Wow. That Was a Lot Harder Than It Looked.
SMOKE SIGNALS MAGAZINE - September- October 2010

Every generation probably says the same thing to the next: "Wow, things were a lot better in the good old days." We wouldn't say that it's really true that everything used to be easier. It just often seems that way.

For example, ten years ago, it was easy to redesign a website. You took out your trusty WYSIWYG editor, typed for a little while, uploaded the page - and voila - a new look! As you've all been able to witness first-hand, however, that's not quite the way it's worked with the Smoke Signals Community website.

Without boring you with the recent history, which you've also witnessed - we'll just say that the initial re-design of the site didn't work as well as we had hoped it would. And that led us to decide on the second re-design, which took place over the summer. Central to this version of the site was one major realization: for the last sixteen years, people have come to Smoke Signals for news/stories/articles - and for our messageboards. The site we unveiled in April lost sight of that fact. With the new changes, we think we've moved back toward our real roots - as well as moved into the future with functionality.

We hope that this new Smoke Signals Community site will be a lot more user friendly for all - and that people will bear with us as we fix the final few bugs in this design. For example, not everything in the messageboards works quite properly yet - because we're using a beta version of the latest messageboard software. The final release should come any day, which will fix the remaining bugs there. We're also still learning how to work everything, which means that our first free issue of Smoke Signals Magazine (of which this article is a part) may look a little disjointed - but we hope to have all of those little bugs worked out quickly as well.

We're also very aware that our forums, long a "most visit" destination, have been left by the wayside for the last few months while all this work was being done. Now that registration is no longer required to post - we hope you'll all stop by and say hello after you read this month's issue of Smoke Signals.

One reminder, and one piece of news. The reminder: many of the "Facebook" type of features are still here on the Smoke Signals Community site - they're just not on the front page any longer. If you log in and look to your left, you can access them on the "User Menu" - and send messages, make friends, and share photos and videos.

The news: this fall, Smoke Signals will be unveiling a brand new sister site, which we think will be a very cool new addition to the smoking fetish world. We're excited about it, and hope you'll find that it's worth our excitement.

Enjoy the redesigned site and the September-October issue!

After a few months of experimentation with the new Smoke Signals Community, and with some feedback from you, we realized that some changes would be necessary..

Those changes have now been made.

We understand that the messageboards, which for more than a decade had been the centerpiece of our site, were hard to find and hard to use.

They are now on the front page of the site - and perhaps more importantly, no longer require site registration. They are open to everyone, members and visitors.

We also understand that people have come to depend on us for news and updates from the Smoke Signals family of sites as well as the smoking fetish world at large. For that reason, we've made two other major changes.

You're already aware of one, because you're reading it. The latest news and opinion from the Smoke Signals editor/publisher's desk will always be featured in this spot on the site - and the very latest from our Smoking Fetish Blog will always be featured "to our right."

The other should also be pretty obvious when you check out the rest of the site. We have moved the online Smoke Signals Magazine to the Smoke Signals Community site. For the first time since we began the magazine in 1994, it will be available to everyone, without a fee. Articles from the latest issues will be highlighted on the front page; articles from the entire magazine can be accessed from the "Table of Contents" to your left.

Finally, the areas of the Smoke Signals Community that let you make friends and share messages, photos and video are still here. They're all available from the "Table of Contents" and the "User Menu" and we hope you'll use them.

Thoughts? Opinions? Feedback? Please, let us know.

And thanks for your patience :)