[OSM-talk] Front page design and SEO

[Andy Robinson (blackadder-lists)]

Richard Fairhurst wrote:
>Sent: 03 March 2009 10:05 AM
>To: talk at openstreetmap.org
>Subject: Re: [OSM-talk] Front page design and SEO
>
>
>SteveC wrote:
>> I asked the CM designers for some quick hacks on what different
>> front pages could look like which you can see on the wiki page
>> below.
>
>Very pretty in a sort of let's-polish-the-CSS way, which isn't a bad thing
>at all.
>
>In a "let's ask for the stars" way, though, how about:
>
>- a little draggable "I've found a problem" icon - yeah yeah, OSB
>integration :)
>- something that says "Hey! We're a fun community!"; maybe two forthcoming
>events in tiny type?
>- some visualisation like Mikel's old activity tracker, showing where
>people
>have been editing recently - so you get a real sense of how alive the
>project is; would only want this at, say z1-10
>- as per Dave's e-mail: lots of visibility for "you get different views on
>the same data", maybe with a "More..." link to featured images, or a
>gallery, or something
>- downloadable Fake SteveC mascot for your desktop which installs some
>spyware and stuff like that
>

These are all great star gazing ideas, well, maybe excluding the last ;-)  

Whatever happens, my view is that it's not the converted mapper that needs
the focus of the front page. Most of us who are active with the project day
to day will always be looking at the map but rarely do we need to use the
front page or any of the other services. We probably have all those
bookmarked anyway. Instead the front page should be speaking to everyone
else, those we want to hook in (viewer or contributor).

So, like Richard I don't like the idea of just tinkering with the css and
layout. Better to be radical. Ideally a concerted effort for different
people and web developers to come up with the look and feel and then compare
the different versions. One is likely to win out, or perhaps more than one
will be preferable, just like the German portal I am sure is probably used
by many German speakers as their first point of call.

What the experienced community should probably do is set the target message
and focus ideas that should be incorporated. Richards's suggestions are a
good start. I'd add stronger local community building to the list since we
know that if you can build a local focus/interest group a lot more gets
accomplished and everyone has fun doing so.

Cheers

Andy