Reinvention: Goals

April 26, 2006 | 6 Comments

This is the first in a series of posts documenting and exploring my online reinvention. See this post for more.

What’s gone before

I’ve decided to lay Asterisk to rest.

Getting started down the path to something new

The first thing I did was accept that I had a problem with Asterisk. I’d realized that I wasn’t putting much effort into it and my readership was taking notice. The quality of my posts was going down a bit and I was generally spending less and less time on the site.

There were various factors going into this, but the one underlying cause was simple boredom on my end. I’ve been writing less and “blogging” more. My design had grown stale to me. My CMS was a mess. No one leaves comments anymore. Etc. Etc.

After acknowledging that I needed to do something I made some lists (pros vs. cons, etc.) that helped me define the problem and some various solutions. The result — I decided to go for a complete reinvention of my personal site. From the ground up, top-down and with a blank slate. Totally new baby!

So, I’d nailed my problem and had a general idea of the solution. Now to list my goals. Below is the first cut goals (in an off-the-top of my head format) I’ve laid out for this new site.

The big list of goals

• A “baggage-free” space to express myself
• A CMS that works well for what I want it to do
• No Spam
• A portfolio for my work
• Less blogging, more writing
• Higher quality posts, even if they’re less frequent
• A place to share things I enjoy (music, books, links etc.)
• Music podcast
• Encourage discussion
• A design I can be really proud of
• A place for my links
• More of my personality
• No ads
• Less concern about traffic and pageviews
• A “snapshot” and “scrapbook” of me and all my online stuff
• Less maintenance, something easier for me to keep up with
• Better organized (categories are out of control)
• More art and photos
• Images within posts
• A place to share inspiration
• Something new and different

Three high level categories

These goals and problems can be grouped into three high level categories

• Content (I’d like to write more and blog less, show my work, etc.)
• Creative (I’m hankerin’ for a new look, etc.)
• Technical (My system isn’t working well from just about every possible angle.)

Next Steps

What I’ll do next is take these goals, refine them and expand and/or contract where necessary. I’ll split them into those three high level categories so that I can then better address as far as a solution goes. For example, I’ll put all the technical things into a group and use that to help determine what kind of CMS I’d like to use. I’ll put the creative issues into a list I’ll address via design etc. I’ll then probably whip up a quick summary of each for reference.

Then, once I know what I need to address and why, the real fun stuff starts.

I’ll be taking this a bit slow. Mainly to make sure I get it right but also because I’m really busy. I’ll keep y’all in the loop and I appriceate any feedback you’ve got to offer.

Filed under: Reinvention
Keyword Tags: web+design process goals

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