Welcome 18to88 (Version 3.0)

So there have been a few changes around here…

As you all can see, 18to88.com has moved to a new network (emphasis on the word new).  We are happy to announce a new partnership with Bloguin.com (pronounced ‘bloggin’).  The move provides us with the opportunity to try some new things.

Most everything about 18to88 is the same.  You can still find the Articles and Fixtures archives on the main page. Comments will still be unmoderated, and you are free to post anonymously (as long as you don’t violate the one rule of commenting). There have been some changes, however:

• The latest podcast can be played from the embedded player on every page
• The comments from old posts aren’t in the archives any more, but don’t worry, they aren’t gone.  If you want to follow any of the epic discussions that we’ve had on old posts, just click on the archives section and select “Previous Versions”.  There you can find 18to88 1.0 (the blogspot edition) and 2.0 (MVN).  The comments on old posts have been preserved there.  The interaction we have on the site is important to us, and we didn’t want to lose the record of two and a half years of dialogue with all of you.
• Polls will once again be a regular feature.
• The other new feature is a “Football Outsiders-style” links section.

For some time now, we’ve wrestled with how to best handle linking to other stories.  Originally, we would just make a new post for every piddly little story we wanted to link to.  It seemed like overkill to me.  Then, I started tacking links on to the end of posts.  That wasn’t a great solution either.  Now, we are posting links individually, but they won’t show up on the main page.  They’ll still register in an RSS reader as a new post (UPDATE: NO THEY WON’T…we’re working on adding an RSS page for the links), but won’t clog up the front page with minutiae.  Now, when you come to 18to88.com, be sure to glance at the “Daily Links” box at the upper left hand corner beneath the header.  There you can click on any link that will take you to a page with our limited commentary.  You can then comment on the link on a dedicated page.  I think it will keep the dialogue more orderly as there won’t be 10 topics per post any more.  The links list will show the latest 10 links.  If you’ve missed some time and want to catch up, they’ll be archived for you…just click on links at the top of the page.

Now we need some help from all of you:

Keep giving us feedback.  If there are things on the new site that are problematic, let us know.

If you have trouble with the commenting system, DEFINITELY let us know.

If you find dead links in any of the archives, let us know.

Because 18to88 started on a lark, we never envisioned a lot of the problems that come with growth.  We need your help to keep a handle on all of them.