[CAMWEST-discuss] Meeting about the Web Site: what do you think?

[Nick Urbanik]

Dear CAMWESTies,

Last night, Ian Macindoe, Rob Kemp, Mark Robson and I met to talk
about the web site, and how to make it better.  Here is what we
decided, or discussed:

1.  To put little arrows in the menu items that lead to second level
    menu choices.
2.  To add a topic "Health" to the menu, to link to items on health and
    active transport.
3.  To remove the menu item Advocacy -> Baulkham Hills, and put
    Advocacy -> Blacktown instead (Unless anyone is interested in
    attending the Baulkham Hills Council meetings to discuss
    cycling???)
4.  To discuss the Duck River Cycleway plan proposed by Mark Robson
    with Megan of the Parramatta Cycleways Committee to look for ways
    to complete the path while avoiding damaging endangered plants and
    wildlife.
5.  We discussed alternative navigation systems.  Rob Kemp suggested a
    useful idea with a horizontal main menu, with a second row below
    consisting of sub menu choices that relate only to that main
    top-level item (okay, I'm lousy at explaining it, but hopefully Rob
    can point to a live example, as he plans on implementing such a
    navigation scheme for his own web site.)
6.  We discussed proposals for radically reducing the material on the
    front page.   The consensus was to keep it extremely simple, with a
    straightforward "mission statement", a small photo of cheerful
    CAMWESTies with their bicycles on the right that links to other
    photos, a couple of links that change from time to time, saying
    simply: "Upcoming Events", or "Upcoming Rides"
7.  There was strong consensus to reduce the clutter in the right-hand
    column and to keep things simpler and current.
8.  Rob suggested changing the "Advocacy" menu item to "Happenings".
    There was no solid consensus on this, so for the time being I will
    leave it as "Advocacy".
9.  We spoke of the need for people who come to CAMWEST to learn the
    wisdom of advocacy, how it works, what is successful, and what are
    good strategies.  CAMWEST has a long, proud history of this, for
    the most part now embodied in Ian.  Ian said he has given a number
    of talks on these topics, and that he would write an article, and
    that I would put it on the web site.
10. Change the information about the "newsletter" from being
    two-monthly to being sent out from "time to time".
11. We discussed the concept of "Joining" CAMWEST.  We came up with the
    more appropriate phrase, "Get Involved".
12. Ian pointed out that there are three main reasons for people to
    visit our site:
    1. For information about CAMWEST, Parramatta and our history.
    2. To find out about rides.
    3. To get involved with advocacy, and working with Councils on
       bike plans, and other ways to make cycling safer and more fun.

    These three things should be expressed somehow on the front page.
13. Add Mark and Rob to the list of people who can post to the
    CAMWEST-announce list.  Consider it done; as soon as I send this
    mail, I will enable your posting.
14. We discussed what is appropriate to post to the announce list, and
    the consensus is that it should be brief, simple, text (not a MS
    Word document) and point to more detailed information that I
    should have already posted on the web site.
15. We discussed the important fact that membership of BNSW provides
    insurance while cycling, and that it is necessary to be a member
    of BNSW before you can lead a ride.
16. To add Mark's contact information to the info on the web site
    about the rides he is leading.  Done, Mark.

These are for the most part action items for me, and so far I have
only completed one of them, but I intend to work through them.

Now your ideas matter too, so if you have any suggestions or ideas
about how we can make the web site, and CAMWEST itself of course,
better, then please let everyone know.
-- 
Nick Urbanik   RHCE         http://nicku.org        nicku at nicku.org
GPG: 7FFA CDC7+5A77 0558 DC7A 790A 16DF EC5B BB9D 2C24 ID: BB9D2C24