New features - feedback please!

There were 3 significant, visible changes to the site today (and many, many others under the hood) - we'd love to know what you think.

1) New Product Pages

This redesign is in response to some observations we made about how people use the site when they come in via Google and other search engines, trying to make sure the information they're looking for is maximally accessible. As an example, see the Tesla Roadster, or any other product in the system

2) Blog Integration

We have long looked for ways to work symbiotically with other sites that we think provide great, relevant content and we took a step in that direction today. You should start seeing Related Blog content on most product pages and other pages throughout the site, and you can even follow some of your favorite blogs RSS feeds (and tag the posts) from right in Green Home:

http://greenhome.huddler.com/blog

Several sites have started linking over to Green Home in a similar fashion because of the great, informational content we create together here, so thanks all Huddlers! As an example, see the link mid-post here:

http://gas2.org/2008/11/04/china-company-changan-and-electrovaya-to-launch-electric-cars-in-canada-by-end-of-year/

What other blogs/sites would you like to see featured?

3) New badges

You'll see both "A-Team" and "In the Industry" badges on specific users throughout the site, e.g. http://greenhome.huddler.com/forum/thread/795/yonaturals-vending-machines

the In the Industry badges are meant to enable manufacturers and vendors to participate on the site with us, but also call themselves out as such. That way we can know that they're knowledgeable, but also might be a bit partial to their products.

What do you think?

New product pages - nice.  I like the thumbnail photos and the reviews being on the main page.

Blogs - awesome.  You should add EcoGeek.

A-Team - sweet!  I pity the fool!

I noticed the changes as I was browsing the site today and I must say I like them! The product pages are great and the links to blogs even better. If I think of something else I will let you know!

I noticed that on reviews you can now click the 'yes' button if they're helpful instead of the thumbs-up.  It might be nice to also have a 'no' button, because some reviews (i.e. a couple on the EVD) are just flat-out bad/wrong.  Then it would be nice if the average star rating took those 'yes'/'no' helpful ratings into account (i.e. more 'yes'/fewer 'no' gets more weight than an unhelpful review).

I like the idea of badges to differentiate different members. I have to admit that I love all the lovely Ajax features this board uses. Its very sleek and fast!

Oh, you should also add a 'blogs' tab up at the top!

Thanks for all the compliments, much appreciated.

I especially appreciate the fact that you get the A-Team reference.  Please give Stins the appropriate amount of crap...she had no clue what the A-Team was!  We had to show her the show's intro on YouTube (and I don't think she even appreciated it)!

EcoGeek runs on a different blog platform, so our integration doesn't work as is.  We'll look into adding him in the future though.  Hopefully this is a great start.

I think devoting a tab to 'Blogs' would be a bit much (at least right now).  We're just trying to provide additional, relevant resources for people, but it's not really a core feature of the site.  It probably does need some additional navigational paths to it though.  Any ideas for other places you'd like to see links to that content?

Hmm I dunno.  I always either use the tabs at the top or the 'recent' stuff at the bottom of the page.  Not sure where else a blogs link could go.

Okay, this is totally getting off track of the whole feedback discussion...but come on!  I guess I'm just too young to be in the know.  Anyway, according to Wikipedia, the show ran from 1983 to 1986.

In any case, for those of you who are also unfamiliar with the whole A-Team reference...here's the show's intro.

Kids these days.  *shakes head*

Yeah, I remember watching this when I was little! I loved Mr T!

The general issue of low quality reviews is definitely on our radar.

To help deemphasize the lower-quality reviews, the two highest rated reviews will be sorted to the top of the page starting with the next site update.

Review ratings are definitely still a work in progress.  Reviews that meet certain criteria are excluded from the average product rating entirely; however those criteria need some tweaking.