The beta site is here: DailyKosBeta.com
People keep bizarrely claiming that I've never justified this transition, and that we're creating this new version of Daily Kos just for the sake of doing something new. While I've written extensively about my motivations and justifications, this piece is the most succinct explanation of why we're transitioning, and why I believe this current version of the site is obsolete and broken.
Sardonyx has been doing heroic work in this transition period. Apparently, the 24 hours a day he's spent beta testing left him with spare free time, so he put together a DK4 FAQ. Sardonyx also pointed out that we're missing a link to the FAQ from DK4. It's an oversight we'll fix by the transition.
Speaking of transitions, my team says they're still on track for a February 4-5 transition. The site will be down starting Friday night, and could be down most of Saturday, as we transfer the gazillion diaries, comments, ratings, and hotlists from this site to the shiny new one.
Stability at the new site continues to increase, as has speed. Here's the latest site performance report from Chartbeat, which provides us with some of our site metrics. The report is for this past week:
Responsiveness
dailykosbeta.com
The average server load time was 0.6 seconds and average user load time was 5.9 seconds . No responsiveness alerts were triggered.
dailykos.com
The average server load time was 0.6 seconds and average user load time was 8.6 seconds . No responsiveness alerts were triggered.
In other words, DK4 loads faster than this current version of the site. So for those on dial-up connections, the new Daily Kos shouldn't create any new barriers. In fact, it should make your browsing experience better.
Note, being on dial-up is different than being on an old computer. If you're using a 10-year-old browser, then the new site's extensive use of Ajax (a web technology) won't work. Then again, even Google is pulling support for those ancient browsers. So if your computer is that old, Daily Kos will be the least of your problems.
Another unrelated note -- some people have complained that the development team isn't responding to bug reports. They're not -- because they're busy squashing bugs and fixing user interface problems. If you send in a bug report, it gets categorized, prioritized, and then put on a list. Not everything on the list will be done by launch. Bugs are never eradicated entirely (this version of the site is six years old and still has bugs), and some things people consider to be "bugs" are really subjective usability nits. Many of those will be fixed in due time, but if they don't affect the ability of the site to function, they get deprioritized. And yes, sometimes what people consider to be "bugs" are actually not bugs (such as design decisions), and will never be "fixed" because I don't consider them to be a problem.
In any case, every second that the development team spends trying to respond to the dozens of people submitting bug reports is a second away from fixing problems. Our priority is to fix the problems. So know that every bug report is read and categorized. And if it's a true functionality problem, it'll eventually get fixed.
After a one week Arizona-induced hiatus in DK4 meta chat, there was a ton of it this past week.
Patriot Daily News Clearinghouse wrote "DK4 Myths Unplugged" -- a community member's response to much of the criticisms leveled at the new platform.
Recent diaries and comments indicate that there are a few myths or misperceptions about DK4. There seems to be some confusion and some feelings of intimidation, but the upshot is really that you can use DK4 just as you use DK3 and never learn about or use the many tools provided by DK4. But, if you want to expand what you can now do at DK3, you might want to gradually learn about the new features at your own pace.
One fact is undeniable: DK4 is focused on strengthening and expanding our community and sub-communities while making it easier for us to organize political activism. Another fact should increase our comfort levels: These DK4 tools increase and expand the functionality of tools we now use on DK3, not FB or twitter. DK3 has diary series, sub-communities and group user accounts that are some of what is called "Groups" in DK4. DK3 has subscription and hotlists that are called "follow" and "stream" in DK4.
User 2501 complains about the larger text sizes in the new site:
Kos, are you aiming to get more elderly readers?
Many elderly (and sight-limited) readers argue in return that I'm throwing them under the bus!
Fact is, the new site does have more white space, so it breathes better. I like it. Some of you will disagree. It's the nature of the beast. But when I compare DK3 and DK4 side by side, the current site looks and feels claustrophobic to me.
Fact also is that the new site has larger fonts all around. No font on DK4 will be smaller than what is currently used in this version of the site. The good thing is that it makes for better readability. The bad thing is that stories and comments take up more space -- so more scrolling. It's a tradeoff.
Luckily, modern browsers allow people to size their fonts up or down depending on personal preferences, and thus if the font sizes we've chosen don't work for you, you can use technology to adjust. On this one, it's impossible to please everyone.
User Hopeful Monster "kind of likes DKos 4". Among the reasons:
- DKos 3 is a terrible place to try to find information if you're not on all the time. Once a diary is gone from the recent list, it's as good as gone forever. Yes, I know it's POSSIBLE to find those old (4 hours old) diaries, but it's a pain to do so and frankly, I never bother. I find it dramatically easier to follow particular writers on DK4, including finding their diaries that I missed.
- The new tags are outstanding. As a scientist, I am of course interested in science-related diaries, and there are a lot of excellent ones on DK. Unfortunately, I often don't see them - they roll of the Recent list too fast. That has not been a problem for me on DK4.
Like the diarist, I know there are ways to find older diaries that have scrolled off the front page, but few look for them. The vast majority of visitors also don't visit the site multiple times a day. Ergo, the vast majority of visitors miss a ton of good diaries every day. DK4 solves that problem. You don't have to live on Daily Kos to make sure you see everything you want to see.
twigg responds to complaints of balkanization (among other things) at DK4:
Cliques, entrenched views, Balkanisation ... it exists. It is alive and well on DK3, and is no reason not to move to DK4. Remember BlackWaterDog anyone?.
Daily Kos has never eliminated "balkanization". We still have sub-communities focused on specific topic/issue areas. We've been successful in large part because we've brought those sub-communities together under one umbrella. So rather than have Human Rights Campaign over there doing their thing, and having Sierra Club over here doing its thing, we have a place where people who believe in equality or the environment can share the same forum. Throw in the cat people and the knitters and the book clubs and the myriad of sub-communities that grace Daily Kos, and you have this rich tapestry of a community.
If we all talked about the same things and participated in the same discussions, Daily Kos wouldn't be what Daily Kos has become. We are balkanized, but in a good way. It's a holistic coming together, rather than the antagonistic "you must lose for me to win" way that has bedeviled the progressive movement forever.
And that's just on the issue front. Daily Kos obviously "balkanizes" along personality lines. This site can be very cliquey. That's just human nature, and you cram in tens of thousands of active community members into a site, there's no way to avoid that.
SpamNunn, in a comment, says I'm being a dick whenever anyone criticizes DK4.
Yeah, I can be a dick, but that claim is not completely true. There's an entire core of committed beta testers whose entire focus is to criticize DK4 -- tearing it apart and questioning my assumptions and decisions.
And here's the thing: DK4 has evolved quite a bit over the last six months of beta testing, first from feedback from the closed beta, and now from feedback from the open beta. Those beta testers have my everlasting and undying gratitude for their criticisms. We've made a ton of changes based on that feedback, and will make a bunch more before all's said and done.
My job is to provide kick ass tools to enable the kind of activism that will make this a better world. Given my limited time, my energies will be spent with those who are constructively engaging.