On Facebook and Twitter, your reactions to our new design were all over the map. Social media seems to pit the lamb against the tempest in you, and you're not shy about putting them both on display for the world wide web to see.
Some of you couldn't hold back your praise. On Facebook, you called us "spectacular...clean, classy, and easy to navigate," and told us we were "getting better with age" on Twitter. The word "beautiful" was thrown around quite a few times, and retiring our former trademark — the overarching, interactive map — was lauded as a "good call" by most.
Overall, we fielded a great deal of congratulatory messages, for which we graciously bow and thank you. We put a lot of clicks, sweat, and clears into making CultureMap 2.0 happen, in the hopes that our readers would love CultureMap that much more.
But you wouldn't be CultureMap's loyal and opinionated readers if you swallowed everything we fed you. While we'd never halt the lovefest, a critical eye goes a long way with us as well.
You used your non-character-delimited space on Facebook to tell us you were "hot and cold" about the new site, and point out, to your dismay, that "half of it is covered in ads," and you "liked the old format much better." Much to our surprise, there was even a lament or two over the banishment of the map. We suppose we can't win them all.
It seems we inadvertently caused seizures among our tweeting fans, and the dissenting Twitterati generally found our new site "too busy below the fold." Since our more techie-inclined audiences communicate in 140 characters or less, we certainly don't take this feedback lightly.
