One of the things about running a site like The Spearhead is that you have to learn as you go. It’s a bit like bushwhacking in uncharted territory. So, I’ve been struggling for a while to figure out how to properly manage the site. The Spearhead is a bit tricky, because it’s become both a community and a magazine, and finally I’ve come to accept that it ought to stay that way. Unfortunately, the problem with this is that there isn’t much software out there that makes it easy to manage this without making things too complicated for one person to handle.
However, I’ve finally come across some software that I think will do the trick. I’ll break down the plan as I currently expect to implement it. Keep in mind that there will certainly be changes to the plan as bugs and issues come up, but here’s a (very) rough outline:
The site will become a membership site with two different levels of membership, including supporters and subscribers. Most of the content will remain open to all, but certain things, such as long features and some downloads, will only be available to subscribers and supporters. Only members will be able to vote on comments, but any reader can comment as before. For casual readers, it will make little difference, although some of the content – perhaps a weekly feature – will not be available.
To implement membership, I’m going to purge subscribers from the current list, but first I’ll give them an opportunity to stay on as members if they want. Perhaps a couple weeks’ warning will suffice.
One thing I’d like to do would be to give supporters a vote concerning the site. I think they should have some say as far as what direction they’d like me to take The Spearhead. To do this, I may enable a comment system whereby they can make comments that are only visible to the admin (and other supporters if I can figure out how to do that). There will be a lot of new features, and I’ll have to do some testing to make it work.
I should say that I plan on implementing this mainly for supporters, who have kept the site up for the past two and a half years — without them I never would have been able to put so much work into The Spearhead. Hopefully, it will make my job a bit easier as well, but there’s no guarantee there. In any event, the site has become too important to neglect, so I want to maintain its health for some time to come.
So, I’m going to be doing some testing and you may notice a few bugs over the next few days as I integrate the software. Before I finally flip the switch, I’ll give readers ample notice. Nobody has to become a member, and I don’t expect everybody to sign up immediately, but membership will offer something extra to those who are already supporters, so I’d urge those who already contribute to the site to sign up. I value readers, and it will be great to finally have the opportunity to offer additional features to those who have invested in the site without depriving those who simply enjoy the content from time to time of anything of consequence.
In the meanwhile, I’m going to be in the engine room tinkering around with the new software. Hopefully, I can pull it off without a hitch.
