And I did it all without crashing a single thing! UTTER VICTORY!
One of the benefits of switching to doing this all full-time is that I finally have free-time. I haven’t had a significant amount of free time IN SERIOUSLY LIKE A YEAR. So I have been putting off smaller cosmetic and organizational things this whole time, and they started to get REALLY BAD. Today was my first day without a single review to write (everything for next week is already done), so I wanted to devote time to fixing some things around here. Here’s what’s changed!
1) Smaller menu bar
It was starting to get crowded. Now, all my past books I’ve reviewed are under the “Past Books” tab. HUZZAH.
2) New Suggestions page
So, who wanted to swim through thirty-one pages of nearly 2,300 comments of suggestions to see if a book or series they liked was suggested? No one ever, that’s who! So I copied over the Confirmed/Rejected lists to a new page, deleted the old one, and now we have a spiffy new process for suggesting books to me.
From now on, I will go through the comments for suggestions, adding them to one of the two lists, and then I will delete the comments for suggestions. This way, y’all will never have to deal with that massive page weight that was the comments section. Make sure to bug me if the list is starting to get super long.
3) A Frequently Asked Questions page!
Ever wonder when I’m going to watch movie versions of books? Want to know how to contact me? Do you have other burning questions regarding Mark Reads? Read the FAQ first. You can also suggest I answer new questions pertaining to the site. Which brings me to the next part….
4) Forums!
So the old forums were on a different platform and it’s actually how Mark Watches got hacked last year. So, I went with the SimplePress forums. If you have a WordPress account, you can just log in and start posting in the new Mark Does Stuff forums! If you’re using anything other than WordPress, like Twitter or IntenseDebate, the cool thing is that if you sign up for an account on the forums, it will not ask you to log in twice. You can comment under your IntenseDebate profile in the comments, and then your forum name there. IT IS GORGEOUS. This is also where I will host the Ask Mark forum for all questions that don’t fit in the FAQ.
5) Schedule!
By request, I’ve created a Master Schedule for both my sites. Here, you will see what chapters I’ll be reviewing for Mark Reads, what episodes I am tackling for Mark Watches, when we will have liveblogs, and all of my tour dates. I will also announce and schedule new series on the calendar as well so y’all can take appropriate measures to purchase or acquire any books or shows in advance. (I’ll be filling in the calendar today, so I know it’s empty.)
Okay, I’m pretty stoked to get this done. Are there any other requests for things you’d like to see or features you would like to have? Please let me know!
