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New version of Razakius.com

Ok, so for the last few weeks I have been diligently at work designing and coding the next version of my website. I didn’t previously have any desire to update the site, I had designed the current one with the idea that it would be in use for a few years. But then I started to play with roxer.com, which is a great site if anyone wants to try it. The design I came up with over there started making me think about the design that I have here. While I overall like the design here, I never was in love with it and it doesn’t work well in many parts of it. So I started putting the design I had in roxer into HTML and CSS and started breathing life into my new site.

Without further adieu:

Razakius version 3.0

Here is an image of my next website design that I have come up with. It is very rough around the edges but should give you an idea of the changes I have in mind. In particular, believe none of the text, the sidebar in particular was quickly put together and I have yet to really edit the style I want to give it. There are a number of things that I am aiming to do with the new site:

  • Less, but more effective advertising. I feel like the advertising on this site has kind of gotten out of control. I have way too much here. My plan on the new site is to limit myself to a small adsense ad on the sidebar on the main page and then the skyscraper on future pages. I may decide to rotate it with adgitize and I may also try giving project wonderful a whirl. But the overall advertising space should decrease. I also want to lower my reliance on the amazon ads, however, I do think they have worth in reviews and those ones are likely to stick around.
  • A more stream-lined interface. I don’t like the fact that the interface is everywhere on this site. There are some menus on top, some on the side, some on the bottom. I want most of the menus to be in one space and that’s it. And I want them to consume less room overall, and hopefully easier to use.
  • More Color. Obviously when looking at the picture this should be the first thing you pick up on. I think the greys I use in the current site are drab and want to bring some life to the table and I think I’ve done that.
  • Faster. I think this is hard for me to tell in the long run. But I think the way I’m setting this particular site up should lead to faster load times. I’m also lowering the size of the banner image in order to hopefully make it more speedy there as well. I also hope less advertising will accomplish this and well and am hoping for less plug-ins as well.
  • Completely Mine. I wanted the site to be created completely by myself. The previous site while the top was designed by me, it was largely built off of k2. I wanted to get away from it, it is a great theme but I wanted the theme to be mine and mine alone.  Something no one else would have and would be very distinctive to a new viewer.

These are some of the main points, but am sure there is more. Is there anything anybody else would like to see from the site? Feel free to drop a line. Now is the time when I am doing a re-organization of the whole thing.