June 27, 2008APME recognizes Roanoke Times/roanoke.com for Age of Uncertainty seriesThe Associated Press Managing Editors association recognized The Roanoke Times/roanoke.com with its Online Convergence award for the "Age of Uncertainty" series. This is the third time in four years the site has been recognized with the convergence award. Previous awards were given to the series on Bantu refugees living in Roanoke (2005) and coverage of the Virginia Tech shootings (2007). This year's series focuses on the the rising elderly population and looks at the challenge of providing care from several viewpoints. Beth Macy and Josh Meltzer, who provided the coverage for the Bantu series, have spent the past several months telling the story from the perspective of family members, doctors, health-care providers and caregivers.
Continue reading "APME recognizes Roanoke Times/roanoke.com for Age of Uncertainty series" » June 11, 2008New look rolling out on roanoke.com
The new look of roanoke.com The new design was created after discussions to update the current look of the roanoke.com mast. As we've heard from readers and users, there's a lot of stuff on our site, but it's sometimes not always easy to find. We've added a "Check this out!" box to spotlight new features and additions to the multimedia database. We're hoping that a shift of elements within the new design will also make things easier to find. Late last year, we asked a search engine optimization firm to evaluate our site and recommend ways to improve. We've incorporated some of the firm's findings in the way templates are developed. Those changes are reflected in the new design. Making those changes should improve the search engine results, on our internal site search as well as Google, Yahoo! and other engines. April 11, 2008Video portraits: One year later We wanted to try something similar using video to tell the story of how people are doing one year after the Virginia Tech shootings. Working with photographer Justin Cook and a number of reporters in our New River Valley bureau - Greg Esposito, Anna Mallory, Tonia Moxley, Donna Alvis-Banks, Tim Thornton and others - we set out to capture people's thoughts and emotions, "in the spirit of Avedon," for this interactive project. I edited the video with no cuts and no b-roll. We wanted to hear the words and see the people the way they carried themselves, by how they stood, sat and spoke, for a minute or two. Their eyes looking straight at the camera, we wanted them to have a conversation with you. April 9, 2008Convert documents to PDF for freeFor those of us without Adobe Acrobat or a Mac, creating PDF's can be pain -- and it often means outsourcing the task to another cubicle. DrawLoop has done an excellent job rectifying this problem with their free, online PDF converter tools. They have a webpage-based version and a Firefox add-on (no administrator rights needed!). March 24, 2008"Community" lands on the homepage
It was a small change, at first glance -- aesthetic, maybe. One word has replaced two in the tabs, and nothing looks too terribly different at the outset. But spend a minute or two at roanoke.com. Mouse over the tabs at the top of the gateway. See the news updates, the bracket challenge, today's calendar events and our latest Virginia Tech video. Then hover your cursor over the new tab -- the one that used to say "About Roanoke" -- and you'll notice something just a little bit different. "Community," it's called. A word that's been hanging around the newsroom a lot lately. It's making itself comfortable, settling in, drinking all the coffee and forgetting to brew a new pot. Hang out with the community tab for a while, and you'll find news from your area, the latest stories about the place where you live and -- if your address lies within our core coverage area -- even a homepage for your corner of the Roanoke or New River valleys. |
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