Dear TobaccoReviews registered user:
The rebuild of TobaccoReviews is having its final polish applied as this email goes out. We expect to go live with the new site on Monday or Tuesday (Nov. 25 or Nov. 26). There may be an hour or two of downtime, but if things go right, it will be almost unnoticeable.
What is noticeable is the redesign of the site. When we started, the plan was to update and repair many of the administrative functions that were, well, they were toast.
But as long as we're at it, we thought, let's ask users if there's anything they'd like to see changed. You may remember that email from last spring. We received hundreds of suggestions for improvements, and most of them made sense, so we tackled a complete rebuild to accommodate the excellent recommendations that came in. We couldn't do everything, but we did a lot.
You're going to be surprised when you see it. It has a much cleaner look and a huge number of new functions. Images are now enabled, so you'll be able to submit photos of the tobaccos (and of yourself if you'd like to have one attached to your profile). New search and sort capabilities will help you more easily find reviewers who have the same tastes as you. Individual reviews can be voted on for helpfulness, a field you can now sort by. You'll be able to see the experience levels and preferences of reviewers so you can determine how much weight to give their opinions.
Reviews can be sorted by several different fields now, so you won't have to wade through them by date alone. We now have a tobacco "type" field for submitting whether a tobacco is an aromatic or English or Virginia/Perique, etc. Searching for tobaccos or reviews is now available by many different fields or any one field. There are so many new capabilities that an email can't list them all.
When I first saw the new design, my immediate response was, "Well, this isn't going to work." The site's appearance hides its functionality. An hour of exploration proved to me that we were building a superior site, and I hope you'll give it the same chance. Let your cursor hover over various elements to discover layers of new options. Click different graphs and headers to find different sort features. Wander through the site, experience what it offers, explore its capabilities—we think you'll be impressed.
Changes will be necessary. There are thousands of errors in the database that we as a community can repair. In the past, and for very rational reasons, any change needed to go through a moderator. Because we have new fields to populate, we are turning off moderation for the following categories:
Blend Type, Contents, Flavors, Cut, ImageFile and Production Status (whether currently available). You can change these items in a blend without moderation for the short term, so that we can all benefit from the quick population of the new fields and the correction of inaccurate information. However, as you can imagine, if people start uploading inappropriate images, we'll have to turn the moderation function back on, which will slow things down. I think our community can be trusted to handle this database with care.
By the way, SmokingPipes.com has given us permission to use any tobacco tin images from its site, so if you're looking for images to add to the reviews, it's a good source. Please thank them for their kindness and contribution to TobaccoReviews by visiting them and placing an order when you're next looking for tobacco.
Please log in to TobaccoReviews next week and check out the new site. Let us know what you think, and enjoy one of our hobby's most entertaining and instructive resources.
Chuck Stanion
Pipes and tobaccos magazine
3101 Poplarwood Court, Suite 115
Raleigh, NC 27604
www.pipesandtobaccosmagazine.com