Blue Mass Group

Reality-based commentary on politics.

BMG 3.0 is coming! Help us make it work.

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Key Features of BMG 3.0

  • Pretty much everything that Soapblox does.  The whole point of this redesign was to improve and increase BMG’s functionality, so we naturally didn’t want to lose what we’ve already got.  To that end, we’ve ensured that critical features of Soapblox – user posts, recommended posts, promotion, nested comments, etc. – are replicated or enhanced on BMG 3.0.  Adding the user post and promotion features to WordPress is, we believe, a major advance for WordPress that will be unique to BMG.

  • The BMG Network.  This is perhaps the most important innovation of BMG 3.0.  As you know, Soapblox allows every user to bring up a collection of all content contributed by that user.  Thus, all posts and comments by user xyz appear at www.bluemassgroup.com/user/xyz.  On BMG 3.0, an essentially identical collection of content will be located at www.bluemassgroup.com/author/xyz.

    That’s fine as far as it goes, but we wanted offer bloggers the option to have a site that looks and feels like their own blog, but that also allows their content to appear on BMG itself.

    Hence, the BMG Network.  Any BMG user will be able to create a personal blog at xyz.bluemassgroup.com – to do this, choose the “gimme a site” option when you are creating your new account.  This site will of course contain all of xyz’s content, as described above.  But BMG Network sites will go much further.  A BMG Network site will be a fully-functional WordPress blog, with all of WordPress’s state-of-the-art features, not just an archive on BMG.  Furthermore, xyz will be able to customize the site to a considerable degree.  Logo, widgets, and some other features will be under xyz’s control, just as with any other WordPress blog – additional customization will be available to subscribers (more on that below).  And xyz will still have the benefit of every post on xyz.bluemassgroup.com feeding through into the user post list on BMG itself, so that the editors can front-page the post on BMG.  All BMG requires is a small ad to help defray the cost of offering this free service, and a small announcement that the site is part of the BMG Network.

    We are hopeful that the BMG Network will help spur the growth of what is already an active progressive blogosphere in Massachusetts.  User-generated content is the lifeblood of BMG, and we hope that the BMG Network will be a new and exciting way both to bring content written by new bloggers to BMG’s readers, and for BMG to direct traffic to other bloggers who are members of the network.

  • Page 2.  Right now, we have only two choices with user posts: promote them to the front page, or leave them in the “recent user posts” list on the sidebar, with perhaps a reader-supported bump to the “Recommended” list.  We wanted a way to bring more attention to certain posts, but without front-paging them (which among other things pushes other front-page content down).  We’ve designed “Page 2” to do that.  When we move a post onto Page 2, it will be more prominent than other user posts, and a brief snippet of its content will appear on the front page.  We think Page 2 will give BMG’s front page more of a newspaper-like feeling (without any of the declining circulation problems), and will also allow us to highlight more of the excellent user-generated content that makes BMG such an interesting place.

  • Subscriptions.  This feature is not part of the open beta test, but it will be ready to go soon.  When it’s up and running, it will give you a way to support the ongoing operation and improvement of BMG via a modest financial contribution.  In exchange, you will get an ad-free experience on BMG, as well as additional customization options for your own BMG Network site – you’ll be able to install your own theme, alter the layout, etc., so that it will really look like your own blog.

What Does This Mean For Me?

You’ve got questions.  We’ve got (some) answers.

  • Can I keep my user name?  Basically, yes.  We will migrate the entire database of BMG user names and associated email addresses to the new BMG 3.0 servers.  Some minor modifications will have to be made – most notably, WordPress does not allow spaces in user names, so dashes have been added in some cases.  If you are “Jane Smith” on BMG now, you’ll be “Jane-Smith” on BMG 3.0.  (As noted above, we have not migrated user names for the open beta test.)

  • What about my password?  When we finish the open beta and officially launch BMG 3.0, all passwords will be reset to random, system-generated passwords.  So the first time you want to sign onto the site, you’ll have to click “Login” and then click “Lost your password?” Once you’ve done that and logged in, you’ll be able to reset your password to whatever you’d like.

  • Will my content be preserved?  Yes.  We are going to great lengths to migrate all the existing content of BMG onto the new platform.  (Over 20,000 posts and a quarter of a million comments later, this is not a small task!)  Inevitably, some formatting may be lost in the transition – in particular, previously-nested comments will remain in order but will no longer appear nested after the migration, so long comment threads may be a bit more difficult to follow.  

  • Will links to BMG posts still work?  WordPress formats permalinks differently than Soapblox.  We have tried to ensure that all links within BMG to other BMG posts are updated to reflect the new links.  However, obviously we cannot change the format of other people’s links to us, so extant links to already-published BMG posts from the outside world will not point to the corresponding post on BMG 3.0.  We are working on a partial solution to that problem.

  • How do I write posts, and what happens when I do? Basically, the idea is the same.  You log onto BMG or to your own BMG Network site; you enter the WordPress “Dashboard,” which is where you write and edit posts and control other features of the site; you write up your post (using WordPress’s state-of-the-art editor); and you publish it.  The post will then appear in the “Recent User Posts” area on BMG (www.bluemassgroup.com), as well as on the front page of your own BMG Network site (xyz.bluemassgroup.com).
  • I think this BMG Network thing sounds awesome, and I want my own site.  How do I get one?  For now, create a new account and choose “gimme a site.”  When we launch, we will have a separate procedure for existing accounts who also want a BMG Network site.
  • Why are you doing this?  Isn’t Soapblox good enough?  Soapblox was a major step forward when it came out some six years ago.  But Soapblox was one person’s part-time project, and he was understandably not always able to keep up with the demands of maintaining and upgrading what became a very popular platform.  As a result, many of Soapblox’s features are now somewhat outdated, and we do not see much likelihood that that’s going to change any time soon, nor do we see the new features that we want to introduce becoming available on Soapblox.  And, because Soapblox is not open source, we are completely dependent on its proprietors for upgrades.  We think it’s time to move, and we concluded for a variety of reasons that a customized WordPress platform was our best option.
  • Was all of this work free?  Um, no.  đŸ™‚  We hope that the new subscription feature, and perhaps other initiatives, along with our existing advertising campaigns, will help us defray the cost of this work.  But don’t worry, both BMG itself and almost all of these new features will remain free.

OK, I’m r
eady!  How do I beta test?

You can see the beta site at bmgdev.com.  Everything should pretty much be working, with the exceptions noted above, so if something seems broken, by all means tell us!

If you have something to report – a bug, a question, a comment, whatever, no matter how small – please add it to our beta testing comment thread.  We will be checking that thread frequently and working with our developer to resolve problems as they arise.  Also, if you have a chance, please also email a report of your issue to bmgdev [at] gmail.com.

Thank you, and we hope you like what you see!

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Comments

  1. Just one question for starters.

    <

    p>I have a WordPress blog. If I register to test out the beta site, will that identity somehow become entangled with my existing WordPress account, identity, thing?

    <

    p>Because, do not want.

    • especially if you use a different email address.  I’d suggest creating a new email just for this purpose – then I wouldn’t think there would be any problems.

  2. I gave up blogging on my own. It is great. It’s highly customizable and constantly improved upon. Widgets galore.

    <

    p>I’ve been trying not to complain about SoapBlox, but it’s taking me minutes–not seconds–to get BMG to load at home. I always get errors on several the Facebook and Twitter widgets. I try to use Chrome at home, but it doesn’t work with my school grading program and requiring readers to use a particular browser is asking more than a site should.

  4. It seems as if you’re keeping what works and adding stuff on top to make it work better.   A strong improvement over throwing it all out for something shiny.

    <

    p>I particularly like the minisites, as it’s the bridge between independent blogging and largely BMG-reactive stuff I”ve been trying to find.

    • We have enough education posting to justify a mini-site dedicated to education and policy.

      <

      p>Some of our wonkier stuff doesn’t have a broad enough interest for the front page, but would still attract readership and allow for conversations between wonks and friends.

      <

      p>I will happily pay a subscription fee, but if you sell out to AOL, I wouldn’t mind a cut ;=)

  5. After the dust settles would love to chat with someone about this. We are having similar thoughts up here in BlueHampshire Land and would love to see if we could leverage some of what you have done or perhaps help defray some of your costs.

    <

    p>SB just has not been keeping up with the time (and really should be something like  Drupal install profile)

    <

    p>The legacy content has been the biggest hold up… how do you convert 12k Diaries and 100k comments.

    <

    p>Let me know whom I can contact to chat!

    <

    p>Best of luck with the conversion its a HUGE undertaking!

  6. I’d love to throw some $$ your way in the way of a subscription.  Very cool, indeed.  I’ll swing by the beta and give ‘er test  run.  

    • We are looking at various options to generate revenue. BMG is profitable, and has been since Day 1, because we volunteer our time and the hosting costs for blogs are very low. So it is sustainable indefinitely as presently constituted, albeit a labor of love. Is love really all you need? In any event, the more funds we get, the more we can do.

      <

      p>Our primary concern is to keep this an enjoyable experience for everyone.

    • is that sabutai (for example) would have his own blog located at sabutai.bluemassgroup.com.  That blog will look and feel just like a regular WordPress blog (i.e., he can upload his own picture to be the site’s logo, he can moderate comments, he can select widgets, etc.), except that every post he writes there shows up in the “Recent User Posts” list here, so he is both updating his own site and continuing to contribute content to BMG.  As with any other user posts, we can move his posts to BMG’s front page.

      <

      p>Does that answer your question?

      • I guess I won’t know until I see how and how much it is used, but I wonder about having network posts feeding into the “recent user posts”. If the network feature is used a lot, it could end up crowding out non-network posts (pushing them down the list faster than now). And if the network blogs end up being very specialized, they might not have the broad appeal most of the current user posts have.

        <

        p>If this does become a problem, maybe there could be an additional space of “Recent BMG Network Posts” that is separate from the user posts. But, again, we probably won’t know until we get some mileage on the new system.

        • I think that’s the kind of thing we’ll have to sort out as people start using the new system.  If there turns out to be a need for two separate feeds, I’d imagine that we could implement something like that.  But even now, there are a number of users who post frequently on very specific topics, and it doesn’t seem to have harmed the “Recent user posts” feed.

          <

          p>Also, if the Network feature becomes popular, that would be a great thing, as it would mean a lot more people actively blogging about MA politics!  So let’s hope that’s a problem that we have to solve.  đŸ™‚

      • and, if he moderates comments on sabutai.bluemassgroup.com are they removed from the copy in User Posts?

  9. So what does someone do if their email address that you have doesn’t work anymore, and they no longer have access to their account?  If they see this post now, they can know to log in and check their settings and update their email address – although you really didn’t emphasize that point and I think you should in a separate post – but it’s not unusual for someone, even an active user, to take a few weeks between visits to BMG.  If they don’t notice and fix their email address before you transition, they’ve lost their account.

    <

    p>You could perhaps send out one mailing to everyone in advance, with a confirmation click-link, to check which ones aren’t responding, and get a sense of the scope of the problem.

    • That problem would exist on the current site, as well as on the new site. So it is a general concern, rather than something related to the new site specifically.

      <

      p>People can always write to us if they have a problem like that, and we can help them manually. We have many thousands of users, not many tens of thousands, so this is not in practice a colossal problem.

      <

      p>But thanks very much for noting it!

  10. ” in particular, previously-nested comments will remain in order but will no longer appear nested after the migration,”

    <

    p>Why is that?  Is there no way around it?  Un-nesting threads will actually make a very large number of past BMG discussions effectively unreadable, almost as bad as not migrating the comments at all.  It’s worth a lot of effort to fix this.  I’d donate money if it would help.

    • Seriously, this would be a major undertaking that would be quite expensive.  Our budget is limited, and we concluded that it made more sense to spend money looking forward rather than backward.  We’re already spending a lot just to import a complete archive, and we decided it wasn’t worth extra expense to ensure perfect formatting for old comment threads.

  12. Will you be claiming ownership over everything posted on the BMG network? Like you do here?

    • After all, since every BMG Network post will feed through to BMG itself (on the Recent User Posts list), it presents the same ownership issues, no?

        • I wouldn’t lose sleep over it, dcsohl. If your blog posts become so valuable that you eventually want control, you’ll be able to afford a good legal team. Mind if we live-blog the case?

          • Well, I’m not actually losing sleep over it. I find it morally objectionable, enough so to take the chance to bring up my objection whenever appropriate… but I’ve not (yet?) gone to the lengths of putting a copyright statement in my profile or signature, and I am still posting here.

            <

            p>But I do find it objectionable enough that I will not be setting up my blog/mini-site/whatever on the BMG network. It’ll be just like a blog of my own but not actually my blog? No thank you.

            <

            p>How, legally, is cross-posting handled? If I have my own blog and cross-post (as many BMGers do on occasion), who owns those words?

            • My non-lawyer take:

              <

              p>1. You own the one on your blog.

              <

              p>2. Borg Mass Group owns the own here, and all comments with it.

              <

              p>3. I own all other versions* in any media that exists now or may be invented.

              <

              p>*May not be true in all states.

              • Copyright doesn’t work like that. For a given work, there’s an owner, and there are the licensees. For example, book publishers would never stand for it if you sold the same book to two publishers, each of which claimed ownership of the copyright. (Which generally doesn’t happen; if you look at a book it’s always copyright the author, not the publisher. The publisher is generally granted an exclusive license. Which is one of the many reasons BMG’s position on this irks me – you simply don’t see this happen anywhere “in real life”.)

                <

                p>That copyright statement at the bottom of the page links to a Creative Commons licensing page, stating that all content is freely available to share as long as you don’t change it, don’t charge for it, and attribute it to the author.

                <

                p>But who is the author? If BMG claims copyright on all words here, then I guess I’m not legally the author of words I wrote. And attribution then should be to “BMG Media Empire LLC” and not to me. Which frankly, kinda sucks, if the Boston Globe comes round here and decides I made a worthy point, and they quote me, and I don’t get the attribution!

                <

                p>A far worthier position of BMG would be to say, in essence, “you own your own words, but you must assign this Creative Commons license to everything published on this site.” That makes a lot more sense to me, gives us credit for our words, and removes some of these legal questions and ambiguities.

                • I feel like the analogy breaks down, though. You can, for example, post to another blog. But the two blogs aren’t really rival publishers in the traditional sense, but more like neighboring communities. Adrian Gonzales owns his career stats … but the Red Sox will benefit (we hope) from his output while he plays for them. So cross-posters play for two teams, in effect … now I’m really confused.

                  <

                  p>In short, though, we’re engaged in a socialist enterprise. The BMG community can make your post more valuable to BMG Media Empire by commenting on it frequently, but that does not benefit the other blog that carries your post. Bottom line, if you work for free … you don’t get paid. And copyright is largely about who gets paid.

                  <

                  p>

        • you’re posting it on our site.  That’s what makes it reasonable.  If you want to retain full ownership, you are of course free to start up your own blog!

          • Also, and I know this is an old thread so you might never notice this comment… but it struck me over the weekend that you are a hard-core proponent for the idea that third-parties are Bad, that if you want to change the Democrats you should do so from the inside.

            <

            p>Yet when I, from the inside, try to suggest a change at BMG your initial response is to, effectively, F off and start my own blog.

            • I don’t think third parties are bad.  Actually, I wish we had viable third parties, and I support voting reforms like IRV that will help them gain traction.  But I’m a fairly pragmatic sort, and I see no value in the Ralph Nader approach to electoral politics.  That, after all, is what gave us eight years of George W. Bush.

              <

              p>How that translates to the way we manage BMG, I’m not entirely sure.  Will leave that to greater minds than mine.  đŸ™‚

        • retain ownership of what their writers write. Writers often retain rights as well.Technically, I don’t see how BMG can exclude writers from claiming ownership of their own material. But I’m not sure I see a problem with BMG retaining ownership rights to writers’ material. It’s a question of fairness.

          <

          p>If the Editors were to somehow start to selling posters’ and commenters’ material outside of BMG, I could see a problem with that. If the Editors, for example, were to publish material in a book, that would go beyond the site itself. These are relatively big if’s.

          <

          p>As far as advertising and earning a profit go, I guess I don’t have a problem with that. People can choose not to post or comment here. And profit is okay with me.

          <

          p>Both the Editors and the people who post and comment are necessary to BMG; on their own, neither is sufficient. As long as everyone keeps that in mind, I don’t see a problem on the horizon.

  13. i looked over the dev and saw immediately a few problems.

    <

    p>First, where’s the text?  Print’s too big, too few words, adverts bigger than text and intermixed.

    <

    p>Nothing like advertising to destroy a train of thought of conversation.  Ever watch a group trying to socialize with the TV on?

    <

    p>Not that having larger text isn’t an improvement over this.  The tiny ultra small print of the BMG I love and admire is something I’ve come to tolerate as a part of the Windoze disease.

    <

    p>But the text is way too large in the new version.  And the interspersed adverts are completely obnoxious.  Confine them to the edges, at a bare minimum.  Making them smaller would be an order of magnitude better.

    <

    p>Second – why are you using a PC with all its stupid alphanumerics for punctuation?  Do you have any clue of how bad they look to a Mac user?  Your apostrphes are some wierd symbol.  Surely you can get a better text editor than that?  Surely your site developer knows that every site must be checked on every version of every browser on at least 3 platforms – Windoze, Mac and Linux – to be user friendly.

    <

    p>Scott Brown has the same problem.  Looks lame.

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