So, we have a killer feature at Netscape that hasn’t received a huge amount of attention yet, but I’m going to change that. Jason has talked about our great Navigators, we have great developers working hard on new features like the recently released site mail, and we have great members actively participating in the site. All these people are part of our not so secret killer feature: the people. However, I want to highlight the ones who actually monitor the site and keep it pulsing with life: The Netscape Anchor Team.
The Anchors work in shifts, always on (even on their off days, I catch some of them working), watching the site, adding pictures to top stories, trying to find good stories to highlight at the top of the site and the different channels, participating in the coversation with our members, killing spam, and closing duplicate stories. Our goal is to be as transparent as possible about how we monitor the site, so if we close a duplicate story that you submitted, you’ll find a note in the form of Anchor Commentary, stating why the story was closed and linking to the original story. If you’re ever uncertain about something happening on the site or think you’ve spotted a bug of some sort or thought of something that you think will help improve the Netscape experience, send any of us a message via the site mail and we’ll do our best to get back to you, help you out, or try to improve the site in the ways you’d like. We’re here to serve.
Alongside all this, one of the things that we look forward to doing most and something that we are hoping to make more and more time to do in the near future is to add context and additional information to stories in the form of Anchor Commentary. I’m going to start blogging the great stuff that the team is putting together on the site. Here’s a few examples from the beginning of this week:
- Netscape Anchor Ryan Budke helped orchestrate this past Sunday night’s live Netscape Emmy’s chat, drawing on his experience hosting chat rooms for multiple TV shows last season on TV Squad.
- My co-lead on the site, Netscape Anchor Karina Longworth provides regular contextualizing commentary on all things film related (both box office information and a view into the world behind the scenes), as well as breaking news stories. With the help of our video editor / producer, Netscape Anchor Alexia Prichard, Karina produces a weekly video in the form of Netscape at the Movies with a great graphic introduction created by former Netscape Anchor and our continued good friend, Randall Bennett.
- Netscape Anchor Fabienne Serriere often provides slight corrections and follow up information with links sent to her by our members and our Navigators. She also loves mathematics.
- Netscape Anchor Dakota Smith does a great job of providing more information on stories like this one on Labor Day and gas prices and this other one on Megadeth’s Dave Mustaine hating the U.N.
- I tend to drop little bits of information, as in the Anchor Commentary on this post. Every once in a while, I’ll even go the extra mile and install Ubuntu Christian Edition on a spare laptop, just to provide a mini-review.
- Netscape Anchor Eliot Phillips has covered a few fringe events for us and likes to update our posts, but he’s our nightowl, keeping an eye on the site when the rest of us are snuggled in our beds. He’s got a few new cool features planned for the DIY channel, though, so stay tuned.
In any case, I just wanted to take the time to draw some attention to these people and what they do. Feel free to message any of us with suggestions. I’m going to start putting together a regular link post to some of the great metajournalism they’re doing on Netscape.
Update: I’m closing comments, because of all the comments that have nothing to do with this post. However, I do want to help those of you having problems with your Netscape email. First, I just want to note that I personally have nothing to do with the email transition. This other blogpost titled “So, why did we force Netscape Mail users to move to AIM Mail?” and written by James, who made the decision that the transition needed to happen. Also, there is an updated FAQ about the transition. I’ll try to track down some solid contact information for you all as well, since it would seem to be missing from the FAQ. Stay tuned…
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