Short blog this week guys but I think an important one.
Obviously social networking has become a huge part of webcomics. Most of us have Twitter accounts. Many or us are on Facebook (I have been resisting but when I get some time I'm probably going to take the plunge); The Webcomics List, Stumbler, Tumbler, Top Web Comics, I could go on and on.
And obviously it's important to our websites to have these social networking tools all lined up and ready for our users to get at. Why it's even a category for the reviews Dragon does for us here on the site.
But lately I've had a bit of a beef with the placement of the SNT (I'm calling Social Networking Tools this from now on and you'll like it!) on the web page.
Recently two webcomics I occasionally frequent started using a tool called
Wibiya. Go ahead... check it out.
Back?
Ok. Here's my problem with this thing.
My feelings about comic presentation on the web page are pretty strong. The comic should be front and center with as much of the comic itself above the fold as possible (excepting the header, which is kind of needed so people know where they are). A splash page is obviously a necessity for comics with certain content but for the most part this is a rule to live by. Your comic is king. Everything else is in support of the comic.
Both of the aforementioned sites using Wibiya had alerts turned on. This created pop up alert messages telling me what was in the store for sale or the next convention the creator would be attending or... I don't care. The point is these pop ups blocked part of the comic. You know... the reason I came to the site in the first place?
One of the sites had 2 pop ups. One blocked part of the comic and the other blocked part of the navigation beneath it. I had to close them both to see what I came there to see and do what I came there to do. Want to guess how much I'm looking forward to my next visit?
What's really maddening is that both of these sites still had their regular SNT links on their page. Presumably in case people have Java or Flash or whatever Wibiya is using blocked.
And that really made me think. What the hell is the point then? And Wibiya isn't the only program like this. Skysa, Meebo, Conduit, Gigya and probably a bunch of others are performing the same tasks. I really don't get the purpose of this tool. Yes it looks nice but it blocks part of my page. Even when it is fully collapsed (and you can shut off the alerts... I complained about it to one of the two sites and he turned off the pop ups... but at first replied... "it's only blocking a little bit of the comic!") it is always going to block part of my page.
And what's more, I have all these tools built into my website. If Wibiya did something that I couldn't do on my web page I would ask Chadm1n to change my web page so I could do that thing. But it seems like the primary function of Wibiya and sites like it are to facilitate the use of SNT and alerting readers to what's going on at the site.
My SNT's are built into the site and my blog is there for me to communicate with my readers (not to mention the forum). So I just don't get its value. Yet I'm seeing this tool pop up on site after site and a lot of Webcomics people are really singing its praises. So I put it to you Webcomics Community.
What do you think of Wibiya and other SNT tool bars and such? Wave of the future or fad for people who crave more site functionality than their coding skills can handle?