard to take the site seriously.
In this day and age of HTML5 and CSS3 a site that looks like it's been rendered with lynx doesn't immediately produce feelings of confidence in the value of the sites contents. It's ridiculous I know, but it's a fact of human nature. Having spent the last 10 years trying to convince customers that something that's free can be as good or better then something that costs an arm and a leg, I know exactly how embedded these kinds of assumptions are.
Certainly I felt some trepidation shelling out when I first signed up, not having a clear idea of the kind of value I'd receive for the money made it hard to pitch to my then-boss too.
Having been a subscriber for a while, I get the most value from the daily mailouts, and occasionally visiting the site for more detail on security alerts, so flashing up the website would make no difference to my experience. But in my opinion, if you want more subs, you gotta make it look pretty.
Luke.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 4:12 UTC (Thu) by hp (subscriber, #5220) [Link]
The right designer might be able to do a restrained freshen-up that would make it look professionally done and more modern, but not give up the minimalist utilitarian vibe.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 7:32 UTC (Thu) by KotH (subscriber, #4660) [Link]
But the simplistic style of LWN is exactly what i like about it: It's simple, the information is there where you expect it to be, it's fast, no java, javascript or any other flashing and blinking, pop-up generating elements... just pure information. Yes, the colour theme might be a bit outdated. But i dont care. I like the look of LWN. And heck, it's even simple to parse it with a couple of lines of perl to generate a latex document (and then farther to pdf) for easier reading.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 8:14 UTC (Thu) by pest (subscriber, #76936) [Link]
I wholeheartedly agree with what you're saying, however if the goal is to improve subscription rates, and subsequently improve the volume and quality of the content, I think a compromise should be attempted.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 14:04 UTC (Thu) by patrick_g (subscriber, #44470) [Link]
>>>Yes, the colour theme might be a bit outdated.
Go to My Account -> Customization -> Display preferences.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 9, 2012 14:31 UTC (Mon) by jwarnica (subscriber, #27492) [Link]
So a "Print to PDF" button would be of some help to you. See, changes already and we haven't even started thinking hard :)
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 14, 2012 6:44 UTC (Sat) by panzerboy (subscriber, #16142) [Link]
Maybe also ePub or mobi with the option to save directly to Dropbox.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 14, 2012 11:21 UTC (Sat) by hummassa (subscriber, #307) [Link]
I second this. MOBI could even send directly to kindle via email. (I do that a lot: all as a big page, printable format, select all, paste in mobi editor, send to kindle via email)
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 8:11 UTC (Thu) by rvfh (subscriber, #31018) [Link]
+1
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 13:09 UTC (Thu) by Lovechild (guest, #3592) [Link]
I'd personally like a mobile version of the site. I mostly end up reading LWN on my phone and my tablet and having a good mobile version would certainly improve that experience. Ars Technica's mobile site e.g. is a great improvement over their desktop site for small screens.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 15:42 UTC (Thu) by jond (subscriber, #37669) [Link]
Agreed. I use "instapaper" for some of the longer LWN articles.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 6, 2012 10:05 UTC (Fri) by ersi (subscriber, #64521) [Link]
I'll second the need for some mobile/small-screen customization of the site and/or article. It would be very pleasant to have.
This should hopefully not require too much change to the current site :-)
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 6, 2012 13:31 UTC (Fri) by pspinler (subscriber, #2922) [Link]
I disagree. This is one of the very few non-mobile websites that renders nicely and is easily readable on my smartphone and tablet.
Please, keep this site as simple and fast as it has always been! It's a breath of fresh air in the over CSS'd, flash heavy internet.
-- Pat
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 6, 2012 19:22 UTC (Fri) by geuder (subscriber, #62854) [Link]
> I'd personally like a mobile version of the site.
Just for curiousity: On what kind of device lwn is not usable?
I used to do 90% of my lwn reading and even some commenting on an N900. Of course that's a better device than many others. But recently I have been forced to downgrade to an older Symbian device, because my dear N900 shows signs of mechanical aging. And lwn still is fully usable even on that infamous platform. (Not sure whether this proves that less (eye candy) is more or whether Symbian is better than its reputation, probably both...)
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 6, 2012 19:30 UTC (Fri) by boudewijn (subscriber, #14185) [Link]
It's pretty hard on the n950 -- even in landscape position, the lack of reflow means the fonts need to be rather small.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 6, 2012 19:40 UTC (Fri) by geuder (subscriber, #62854) [Link]
Ahh, I'm short-sighted and comfortable with small fonts. Maybe it's worse for normal-sighted readers.
Crowd-sourced funding for improving the site? Posted Jul 9, 2012 0:50 UTC (Mon) by alison (✭ supporter ✭, #63752) [Link]
Lovechild opines:
>I'd personally like a mobile version of the site.
A mobile version of the site most definitely: not a horrid tablet app, but content that rerenders properly so that constant scrolling isn't necessary.
A better RSS feed and better search engine are also no-brainers. Improved external visibility of the content would help popularize the site.
What about a Kickstarter/IndieGoGo project to hire a developer to make some of these improvements? I'll go on record saying I'm willing to contribute. We funded the Debian sysadmin manual this way, and we can fund LWN Upgrade too!
-- Alison Chaiken
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 12, 2012 14:31 UTC (Thu) by Jandar (subscriber, #85683) [Link]
> Put simply, at first glance it's hard to take the site seriously.
Quite contrary, I find sites with much "design" mumbo-jumbo untrustworthy. KISS is one of the most significant design-principles.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 13, 2012 1:07 UTC (Fri) by apoelstra (subscriber, #75205) [Link]
>Quite contrary, I find sites with much "design" mumbo-jumbo untrustworthy. KISS is one of the most significant design-principles.
I second this. Upon seeing a site like LWN my first response is to check the visible headlines for a 2012 date somewhere (just in case :)). If the site is actually active, I'm thrilled to bits.
And with Noscript and RequestPolicy both running, "fancier" sites tend to look awful these days, so LWN seems pretty slick by comparison.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 13, 2012 13:30 UTC (Fri) by philomath (guest, #84172) [Link]
That's right, that's what made me subscribe here.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 17, 2012 15:36 UTC (Tue) by Baylink (subscriber, #755) [Link]
The... daily... mailouts.
Huh?
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 4:06 UTC (Thu) by hp (subscriber, #5220) [Link]
People complain all the time about noise and inanity on Hacker News, just as they complained about Slashdot back in the day. LWN is the refreshing alternative but it has a pretty narrow focus. I'd sure like to read the LWN sensibility applied to Java or node.js or HTML, and the pool of potential subscribers on those kind of topics could be large ...
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 7:01 UTC (Thu) by mathieu_lacage (subscriber, #3967) [Link]
I fear that there is already high quality competition in web client-side content. (http://uxdesign.smashingmagazine.com/ for example but there are many others)
However, the idea of producing web related content seems sound if you can look into server-side fontend/backend stuff. What I have in mind for example is the whole server-side apache ecosystem for cloud computing (infrastructure like hadoop but also more application oriented projects like mahout). Node.js is also a nice example, just like twisted and some of the many python (pick your favorite language) web frameworks.
Yes, producing high quality content in these areas would be costly but I can see a fairly large potential reader base. Reaching this user base will be hard because it will be challenging to reproduce the lwn model of writers who are part of the community, but hey, this is what makes life fun and interesting :)
Bah, this post is longer than I intended to. I wish lwn good luck!
SSN: ServerSideNews Posted Jul 6, 2012 10:40 UTC (Fri) by man_ls (subscriber, #15091) [Link] Perhaps a sister publication centered on the other Free software parts of the LAMP stack might be viable. Right now there is a rich market for alternatives:
SSN: ServerSideNews Posted Jul 13, 2012 14:06 UTC (Fri) by KotH (subscriber, #4660) [Link]
node.js?
Am i the only one who thinks a webserver implented in a language meant to be run by a webserver is kind of... crazy... and using it for production is kind of.. sick....?
SSN: ServerSideNews Posted Jul 15, 2012 23:32 UTC (Sun) by man_ls (subscriber, #15091) [Link] I assume you meant "a webserver implented in a language meant to be run by a web browser".Oh, I don't know if the original purpose of a language is really significant. Java was initially pushed also as a client-side technology (remember the infamous applets?). Perl was initially a scripting language, meant as a replacement for Bash. Lisp was designed as a language to make mathematical computations, and used for artificial intelligence. Python was designed for learning. Ruby was also created as a scripting language. All of these have been used successfully in web servers. Besides, I think this retooling is kind of cool. When I first saw your message I misread: and using it for production is kind of.. slick....?"I don't know about node.js, but the MongoDB console (in JavaScript) is easy to use; JavaScript really shines there, better than in a browser. Nasty browser implementations aside, there is a reason why JavaScript is taking the world by storm.
SSN: ServerSideNews Posted Jul 17, 2012 15:40 UTC (Tue) by Baylink (subscriber, #755) [Link]
I believe the implication is "well, this will be interactive, and not doing too much, so we don't need to be too concerned about efficiency in the implementations that the design will imply."
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 5:38 UTC (Thu) by apoelstra (subscriber, #75205) [Link]
I, too, love the minimalist functional layout, and the fact that it works on Firefox no matter how many noscript-style plugins I throw at it. (And it looks good in lynx, too!)
So whatever prettification needs to be done, please don't make anything depend on Javascript, load content from several domains or be excessively heavy (I generally read LWN.net over Tor, and often only get a few Kb/sec).
One idea to get new readers might be to accept Bitcoin. Bitcoin users are always looking for some way to spend their coins, and many of them are sitting on large piles of them, since they were involved with the system before it had any actual value. The BTC world is a small community, but they tend to be pretty technologically savvy and I suspect there could be a large overlap between them and LWN.net readers.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 6:33 UTC (Thu) by Felix.Braun (subscriber, #3032) [Link]
I think congratulations are in order for taking the bold step of hiring two new editors. I am looking forward to Michael's contributions and I join you in hoping that expanding your coverage of the embedded world will not only please your existing readers but also attract new subscribers.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 7:09 UTC (Thu) by Cato (subscriber, #7643) [Link]
On promoting the site - some of the standard things such as Facebook Like button, Google +1, 'Tweet this' etc would help a lot I think. Really just an evolution of the Post a Link feature, and could be hidden under a 'Share this article' so it's not too visually intrusive.
A design refresh of the site would be good, personally I quite like the minimal approach but it doesn't look very attractive - unless someone knows your site already, it looks like a hobby site.
For the "landing page" for new visitors (not subscribers), i.e. default home page, it would be sensible to have some testimonials or awards so that someone who knows nothing about LWN has some "social proof" that it's a great site. A quote from Linus or other luminaries perhaps?
Linux is far more popular now than a few years back, so it should be possible to get more subscribers with a bit more focus on promotion, without changing the tone of LWN.
Maybe you could appeal to the LWN community for free/discounted help from a professional web designer/developer? I'm sure there are some out who understand the LWN ethos and could help.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 7:23 UTC (Thu) by Cato (subscriber, #7643) [Link]
(Replying to my own post, sorry)
One other more obvious thing is search engine optimisation (SEO) - have a look at your server logs for the sorts of queries people use to find you e.g. "Linux news". I just checked and LWN is very low on first page for https://www.google.com/search?q=linux+news
Then make sure your home page is optimised for the keywords you want to use (ask an SEO expert for how to choose them) - for example, "Welcome to LWN.net" is a truly terrible <TITLE> tag as it doesn't even mention Linux or news (assuming the "linux news" keyword is what you should optimise for, which is likely).
There is a lot you can do with "onsite SEO" that is subtle and won't annoy readers - you already have outstandingly good content so it's probably just writing a couple of pages that talk about LWN and what it provides, I would guess. On the "offsite SEO" i.e. links from other sites, it's important that only reputable link building is done, using your chosen "linux news" type keyword in the <a href> link text on the other site. Finding a good SEO expert through personal recommendation is important, or you could go to http://www.seobook.com/ or http://www.seomoz.org/resources and learn about SEO, if you prefer to do it yourself.
The community could help with link building of course - once you've decided on the right keywords and pages to point the links at, you can have a "link to us" page that encourages the community to put badges and links on their blogs etc, getting free links from people who like LWN - better than doing your own link building in fact.
Since you already have great content and community this would be much easier than a new site, but it needs to be done in the right way.
Any updated site design should as a minimum be based on SEO, so that the time/cost put into this gives you an SEO benefit.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 8:26 UTC (Thu) by niner (subscriber, #26151) [Link]
Clicking on your Google link I find lwn.net in third position of the first page. Not that low at all. Remember: Google does search results localization and personalization. It's not that simple anymore.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 9:47 UTC (Thu) by Tobu (subscriber, #24111) [Link] It ranks 10th on this query (pws=0 disables personalisation, hl changes the query language and ui language, gl changes the region): [linux news].
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 11:29 UTC (Thu) by Cato (subscriber, #7643) [Link]
Good point about personalisation and it's good that this helps LWN in your case, but it would be good to know LWN's rank on first page for someone who occasionally visits Linux sites, rather than an LWN subscriber. Or even someone who never visits Linux sites (but maybe reads other open source stuff). Other search engines such as Bing, Yahoo and DuckDuckGo may not do so much personalisation, and the same principles apply.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 8:29 UTC (Thu) by fb (subscriber, #53265) [Link]
> On promoting the site - some of the standard things such as Facebook Like button, Google +1, 'Tweet this' etc would help a lot I think. Really just an evolution of the Post a Link feature, and could be hidden under a 'Share this article' so it's not too visually intrusive.
+1.
AFAICT this is the site promotion strategy with the best `cost & benefit` ratio, as it leverages the fact that there are so many respected technology folks who are LWN readers and who should have a fair a amount of potential LWN subscribers as followers on Google+/Tweeter/etc.
I know we already have "Post a Link", but increasing the convenience of posting links at Google+/Tweeter/etc should increase the number of actual posts.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 9:42 UTC (Thu) by micka (subscriber, #38720) [Link]
And that would be a good promotion of plugins like FacebookBlocker, too. Are there things like that for google+ and twitter ?
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 10:13 UTC (Thu) by fb (subscriber, #53265) [Link]
> And that would be a good promotion of plugins like FacebookBlocker, too. Are there things like that for google+ and twitter ?
I am well aware of the concern with privacy that LWN readers share ;-) as well as the sensitivity to anything created in the internet less than 20 years ago that many here seem to also have. `The internet was fine as it was in 1992, IMNSHO, why couldn't it just stay like it was` :-P
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 11:20 UTC (Thu) by kay (subscriber, #1362) [Link]
+1 to social link on a seperate page.
+2 to additionally use a two klick method like on heise, see here (german)
http://www.heise.de/ct/artikel/2-Klicks-fuer-mehr-Datensc...
Kay
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 15:44 UTC (Thu) by jond (subscriber, #37669) [Link]
disconnect.me is a plugin for google chrome (and chromium) that works for digg, facebook, google, twitter and yahoo. I quite like it.
Having said that, I believe it's possible for a website to construct 'like'-style buttons which do not damage your visitor's privacy: it's just that the default ones supplied by the socials do.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 11:56 UTC (Thu) by davecb (subscriber, #1574) [Link]
I've occasionally posted links to google+, and will resolve to do more. --dave
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 9:53 UTC (Thu) by Tobu (subscriber, #24111) [Link] I don't really want Facebook's iframe supercookie tracking or what have you, though. If it's hidden behind a link or some explicit activation, fine, but I imagine Facebook cares more about the tracking than the sharing functionality.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 10:30 UTC (Thu) by aggelos (subscriber, #41752) [Link] "On promoting the site - some of the standard things such as Facebook Like button, Google +1, 'Tweet this' etc would help a lot I think. Really just an evolution of the Post a Link feature, and could be hidden under a 'Share this article' so it's not too visually intrusive." Oh, right. The blink tag of the 2010s, except, you know, *actually* harmful. Social issues aside, personally I wouldn't feel welcome on lwn.net any more if that came about. Probably wouldn't go so far as unsubscribe, though. So, given that there is a real (however small one might consider it) cost to carrying such buttons, is there any evidence that they actually help a technical site appear more appealing? Honest question.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 11:32 UTC (Thu) by Cato (subscriber, #7643) [Link]
I saw a comment that one site got 25% of its traffic from social media such as Facebook, Twitter, etc (I think it was Techcrunch but couldn't swear to it). So they do make quite a big difference in some cases.
If it's done carefully via a one or two click model, perhaps via separate page so that visitors/subscribers who hate this sort of thing are not tracked, it would let those who do use social media share LWN links more easily.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 16:01 UTC (Thu) by fatrat (subscriber, #1518) [Link]
But the whole "only see it for free after a week" model breaks the +1/Like.
If I like this article today, my friends can't read it.
I'm not a fan.
But please, yes to a mobile site. I often read content on my phone or a table, and the current design doesn't work well there.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 6, 2012 9:51 UTC (Fri) by bosyber (subscriber, #84963) [Link]
Given there's the "Send a free link" for articles that are not yet freely visible, I don't think that's really true. Using that link in a tweet works pretty well.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 16:15 UTC (Thu) by aggelos (subscriber, #41752) [Link] I saw a comment that one site got 25% of its traffic from social media such as Facebook, Twitter, etc (I think it was Techcrunch but couldn't swear to it). So they do make quite a big difference in some cases.Um, that does not imply that people wouldn't spread links around w/o the "social" buttons. It might make it easier for some, but clearly the 25% would be more like an upper bound.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 14:00 UTC (Thu) by corbet (editor, #1) [Link] A design refresh is overdue and in the plans, if not quite in the works yet. I very much want to keep the text-oriented focus, but better looks, small-screen support and navigation can only be a good thing.I am a long way from being ready to accept things like "like" buttons, though.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 16:56 UTC (Thu) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link]
What about 'hate' buttons, to automatically repost to the hates-software mailing list? :P
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 6, 2012 2:16 UTC (Fri) by garrison (subscriber, #39220) [Link]
I suggest considering 99designs for such a redesign, with any requirements noted in the project spec (e.g. the focus should be on the text, fixed-width is bad, responsive css == good, etc). I have no experience with web design competitions there, but we at wikiotics had a logo design contest there and are extremely satisfied with the result.
Post articles to Facebook and Google+ Posted Jul 6, 2012 8:38 UTC (Fri) by buchanmilne (guest, #42315) [Link] I used to have the time to browse the top articles on slashdot and lwn every morning, but these days that is a luxury. In order to try and keep, I often read the LWN articles posted to Twitter on my phone (still hanging on to my N900).Other ways to use social media without impacting those who don't want the social media tracking all their reading would be to post the articles to Facebook and Google+ (AFAIK you should even be able to get Twitter to do it for you). There is a generic page for lwn.net on facebook, and 50 people have liked it already. A slightly more mobile-friendly layout would also be appreciated.
Post articles to Facebook and Google+ Posted Jul 17, 2012 15:45 UTC (Tue) by Baylink (subscriber, #755) [Link]
For some reason, that link is 404
Thanks to everyone! Posted Jul 5, 2012 7:45 UTC (Thu) by KotH (subscriber, #4660) [Link]
I remember the day well, when i read the "end of the road" post. I really didn't like it. LWN was (and still is!) the-one-place-to-go when I wanted some up to date information on what's going on in the Linux world without all the buzzwords and marketing mamobjambo. Now, 10 years later, I am glad LWN still exists and provides this great service to the open source community. I wouldn't mind to have some more information on the internal status of LWN, because for me LWN is a vital source of information which I like and support. If anything like the problems 10 years ago should happen again, I would very much appreciate to know it soon enough to be able to do something about it.
That said, I want to thank everyone working at and for LWN. You are doing each and everyone of your readers (and even those who aren't) a big service. We like you and what you do!
I also want to thank everyone who supported LWN all those years. Without you, LWN would have become history long long ago.
Thanks to everyone! Posted Jul 5, 2012 15:48 UTC (Thu) by ortalo (subscriber, #4654) [Link]
I second you.
Thanks to everyone! Posted Jul 5, 2012 18:12 UTC (Thu) by stevem (subscriber, #1512) [Link]
Definitely!
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 7:54 UTC (Thu) by zuki (subscriber, #41808) [Link]
Yay to more kernel stuff.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 9:43 UTC (Thu) by mtelleria (subscriber, #33878) [Link]
After a quick read of the comments before me, I join the group favoring the current simplistic, information-oriented approach. So far for the look and feel everything is fine to me.
As for the colours I always disable them in my browser for all pages imposing my choice over the page designer's. In Firefox this achieved through Preferences --> Colors --> use system colors and disabling "allow pages to use their own colors. Like most newspapers, blogs and other real content-aimed webs LWN does not hide anything from me (as background images for example) and therefore respects my choices.
A possible improvement: work in the search area, or rather the indexes. I find the kernel page index absolutely fantastic and I would suggest creating similar indexes for distributions, development, grumpy-editors, etc.
As for ways to increasing income I think that we, subscribers, should do more pub among our colleagues, LUG's and environments. My university library had had once a group subscription but it was cancelled since it was "no longer considered essential and our budget reduction would not admit it". I don't know what the price was (the negotiation happend levels above my local librarian could know) but maybe I can propose my lab to relaunch the process (at least in a local scene for our 15-20 people).
Congrats Michael (I also have your TLPI book on my shelf) for making it as a new editor and thanks LWN for allowing him to work together with Nathan (whose articles are also quite enjoyable as well)!!.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 10:52 UTC (Thu) by dgm (subscriber, #49227) [Link]
> As for the colours I always disable them in my browser
As a matter of fact, LWN is one of the very few sites that allows you to customize the color theme. You can change all the colors in your account settings. I doubt there's much people that use this feature, though.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 11:33 UTC (Thu) by hummassa (subscriber, #307) [Link]
I do, because (sorry, guys) I find the original color theme simply unbearable. My settings are:
white white white lightgray #eee #eed black red green #909 #ccc
I find it marks well the difference between visited/unvisited links (green/red), quotes, and the green goes with the LWN logo. YMMV, and there are people that do not like the "white-background" theme, but it is what I found less straining.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 17, 2012 15:54 UTC (Tue) by Baylink (subscriber, #755) [Link]
I do. :-)
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 10:35 UTC (Thu) by stijn (subscriber, #570) [Link]
It should be possible to create a substantially more professional look just using CSS and HTML. This does not conflict with 'minimalist' as some people seem to think; in fact a professional look is usually minimalist. I would describe the current look as minimalist and endearingly klunky.
Facebook and G+ like buttons should be considered - they are standard and I assume quite effective. The supercookie tracking is definitely a concern, and if you want to go there it is probably worthwhile checking you will not alienate the present readership. I would support it though.
You may also want to consider the various ponds available to you. I know nothing about kernel programming, and am a free software / web collaboration enthousiast (i.e. a small fish from a bigger pond). I appreciate the occasional kernel article if there is an interesting angle to C programming, but in general I appreciate other articles just as much if not more. You could (further) experiment with articles on various topics (much as you already do). You probably have statistics on page hits already, however, they might mostly reflect on your current paying readership rather than the prospective readership lurking out there. Again, 'like' buttons could help you there if they allow new visitors a bit deeper access than non-subscribers.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 10:48 UTC (Thu) by Tobu (subscriber, #24111) [Link] Great news that we'll have even more contributions on kernel-related topics, you make complex subjects accessible. If a refreshed look is in the cards, here are a few ideas:
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 22:48 UTC (Thu) by przemoc (subscriber, #67594) [Link]
Regarding comments, if you use Google Chrome and you're a keyboard-centric user, you may try my simple extension (it waits for some improvements [like switching from localStorage to indexedDB to support unlimited storage -- see http://crbug.com/58985, easy access to highlighted comments, etc.], sorry, lack of time), which helps me "remember" the state of comments, so e.g. I can easily skip to unread ones at the current page.
NavigComments @ LWN.net
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 6, 2012 12:00 UTC (Fri) by Tobu (subscriber, #24111) [Link] I just tried it (I don't normally use Chromium). I had to repackage it to match the https urls.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 17, 2012 16:00 UTC (Tue) by Baylink (subscriber, #755) [Link]
My single greatest complaint is the same as many other people's single greatest complaint: column widths.
This hits me two different ways: while mobile, and when reading bigpage/printable.
On mobile, it seems not to set the text, always, as reflowable.
When reading the bigpage, something on the page makes the column a fixed width which is too wide for my 12" monitor, when I use ZoomTextOnly to increase the text size far enough for my aging eyes, pushing the edges of paragraphs off the screen. If I don't use printable, it's worse.
I know that article text, or at least comment text, is -- at some level -- reflowable, as it *isn't* if you use plaintext instead of HTML to enter a comment...
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 17, 2012 16:03 UTC (Tue) by corbet (editor, #1) [Link] Minimum and maximum column widths can be tweaked in the preferences area; perhaps you have the minimum set to some wide value?
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 17, 2012 21:33 UTC (Tue) by neilbrown (subscriber, #359) [Link]
"Minimum width of main text column (em)" is out of range (20 to 99999999)
I demand that right to have 2em columns!!!!!
Actually, it wouldn't help. Once the
Weekly edition Kernel Security Distributions Contact Us Search
(at least it does on Firefox)
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 13:17 UTC (Thu) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link]
I can't be the only person who gave out an involuntary "yeah!" on hearing that Michael is becoming an editor here. His work is excellent and unlike so many others he actually cares about decent documentation and does something (substantial) about it.
So, welcome! May your LWNing be long.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 22:54 UTC (Thu) by przemoc (subscriber, #67594) [Link]
No worries, you're not the only one. I am really looking forward to see and read the effects of Micheal's work at LWN.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 13, 2012 13:49 UTC (Fri) by philomath (guest, #84172) [Link]
No, of course not.
Congrats to LWN for such a good choice. I have read Micheal's TLPI from cover to cover. He is the man that made me actually love reading manpages. Good luck!
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 13:37 UTC (Thu) by ingwa (subscriber, #71149) [Link]
Congrats to LWN for this.
Can I hope to get the Desktop section back now that you have two more writers? :)
Explain why... Posted Jul 5, 2012 14:10 UTC (Thu) by scripter (subscriber, #2654) [Link]
Explain why LWN.net exists. Give us something to believe in -- a motto, a slogan, a campaign that we can align ourselves with.
You've got passion for Linux, free software, and for explaining it clearly, and we can feel it in as we read your content. Why do you do it? Why do you love it?
Add the "why" somewhere on the main landing page of the site. Include it in the "LWN.net FAQ", which might also be called the "About" page (it looks like the section "Who writes this stuff?" should be updated).
----
Source for the idea: Simon Sinek's "Start With Why", summarized here: http://www.ted.com/talks/simon_sinek_how_great_leaders_in...
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 14:17 UTC (Thu) by jonabbey (subscriber, #2736) [Link]
Let us know what we can do to help. LWN is one of the most valuable sites on the net as far as I'm concerned.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 14:39 UTC (Thu) by karim (subscriber, #114) [Link]
A few suggestions:
1. Yes, by all means, the site's look is *severely* outdated. And yes, by all means, do use JavaScript/CSS and all the rest. And for the nostalgic crowd, provide a setting to see the site as it is now, without JavaScript. For a site which monetizes through subscription, there really needs to be something a lot more sexy than this for it to be looking like it's worth spending money on these days. (I mean no offense, I'm just saying it as I think a new visitor would see it.)
2. Provide a way to read through similar content in a more aggregated fashion. LWN often features follow-up articles on the same topic, yet I actually have to follow through the in-article links to the back stories. Surely there's a way to organize-this in a more book-like fashion where I can click through a TOC or something like that.
3. And yes, social media integration is a must these days. This goes with #1; i.e. there are a few things that news/content sites are expected to provide these days.
Karim
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 17:12 UTC (Thu) by jmnovak (subscriber, #48627) [Link]
Note that some of us are willing to pay money to *not* have the JavaScript; not out of nostalgia, but because of concern regarding the security of any dynamic content. Same applies to the 'tweet', '+1' buttons, etc. The minimalist design of the site with lots of useful and interesting information is what keeps me coming back and paying my subscription. In contrast, I've dropped other sites that started substituting glitter for content...
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 19:12 UTC (Thu) by karim (subscriber, #114) [Link]
Sure. But the article clearly states the need to expand readership. Those who are already in are great, but a business is going up or down, and right now it looks like LWN isn't going up. Appeal to a broader market is needed.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 6, 2012 10:24 UTC (Fri) by hummassa (subscriber, #307) [Link]
The question the OP asks is: will having social buttons (unless carefully crafted, non-privacy-threatening, possibly two-clicks-needed) gather a wider audience or just empty the current (and really loyal [*]) audience? Can you win readers by having these features FASTER than you'll lose readers? Are new, socialized readers as well prepared to the high-quality content as the old, antisocialized ones?
Mind you, I have a small LWN-prepared audience on twitter and G+ and I would like a simple way to share with them some of the articles and the discussions I have here. And I think some of them could change into subscribers also. But I would only opt in for a simplified sharing (simpler than right-click on [Link] link, copy link, change tabs, middle-click?) if I could do it without pesky track-all-I-read cookies.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 14:48 UTC (Thu) by tshow (subscriber, #6411) [Link]
You should seriously consider a kickstarter campaign. There's a lot of money in them thar hills, and it's good for spreading the word as well. There have been kickstarter campaigns for everything from "our van is busted and we can't get to our next gig" to "we want to relaunch our podcast with higher production values" and lots more besides.
epub version? Posted Jul 5, 2012 15:53 UTC (Thu) by giggls (subscriber, #48434) [Link]
I like the somewhat old fashioned simple design. However something which would be nice to have is an epub or mobi Version for ebook readers.
I must admit, that I did not try this yet, but converting the all-in-on-page+printable version using calibre will probably be sufficient.
Sven
epub version? Posted Jul 5, 2012 16:02 UTC (Thu) by corbet (editor, #1) [Link] There is actually preliminary code around to make an epub edition; it needs some work still, but that particular feature should hopefully land sooner rather than later.
epub version? Posted Jul 5, 2012 16:58 UTC (Thu) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link]
And there's Calibre's automatic scraper to turn LWN into an ebook. (See my recent feature request regarding this scraper messing up read-comment state because it has no way to tell LWN that it's just pulling in the articles and discarding the comments.)
epub version? Posted Jul 6, 2012 20:04 UTC (Fri) by gezza (subscriber, #40700) [Link]
Would be much appreciated.
Perhaps you could make these reformated versions subscriber only.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 16:40 UTC (Thu) by linuxjacques (subscriber, #45768) [Link]
Why do I get the feeling all the people wanting to update the look of the site are trying to sell something?
Who knew so many web designers read LWN.
I believe the set of people who would subscribe to LWN but don't because of the way it looks is empty.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 16:56 UTC (Thu) by ejr (subscriber, #51652) [Link]
Institutional and group subscriptions have to pass through other approval steps. Some of those often (ime) involve more visual people.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 6, 2012 9:21 UTC (Fri) by stijn (subscriber, #570) [Link] I am one of those seeing the benefit in updating the site's look, and I am not in a web designing job nor trying to sell something, so I too wonder why you get that feeling. Some think the current look is minimalist and great as it is, perhaps even reflective of the LWN brand, and I appreciate this. Conversely, it should be possible to see the point of view that it is endearingly klunky (quoting myself). I do not know how it affects people if they share this view, but it would do no harm to at least consider such issues.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 18:57 UTC (Thu) by dag- (subscriber, #30207) [Link]
I wouldn't mind paying for an Android app that enables me to read/mark articles I have read and prefer to 'consume' LWN while commuting. The app shouldn't be too complicated as long as it is efficient in tracking what I haven't read yet.
If there is a demand for this maybe this can bring in some extra money from existing readers, especially if someone would contribute it ;-)
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 19:23 UTC (Thu) by g2boojum (subscriber, #152) [Link]
Although $14/mo seems a bit steep to me, I'd be happy to pay $10/mo. As far as I can tell, though, there's no easy way to do that.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 5, 2012 20:10 UTC (Thu) by Tobu (subscriber, #24111) [Link] You could pony up one year of the premium subscription, and switch to normal after eight months. That works out to 16 months at 9.45 USD/month (after applying the 10% yearly discount). (Whether it makes sense to change the product lining for everyone… I have no idea)
This is exciting Posted Jul 6, 2012 7:19 UTC (Fri) by yodermk (subscriber, #3803) [Link]
I've been going through The Linux Programming Interface (for about a year now, still not fully done!) and Kerrisk is a great technical writer. I'm looking forward to anything he has to contribute about software development (though I'm not a kernel hacker and never will be) and embedded interests.
Admittedly I've been slow to renew in recent years when my subscription has expired because it's starting to feel like "same old stuff" syndrome and I occasionally have doubts as to how much I actually need it. This seems to be a positive development though and if it pans out I'll renew quicker next time.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 6, 2012 10:25 UTC (Fri) by hummassa (subscriber, #307) [Link]
In case it didn't go without saying: welcome, Michael Kerrisk!
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 6, 2012 11:54 UTC (Fri) by bakterie (subscriber, #37541) [Link]
As someone who is slowly migrating from Linux to FreeBSD in the shape of FreeNAS and PCBSD, I would love to see more BSD coverage (yes, I know the site is called Linux WN). Right now it is basically just release announcements. Even when I was just using Linux I would have loved to learn more about other parts of the FOSS world.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 6, 2012 15:53 UTC (Fri) by njwhite (subscriber, #51848) [Link]
> yes, I know the site is called Linux WN
No it isn't. The name isn't an acronym (at least any more).
I'd welcome occasional forays into BSD land, though the current focus is great for me.
Congratulations to Michael - I look forward a lot to reading more from him here.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 6, 2012 15:38 UTC (Fri) by butcher (subscriber, #856) [Link]
Jon, I think if you were to 1) changed the site font to a sans-serif, and 2) the theme color from beige (?) to, say, light blue (not a green, avoid looking like slashdot), you'd get that enough of a 'fresh' look to make people notice without cluttering the http exchange with nested flashy-cssy stuffs... :D
Really, it don't take much to excite folk...
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 6, 2012 20:11 UTC (Fri) by bronson (subscriber, #4806) [Link]
Oh my. The last redesign was such a process that I think it's far too soon to consider another one!
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 13, 2012 13:41 UTC (Fri) by markhb (guest, #1003) [Link]
Looking at that, I now wonder what percentage of subscribers now have comments turned off.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 9, 2012 8:44 UTC (Mon) by mpr22 (subscriber, #60784) [Link] LWN - and I approve of this! - doesn't specify a site font at all AFAICT.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 8, 2012 4:08 UTC (Sun) by dilinger (subscriber, #2867) [Link]
Ugh, I guess I'm amongst the minority of people who think that the interface looks just fine the way it is. I will occasionally visit it in links2, and it's nice that it's so snappy and minimalist.
By the way, I realized that I'd probably buy swag from LWN if it were available. That led me to google this cafepress store: http://www.cafepress.com/lwn_net#link-productCategory-110
If that's official LWN stuff, I'd suggest linking to it from the menu. Selling t-shirts and such seems to work really well for various webcomic artists.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 8, 2012 15:32 UTC (Sun) by mathstuf (subscriber, #69389) [Link]
> If that's official LWN stuff, I'd suggest linking to it from the menu. Selling t-shirts and such seems to work really well for various webcomic artists.
Also posters. Either of quotes or with diagrams of kernel internals (though those would likely need to be updated over time for the more volatile parts).
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 8, 2012 16:20 UTC (Sun) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
Yup. I have a printed network packet flow diagram and it's very useful. I'd certainly pay for a nice poster.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 8, 2012 16:21 UTC (Sun) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
Forgot the link: http://www.docum.org/docum.org/kptd/
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 8, 2012 5:02 UTC (Sun) by davidbarton (subscriber, #67985) [Link]
I just upgraded and extended my subscription. I only became a paying member a couple of years back when you mentioned you had to increase fees and I realised I was just freeloading on your work.
My biggest wish is that you publish more content, certainly it is a much bigger issue than the page design. Hopefully with more editors you can.
I'm curious as to the mix of people who read this site. I'm a Java developer who moonlights as a Linux / Postgres administrator. Maybe you could ask people what sort of articles they would like to read and then put the results to the vote?
Congratulations on the move, I know how hard it is to run a business.
Updates and an announcement from LWN Posted Jul 12, 2012 9:29 UTC (Thu) by perrin (guest, #85676) [Link]
I've been reading this site without subscription for years, and the bad conscience is slowly getting to me. If you had added a more convenient way to pay for a subscription, like Google Checkout or Amazon, I would have been a subscriber already. You might want to cater more to your more lazy readers...
A Google +1 button for articles would be nice, for those of us who has already sold our privacy to Google for freebies. I'm sure other people would appreciate a way to turn it off (or default off), though.
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