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100-Poems Updated
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100-Poems Updated |
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Ron
Administrator
Member Rara Avis
since 1999-05-19
Posts 8669Michigan, US 
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In early 2000, 100-Poems.com was opened as our showcase of the most popular poems previously published at the main site. The list of 100 Top Poems, as determined largely by visitor votes, has changed numerous times over the intervening five years, but the original design and purpose of the site remained the same. A few months ago, I announced a huge update at the main site, after editing and posting almost 12,000 new comments from our Voting forms. Obviously, those new votes affected the line-up at 100-Poems.com. Indeed, the effect was so great that it was almost like completely rewriting the whole site. So, uh, that's exactly what I did.  You can still find the old design for a brief time, but as of yesterday afternoon, www.100-Poems.com is pretty much a brand new baby. * The purpose of the site has been expanded. Instead of just the 100 Top Poems from the main site (that's still there, of course), we are also showcasing the Top 100 Poems from several categories. For example, all of the subcategories under Love Poems have been grouped and tabulated, resulting in a list of the 100 Best Love Poems from all those subcategories. There are five categories showcased right now, plus the original Best of the Best, for a total of 600 poems. In the future, I'd like to add a few more categories. * For the very few who are interested in such things, the new design is completely CSS based, using almost no tables. This is the "new direction" for web design and is quite a bit more accessible to more people, especially those using screen readers. * For the first time in over five years, the process of updating 100-Poems is completely automated. When new votes are tabulated at the main site, I can probably update the lists at 100-Poems the same afternoon. That's an especially good thing right now. With this project put to bed, and the new forum software changes now made live, I can focus on reading and editing the more than 15,000 voting comments sitting in my in-box. I'm excited about the new site because it allows us to showcase more of our talented writers, many of which (not surprisingly) are also active in the forums. You'll recognize a lot of familiar names, I'm sure, and indeed, the poet with the most poems across all six 100-Poems categories is . . . . . . aw, I'll let you figure that one out for yourself. |
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| © Copyright 2005 Ron Carnell - All Rights Reserved | |||
Larry C
since 2001-09-10
Posts 10286United States |
So when I asked you what you do with all your spare time, this must be it!  WOW!!!If tears could build a stairway and memories a lane, I'd walk right up to heaven and bring you home again. |
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Poet deVine
Administrator
Member Seraphic
since 1999-05-26
Posts 22612Hurricane Alley |
..and the new background is simply lovely..a nice look!!!  |
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serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
And all this time I thought he was just, takin' vacations, enjoying the theater and stuff...  |
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Mysteria
since 2001-03-07
Posts 18328British Columbia, Canada |
 Now that little smilie has a dual purpose Ron. To praise the new look and software as it's first class, and of course to answer your question. However, you and Michael did "place." Your hard work on this is sure appreciated, and I sure can't wait to see what else you have under your baseball cap in store for the site. |
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Alicat Member Elite
since 1999-05-23
Posts 4094Coastal Texas |
Woohoo! Made the top 100 Friendship list!!! |
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Christopher
Moderator
Member Rara Avis
since 1999-08-02
Posts 8296Purgatorial Incarceration |
...it can't be too discerning of a top 100, Ron... three of the four poems i've posted to the main site are on there!  however: very cool, very cool. over and onward, upward and sideways, it's always and ever interesting to watch you tinker. |
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iliana Member Patricius
since 2003-12-05
Posts 13434USA |
Ron, the Top 100 looks great. I especially liked the quill. Congrats on the new look.  ....jo |
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Ratleader
since 2003-01-23
Posts 7026Visiting Earth on a Guest Pass |
I freely admit that I don't get around all that much, but I didn't even recognize half of those folks. Does this update mean that we can now submit poetry to the main site? There are poems I'd like to submit in almost every category, but I haven't been able to do it. I'm probably missing something in the process, but I've tried submitting and I've never been able to get it done. ~~(¸¸¸¸ºº> ~~(¸¸¸¸ºº> ~~(¸¸ ¸¸ºº> ~~~(¸¸ER¸¸ºº> |
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Ron
Administrator
Member Rara Avis
since 1999-05-19
Posts 8669Michigan, US |
Soon, Ed. Very, very soon. Let me get those 15,000 comments edited first, though? |
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Kit McCallum
Administrator
Member Laureate
since 2000-04-30
Posts 14774Ontario, Canada |
Another 15,000 comments to edit Ron? Wow ... that's a lot of work ahead, but even more unbelievable, is how much work you've got "behind" you. The changes and flow in the 100 Poems site are great! Very readable, and the additional categories are wonderful ... what a great idea! I love the new look and am having fun reading through the lists. Excellent Ron! |
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Nan
Administrator
Member Seraphic
since 1999-05-20
Posts 21191Cape Cod Massachusetts USA |
I seem to see a recurring "Kit" theme in most every category... It's looking superb, Ron... |
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HopeS Member Elite
since 2000-12-22
Posts 4596Perth Western Australia |
Ron this looks really great , I was reading through and reminiscing ,then to my surprise I noticed a couple of my poems there Hope |
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Marge Tindal
since 1999-11-06
Posts 42384Florida's Foreverly Shores |
Asking what I hope is an easy-to-answer question that I haven't seen covered in an answer anywhere ... (I don't think) When are the ?new? POEMS that were already submitted over the last few years going to be added to the Main Site ? ~I saw a pig fly last night~ (Well the Volusia County Fair is in town)  |
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Ratleader
since 2003-01-23
Posts 7026Visiting Earth on a Guest Pass |
15,000 -- Criminitley! Gonna send you a tube of eyeball grease for Christmas! ~~(¸¸¸¸ºº> ~~(¸¸¸¸ºº> ~~(¸¸ ¸¸ºº> ~~~(¸¸ER¸¸ºº> |
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Ratleader
since 2003-01-23
Posts 7026Visiting Earth on a Guest Pass |
I wonder whether we ought to have a discussion about the 100-poems thing....what happens when someone puts in a current poem that's maybe stronger than the ones on the list. No matter how good it is, chances are that it'll never make the top hundred listing, because it's in there with poems that have a six year head-start....some of those being poems by people who don't even come around here anymore, but they'll stay up for all time by the sheer inertia of having been put there first. I dunno, that just seems out-of-sync to me.... ~~(¸¸¸¸ºº> ~~(¸¸¸¸ºº> ~~(¸¸ ¸¸ºº> ~~~(¸¸ER¸¸ºº> |
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Marge Tindal
since 1999-11-06
Posts 42384Florida's Foreverly Shores |
Ed~ Not my call .. but the Main Site still has a plethora of readers ... (I get email from the Main Site on almost a weekly basis) and the poets you might see posted there either are members here OR they've never been here to the PiPTalk Forums~ My actual first post was at the Main Site ... then when PiPTalk was instituted .. I crossed over~ However, I continued to submit more poems to the Main SIte, at the urging of members here in PiPTalk ... they've just not been added to the database of the Main Site~ I think there are a gazillion (or close) waiting to be added ... sometimes 'soon' is right around the corner ... sometimes it's just 'soon'~ New poetry will be read at the Main Site ... and it wouldn't take too long for those that merit it to jump right on up the list ! I think ! Helpful ? Well, I try~  |
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Ratleader
since 2003-01-23
Posts 7026Visiting Earth on a Guest Pass |
Partly a matter of definition then -- to me this has always been the "main site" and my poetic home, while the other half of things was a quaint little section that seemed to belong mainly to the "old timers"....so I never made it part of my experience here.... my name still isn't showing on the member list over there...maybe I ought to take care of that too, if I can. ~~(¸¸¸¸ºº> ~~(¸¸¸¸ºº> ~~(¸¸ ¸¸ºº> ~~~(¸¸ER¸¸ºº> ______________Ratleader______________ |
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serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
Actually? Since I have forgotten which ones I've submitted anyhow, it'd be okay with me if you did too. (I don't think I wanna see 'em again anyhow) sheesh.  |
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Ron
Administrator
Member Rara Avis
since 1999-05-19
Posts 8669Michigan, US |
The main site came by its moniker, Ed, in part because it's quite a bit busier than the forums (over 100K visitors yesterday alone), but mostly because, well, it was created first. It was started almost a year before the forums were. A lot of the readers we get in here (as opposed to the writers who join and participate) are directed here from the main site. As for breaking into our showcase site, 100-Poems.com, your logic sounds good but I think it has a flaw you will readily see when we compare a category at the main site, say Love Poems, to one of our forums here, say Open #36. Which do you think is more likely to be read and attract comments: a new thread on page one of Open, or a poem posted last month and sitting way back on page 25? The individual poems at the main site are listed, within each category, by their original date of submission. Unlike a poem here, they can't even be bumped. Just as in our forums, it's only human nature for the main site visitors to start on page one in a category and work their ways backwards. Only a relative handful (which is still a big number at these traffic volumes) ever make it back to one of MY poems posted back in 1998. I'll grant that the early poems have a huge lead, but that's a problem not because they were early but rather, I think, because they've been alone far too long. Had new poetry been added regularly, as we do in the forums, those early poems would almost certainly have fallen out of the top 100 long ago. There is, however, a corresponding offset to that. We didn't always get two to three million visitors a month, and a poem added to the top of a category today is going to very quickly get more reads than a poem at the bottom of the category got over its whole six year tenure. The older poems have a head start, but once that lead begins to evaporate they will never have a chance to regain it. In that sense, I think they have a disadvantage much greater than their advantage, though I'll also admit that remains to be seen. When new submissions open at the main site, I fully expect to see yet another dramatic increase in traffic. It becomes a bit viral as a newly published author sends ten or twenty friends to see their new poem (and vote for it!), and if only two or three of those email the poem to their friends, which then come to visit the site, yada yada yada. We already send tens of thousands of emails and ecards every month, and every one of those is essentially an invitation. Were I to post a new poem on the main site tomorrow, it would get a truly tremendous amount of exposure. I think a really good poem, one that connected strongly with our readership (most of whom know very little about the craft), could possibly find its way onto a Top 100 list in a matter of weeks. Unfortunately, I probably won't be posting a new poem on the main site tomorrow. Some small part of the success at the main site is due to an almost anal attention to detail. I wrote many of the early descriptions, have written almost all of the one- or two-line teasers, have spell checked every poem, edited grammar and punctuation when it was clear the writer couldn't, and generally tried to perform the same duties one might expect from a magazine or book editor. I have read and edited as necessary nearly 100K comments, just as I'll soon do to the new 15K, not for spelling or grammar, but just to insure there's no profanity or endangering personal information. Even already posted, done and finished, material often comes back for yet more attention. I just got off the phone with a Resident Poet who was recently promoted to a very prominent position and concerned that a Google search for his name reveals a bit more of his life than he wants, thanks to a single poem he published five years ago. Tonight, I'll be updating half a dozen pages to reflect his new pen name. I'm certainly not complaining, because it's all very much a labor of love -- but I'm not always sure if the emphasis should be on "love" or on "labor." Just as I've been trying to better automate the forums and make them less dependent on me, I've been trying to do much the same for the main site. I have several thousand poems already edited, formatted and ready to go (the ones Marge mentioned), but want to get the comments up-to-date first. I have software in place to help automate new submissions, but want to get the existing backlog of already edited poems cleared first. I even have a new web server, with a new subdomain, to help offload the expected increase in traffic, because I know our existing servers can't handle more. The pieces are there, but like a jigsaw puzzle, I need to put them in their proper places and in the right order. I know it's very difficult, sometimes, to see progress being made, and that's true even from my vantage point. I often feel that I take two steps forward, only to slide three back, and every time one thing is finally finished a changing world demands that five more be added to the list. But things that happen slowly nonetheless DO happen, and sooner or later, we'll get there. It may not be the destination we envisioned, and it will never be a final destination, but with any luck at all it'll still be something recognizable as a milestone. Did I mention that our Admins have already kicked the tires on a very early, very unfinished version of our new software for the forums? |
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Ratleader
since 2003-01-23
Posts 7026Visiting Earth on a Guest Pass |
Au contraire! I, for one, am astounded by the progress I see -- this looks mighty good to me! ~~(¸¸¸¸ºº> ~~(¸¸¸¸ºº> ~~(¸¸ ¸¸ºº> ~~~(¸¸ER¸¸ºº> |
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A Romantic Heart Member Ascendant
since 1999-09-03
Posts 5496Forever In Your Heart |
Ed, my real name is Millette Addison(In reference to your question of not knowing some of the names of poets on the front page of PIP)I hope that fills you in a little..and I am so proud to know that several of my poems are in the top 100. And the greatest thing, I didn't send anyone to come and vote for me, it just happened, makes me feel like a real poet, the people judged my heart and liked it! Thanks Ron! "Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take - but by the moments that take our breath away." |
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Munda Member Elite
since 1999-10-08
Posts 3544The Hague, The Netherlands |
Ron, it looks absolutely fabulous!  |
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