Odyssey has a new website, in case you didn't notice. You're actually looking at it right now. I'm here to talk to you about my favorite new features on this website! (And, before you ask, no, Odyssey isn't paying me to promote them.)
1. The Homepage
The first place anyone sees (unless you have a direct link to an article) when they visit the website should be filled with content, right? Well, the last version didn't have that. It had a search bar in the middle and a list of articles at the bottom. That was it. With this new homepage, you can keep on scrolling for an hour and still won't have hit bottom. It also keeps the search functionality with the search icon in the upper-right hand corner.
2. I'm being followed!
You can now also follow people and ideas with this new website, something that wasn't possible before. This means that, when you're signed in via Facebook and you follow someone, you can know when they have a new article out by just going to the homepage and clicking "People" to get a list of articles that those you follow have published! Just go to an author's article or page (You know, the page you get to by clicking our names.) and click "Follow." It's the same idea for, well, "Ideas," except you go to an article and "Ideas" along the top of the page to follow ideas within the article.
3. Comments!
One of my personal favorites of the new website is the ability to comment on an article! When I first wandered onto Odyssey near the beginning of this past school year, I was surprised they didn't have some way to comment on an article. Now, through the power vested in me by Facebook Comments, I can leave my opinion! (Just please don't lose your head when you do it. That leads to bad things.) Commenting on an article allows us, as readers and authors, to continue the conversation after the last sentence and not feel like that conversation is a little one-sided.
4. Opposing articles
The above screenshots are from the exact same page. The top half is the beginning of the actual article, while the bottom half is at the very beginning of the "suggested articles" section directly after the article itself. The two articles are about the same topic, but from different perspectives. Instead of offering articles that say basically the same thing, Odyssey offered a viewpoint that I might not have considered before. It furthered my thinking on the subject instead of echoing what I had already read. [For the record, these two articles were used for the sake of example. I'm not saying whether I'm for or against Trump.]
These are my favorite features on the new website. While the new website itself is a work-in-progress (as evidenced by the word "beta" in the upper-left), these features are something that I hope stick around and evolve into something even better. This website's not too shabby for something started by two people in college two years ago. (And, for the record, happy second birthday, Odyssey!)
