Release 3 (R3) in Beta

Hi folks -- I just wanted to take the opportunity to expand on some of the items that Tech Manager John and Product Manager Susan have said in their blogs about upcoming R3 features.

These features are in beta testing right now, and should hopefully go live by next week.

Now, if you want to see the beta, it's real easy: Just put beta. in front of your blog address -- for example, my blog's address is http://journals.aol.com/journalseditor/magicsmoke/ -- the beta version is at http://beta.journals.aol.com/journalseditor/magicsmoke/.

When
you do this, the primary difference you'll see is a new footer at the
bottom of all your entries (except without the seasonally relevant and
colorful red and green boxes):

The stuff in green -- "Notify AOL" and "Blog about this entry" -- are things that we'll be getting with R3 later this month.

The stuff in red
is stuff that is going to stay in beta until a later release (possibly
January, maybe later): Online presence and "Incoming Links."

* "Notify AOL"
is pretty straightforward -- it does the same thing as the "Notify AOL"
link at the top of your Journal, though it's now on each entry, so you
can flag specific entries.

It's also a new addition to AIM Blogs
-- previously, there wasn't a Notify button to report problematic
blogs; now there will be.

To those of you concerned that there will be a frenzy of entry-flagging, we've worked with the enforcement team to make sure they use a light touch before touching anyone's blog (and yes, this was a hard-learned lesson from a previous incident where we screwed up).

* "Blog about this entry" is also pretty straightforward. If you're reading someone else's AOL Journal, and you want to write an entry in your Journal about it (and of course, you do want to hyperlink to it because you're a polite blogger, as mentioned in my prior post, How to Get More Readers), just click the link, and it will pop open a window with the link and subject prepopulated, which you can then edit:

You'll also note that you get a pulldown menu that will let you choose the Journal you want to blog to -- or, you can create a new Journal by clicking "New Journal."

"Blog
This" is a fairly basic feature that you see on a lot of blog platforms
-- it's meant to make it easier to increase cross-communication among
bloggers.

It would be even more useful if there was a universal standard that worked across all blog platforms -- the idea has been tossed around the blogosphere, but I don't know where it stands.

(Note
that it doesn't quite work for everyone at the entry level right now,
though it does work from the main pages. This will be fixed before it
launches.)

* Buddy List Rostering is the last major feature we'll see in R3 (it's not on the new footer). This is pretty cool; when it goes live, you'll have a new choice when it comes to managing who can and can't read your Private Journal.

If you prefer, you can keep manually adding or removing readers, just like before. However, you'll also have a new choice: Just by checking a box,
you can make it so that the people on your Buddy List (and only the
people on your Buddy List) can read your Private Journal. Then, as you
update your Buddy List, your Private Journal roster will keep up
automatically.

For some of you, this will be really neat; for others, this is really horrifying.
But have no fear -- in a future release (we don't have a date yet),
you'll be able to pick a specific group from your Buddy List, so if you
want your "Friends" Buddy List group to be able to read your blog, but
not your "Enemies" group, you'll be able to do that.

To see it in action, go to your private beta Journal and click the blue Edit Journal button. Then, in the "Manage Your Journal Settings" section, click "Add readers":

(Oh, and ignore that other item with "BETA" next to it for now.)

Then, click the check box next to "Allow everyone on my Buddy List to read my Journal":

Remember,
you can still manage your roster the old way, so if you want to wait
until you can add a specific Buddy List group instead of your whole
Buddy List, that's cool.

Okay, so those are the features that
we'll see with R3. There's some other stuff, but it's infrastructure
stuff or otherwise not visible (like the Partner Ping we
mentioned, which will make it easier for blog search engines to find
your entries, which will then show up in search results and thus be
seen by more people who will comment on what a great blog you have and
how you're a great person overall).

 The next items will stay in beta until at least January, possibly later.

* Incoming Links is another one of those pretty straightforward things. It's a link to a blog search engine that's prepopulated with the URL for that specific entry, and it acts like a blog entry vanity search,
to show you what other blogs are pointing to your entry. So, if you
want to see who's pointing to your entry, you don't have to cut and
paste into a blog search engine -- all you'll have to do is click the
link.

* Last, but not least is Online Presence.

Now before I say anything else, I just want to borrow a page from the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and say:

DON'T PANIC.

The presence widget basically takes the AIM Presence functionality and puts it on Journals, so people can see if you're online or not by a little icon next to your Screen Name.

This
will include when your Screen Name shows up in the footer of your
entries, and (more controversially) when you leave a comment, even on
someone else's Journal.

Now, again -- please don't panic. It's only on for the test, and I am nearly 100% sure the presence indicator will be turned off by default whenever it rolls out to production (which means you'll have to turn it on manually if you want it to work).

Also
keep in mind that it's the same basic functionality someone would see
if they clicked on your screen name now in a Journals comment you've
left (it pulls up your Member Directory Profile, which also shows your online status, subject to your Privacy Settings)
or if the they cut and paste your screen name into an IM window and
clicked the "Available?" button -- it will adhere to the same privacy settings you've set.



I understand that having the presence visible one level higher makes
many people uncomfortable, so we are taking this into account.

If you want to opt out of the test, which again is only on the beta site, Susan has posted easy instructions on how to do this.

That's it for right now.  We will keep you posted as we get more details about the R3 rollout date.

Thanks -- Joe