Same Blog, Much Different Look

See anything different? We were hard at work this past week working on a new version of the blog. We wanted one that could handle delivering you more content, while making it all easily viewable. Welcome to the new Rupp Arena Blog. Below I will break down some of the new sections of the blog and explain to you where you how you can easily find everything we post up. We basically took all the content from the old blog, and found a way to make it easier for you to read. We can now put up even more recaps, photos, articles, news and other behind-the-scenes content without making you exercise your scroll bar. No need to thank us, for it is because of you that we wanted to make things better. As cheesy as it sounds, you make us want to be a better man blog. (Sorry for the As Good As It Gets quote.) Read below to find out more about the new design.

All-Access Column

This column is the most prominent for a reason. This is where you can find all the juicy and fun content we enjoy bringing to you. It will serve as the new home for interviews, pre-show content, load-in photos, and anything else we snag. Doesn’t it just look pretty with the large images? One of the lovely things about this new version of the blog is that it is much more visually stimulating. Pictures and small excerpts of the three most recent posts in the All-Access parent category will be displayed here. A small summary of what is in each article is located below the corresponding picture. You can click on “Read the story »”, the picture or the title to read the full post. Not to play favorites, but… well… I can tell this will be my (and yours) favorite section of the blog.

Event Recaps, Photos and Contest

The Event Recaps, Photos From Events, and Rupp Arena Blog Contests sections are all laid out the same way. You will find them stacked up in the middle of the page in the aforementioned order. Each section displays the three most recent posts in that category. Since they are all easily viewable then you can easily find photos and a recap of a previous event without having to scroll down forever like you had to do on the old design. As with the All-Access Column, each post has an image and snippet to give you a better idea of what the subject is. Simply click on the title and it will take you to the full post. Underneath those three is the News About Upcoming Shows section which will serve as a simple list of press releases or anything we find that may be relevant.

Featured Video

[stand in the air and yells...] No more Youtube shackles! No offense to those Youtube lovers out there, or really to the community since my beef is not with the site itself, but I have always LOVED the look and feel of Vimeo. They have a fast-growing community and the best part is that their videos don’t have any frames or watermarks. Also, we love that they host HD videos. We just recently got an HD camera and it is safe to say that you may be watching various videos in High Definition.

Those are just a few of the features. Another thing to note is that we are doing our best to not scatter everyone around. I know when I am browsing a site that I love to be able to stay there and have access to all the content they are offering me. We used to have to link you to Flickr after every event and send you over to Youtube to watch the videos. With the new Featured Video section and nifty embedded Flickr slideshows, we are able to bring you all the content here and not scatter you about the scary world of the internetz.

With new design comes new function and new opportunity. There are pretty much no limits to what is possible. If you can think of anything you think is missing from the blog and you would like to see then don’t hesitate to tell us. We may just take your suggestion and makes whatever changes that day. You can email us at rupparenablog(at)gmail(dot)com or be simply clicking the link in the footer on the page. Sit back, kick your feet up, and enjoy the new Rupp Arena Blog.