Angry in the Great White North

The work is 90% done, and good enough to push out for comment.  The blog certainly looks different.  The goal is simple: speed.  The blog had gotten too heavy with Java scripts and advertising and whatnot.  A major cleanup was required.

Also, I wanted to roll out my new tag line -- "a heat-seeking missile in the Conservative arsenal" -- with a bang, and a major rework seemed appropriate.

Finally, I was nominated for Best Blog in this year's Canadian Blog Awards, and I figured that deserved something special.  One thing that I think distinguishes my blog from some others is the constant reinvention.  I'm never satisfied.

So what is new here?  Well, the key is content, as always.  The most recent six stories are laid out in a grid.  The sidebars are banished, with that space being given over to content.  The sidebars had become overwrought with advertising and buttons and links to who knows what.  All the non-performing stuff is gone.  Underneath the content block is a secondary block with those advertising channels that did work, as well as elements that seemed useful to readers.

That notion of simplicity carries over to the other pages as well. 

I measured the download speed with an online service, and the difference is remarkable.  The old home page would download in 50 seconds on a 56K modem (over 200K of data).  This new design loads in 20 seconds.  Not only does that improve the overall experience, it means that the scripts that do need to run, such as those supporting the commenting system, will run faster, as they won't be fighting for resources with other scripts that had accrued on the blog.

So start sending me feedback.  Fonts are too small.  Don't like the banner.  More pictures of me.  Whatever.  I'll take it all under consideration.  Over the next couple of days I'll complete the switchover (assuming the feedback isn't so negative that I have to go scurrying back to the old scheme), including a few page templates that are still in the old style, some optimizations, and a few tweaks.