Since USAToday’s site redesign (which I thought was a great idea) I’ve visited their site weekly, and occasionally participate in the comments.

Anyhow, my visits are entirely because of the comments. I get a kick out of seeing totally mainstream news articles followed by off the wall, partisan bickering over whether Bush or the Democratic congress screwed everything up. There’s a huge disconnect between what readers really believe and what is reported. I find this entertaining.

But just me as a user is meaningless when it comes to larger trends, and TechCrunch wonders, based on traffic data, if the whole USAToday redesign isn’t working. (Update: USAToday has different, more positive traffic data)

I feel that a newspaper’s move towards the social buzzwords of Web 2.0 is a great idea (and could possibly ressurect a fading newspaper) - but in the case of USAToday the execution leaves much to be desired.

First, one reason why I comment on articles is to hopefully get the ear of the reporters and editors that create the paper. But I haven’t seen either actively responding to comments or answering the questions people have.

Mathew Ingram notes:

You can’t just set up shop and expect people to suddenly show up and start contributing and interacting. There needs to be real interaction from the newspaper side as well, and encouragement and moderation and so on. It’s like gardening, not construction.

And Tish Greer:

People now expect folks involved with a project that incorporates social networking to be involved with the community - not just be traffic cops monitoring for nasties. That means leaving comments, answering emails, moderating boards and communicating.

Second, for whatever reason, the site seems bogged down. I’ve had it crash Safari, and even in Firefox pages take an inordinate amount of time for it to load - I notice hangs when it tries to load the green number of comments statistics next to each article.

CNN recently underwent a very slick, modern design that presents news in a clean, uncluttered manner. Here’s an excellent comparison of the two by Andy Rutledge, highlighting some things amiss with USAToday’s redesign. He describes CNN’s look as “quiet structure.”

But despite my complaints, I really hope USAToday sticks with this social news experiment. Truth be told, I pretty much only visit USAToday to read the hilarious comments beneath the articles. If they revert back to a traditional one-way conversation newspaper website, I’ll likely stop visiting. And it probably goes without saying - I’m not reading the print edition, either.

But I don’t think USAToday will retreat. Here’s a good quote from employee Patrick Cooper who writes the USAToday Community Center (slogan: “connecting readers to reporting”) regarding a particularly discussion-spurring article regarding rudeness on the Internet (that generated 228 comments):

But today’s conversation shows why we come to the community at all. While the story shows publishers coping with the challenges, the comments show dozens of readers thinking hard on the same issues and speaking up about what they see. Looking across the site, today alone, thousands of readers are joining them on different topics, meeting up with USA TODAY journalists at different points in the crowd. We’re all pouring ourselves a glass, if you will, because the party may be worth it.

That sounds like full steam ahead to me, with a little passion thrown in. Perhaps USAToday just needs more Patrick Coopers.

Additional Reading: Reflections of a Newsosaur, HipMojo.com

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