I'm Julian March, the Executive Producer of Sky News Online.  I'm on a "burn" tonight.  That's one of those extraordinarily long shifts like on Election night.

So we unveiled the new-look site tonight.  We've been planning this for months.  Usually we're a team of about a dozen journalists, but dozens more have been involved in this project from the technical & design side.

You'll see a new look Home Page, in which we can better showcase breaking news stories.  Breaking news is after all our raison d'etre - we aim to be first for breaking news, on TV & online.  We've hugely improved our presentation of video, with a new look Video Section.  Video is what we can do better than any newspaper sites, and we think it's the big growth area in online news. We've made it easier to find more video.  We've done the same thing with our Picture Galleries.  They say a picture tells a thousand words, well that's definitely true of our latest gallery of the Virginia Killer.

We've revamped the article pages too.  You can watch the video for the story without leaving the page, and the related links are far easier to find.  My team will tell you - I keep on banging on about the "User Journey", making it as easy as possible for you to find something else interesting to look at once you've finished your current page.

There are also plenty more blogs, including this one, the Editor's blog, your hotline to my in-tray!, The Front Line, for our Correspondents & crews on the road, Eurovision, Greg Milam's take from Brussels, and Your Stories, where we want you to tell us about stories we should cover or share your experiences on the stories we're doing.

You can also take a scoot round the site in our graphic Tour.  We'll be doing more of this kind of stuff in the days and weeks to come.

In fact this is only the beginning.  There are plenty more innovations on their way, which you'll see later in the year.

In the meantime, thank you for coming to the site.  We hope you'll agree the re-skin is an improvement, and if you have any questions or comments why don't you post them here.  I'll try and answer some of them today, so keep checking back!

Answers:

Where is Boulton's Blog? - Hi Peter, it's only gone temporarily. We've been working really hard to "re-skin" all the blogs in the new design, and the guys are still working on it.  Don't worry - it's definitely coming back, we hope later today. I'll get it in the ear from my opposite number in the Westminster bureau if not! The same applies to "Have Your Say", Martin Brunt's "Life of Crime" and "Eyewitness", the new name for the Insider's Blog.   They'll all be back soon.

Where's the Link to Lunchtime and Live at Five? Thanks for getting in touch Nicky - The Lunchtime Live page isn't ready yet, so we wanted to keep it off the site until it was finished.  Again, bear with us, it's on it's way!  The Lunchtime Live team have to rebuilt the page with all those great interviews which Kay has done on the show.  As for the Live at Five link - I have to say I don't remember having a Live at Five link.  Are you thinking of the Have Your Say blog, which was the old Live at Five blog?  IF that's what you're thinking of, then don't worry it's on its way!

Too bright and garish? Our design team has been working on the redesign for a few months now.  We're following the lead from the TV look, but all the time we have remembered that TV and the web are very different media.  We felt the black text on a white background was by far and away the most easy to read way to present text.  We ran the designs past focus groups of people who both loved Sky News online and hated it; and both lovers & haters told us it was an improvement.  We even have a guy who specialises in what's called User Experience - and he would rein (not reign, sorry) us in if he thought we were being too garish.

Error messages on loading?: Yes Phil, we're aware of them.  They're intermittent, so if you click refresh you should get your page.  I'll explain why it's happening.  The site publishes on 4 servers, and when you click to see a page you could see any one of those four servers.  The problem is that one of them is a bit old, and it's slower to update than the others.  It's part of the process of bringing the site back up again once we took it down overnight.  The technical guys are flat out on the case.

Where's the clock gone?: Gone.  We took it away because all we were doing was taking the system time off your PC clock,  so the clock on the website matched the clock on your PC, even if it wasn't telling the right time.

Latest at 10:17am : Just had a call from the senior technical guy - he says that his team's testing suggests the site's working a lot quicker now. That's what we are finding in our office.  Let me know how it is for you.  Sorry, I know it's frustrating, but who ever said a re-launch would be smooth as silk?

Screen Resolution: Thanks for your comments Will.  Yes you're right about screen res. 70% of our users have a 1024 resolution screen, but all the time screens are getting bigger.  Sites are growing to fill that space too.  You can already see that our video is in 16:9 and in the coming months expect to see us expanding outwards!

Blog Design:  Mark and others have pointed out the issues with the blog design.  We've clocked them too - it's very annoying that there's no clear division between comments.  The designers are working to fix that today, so we should see some improvements pretty quickly.

RSS Reader on the Blogs: Hi Katie, good to hear from you!  We'll investigate that - it's important for you guys to see when we've updated the blogs!.

15:54 Update: Well I've been at work for nearly 14 hours now (the burn, remember?) and it would appear we escaped with minor cuts and bruises.   We did have a few problems which meant you got all those error messages.  I'm told the caches weren't configured to handle the "carousels" for video and pictures properly.  All solved now, so we're hoping for a less torrid time!  Do let me know if you're still getting problems.

18:26 Update: Ok, time to go home.  It's been a real roller-coaster, but in my experience, relaunches always are! It doesn't matter whether it's online or on TV.  I'll be back tomorrow so let's talk more then! Ciao for now.

Comments

[Jose Franca, London 20 Apr 2007 09:42:01]

Glad to see you listened to some of our comments from yesterday and made it a bit better - now I can read it without getting a head ache. Well done!

[Jacqueline Milburn, Rossendale, Lancs 20 Apr 2007 08:03:12]

Hi Julian

I think it is 'rein it in', not 'reign it in'.

Sorry to be a pedant, but why have a great looking site when the spelling is wrong...

[Emma Dublin 20 Apr 2007 07:49:44]

Bring back the old site, this new site is black and white BORING.....put some colour back into the site,
I didn't think you needed to change the old site,

[Natalie, Japan 20 Apr 2007 03:59:47]

Thank you for the easier access to the videos. Actually before-hand my work PC would not watch them at all, so thank you loads!
My one problem is that the colours are a bit stark. I really liked the blue because it symbolised "Sky" for me. Just takes some getting used to I suppose

[David Phillips France 19 Apr 2007 21:42:30]

Nice job ! keep up the good work

[Vipul - Mtwara 19 Apr 2007 20:41:27]

Great Pages & Layouts. Yes, will take time to get used to the new look.The videos are extremely slow even on 256/128 V-Sat, would that be because of high traffic on the new web site?

Vipul

[Liz Jordan, Northern Ireland 19 Apr 2007 20:20:58]

Fantastic!

[Manchester 19 Apr 2007 17:57:54]

I accessed your new web page as you were explaining the New look on Sky News.
Congratulations! wonderful and easy to access.

Well done

[Maurice - Northumberland 19 Apr 2007 17:56:12]

Oh dear, too complicated for you is it Gary Elsby?
Adam's blog has simply moved a little bit, it never disappeared!
Note to Sky:-
you will have to accommodate the mediocre such as Gary there are still some around, unfortunately.

[Joshua 19 Apr 2007 17:39:40]

Great new site! Its so much better than the old one, though the ticker at the top was something that I liked on the old site.
Your team should tell the TV Graphics team to have a rethink - this site keeps with the theme but shows everything clearer, on Sky News TV all the graphics are chunky. RED is used for Breaking News away from the ticker, please tell them it should be yellow like the ticker for Breaking news.

[Dan, London 19 Apr 2007 17:31:32]

Not enjoying this new look. Its too cheap looking and confusing. Bring back the old look you didnt need to change it. It was good as it was.

[IAN newbury berkshire 19 Apr 2007 17:05:21]

i know this has nothing to do with this but i meet emma crospy last night at a garage that i work and can i just say she was very nice and polite i hope i serve her again

[Gary Elsby stoke 19 Apr 2007 16:51:57]

Is this a right wing plot by william hague and the huskie lovers to remove adam from the air?

I thought as much!

Just remember one thing:

WE WILL NEVER SURRENDER!!!

Bring back Adam Boulton's blog so we can even up the score with the establishment!

The Tories don't like his blog (neither do labour,as it happens).

It does give the little guy a big say though.

Don't worry Adam, we'll come to get you if they (they know who they are)won't bring you back and then they'll be sorry.

ps. They can keep Jon Craig.

Gary

[Eric, Aberdeen 19 Apr 2007 16:16:14]

What a mess. I hope you didn't pay the I.T. monkeys too much to develope this garish site. It has all the subtlety of a half brick is as slow as a tax rebate. The old site did exactly what every one wanted and was as fast as I needed.

[Kevin Mulrennan 19 Apr 2007 15:00:00]

I don't like the way you have to scroll to the right to click on various links.

I preferred it when it filled the whole screen neatly.

I'll reserve judgment on the rest till I've tried it!

[Harvey Salmons - Spain 19 Apr 2007 14:40:30]

Not for the better - very messy - too much moving about.
Time someone learnt to spell, or sack the proof reader! I'm going back to the BBC

[One of the People 19 Apr 2007 14:33:20]

Do you mean "reporting the news" instead of "creating the news".

Surely SKY is an objective news reporter and doesn't create or make up news.

[tony 19 Apr 2007 14:22:44]

i like the new look, some websites can sometimes get a stale look, but this site looks ok, good navigation, and colour scheme. doesnt seem to be working 100% yet, but in time im sure it will be as good if not better than the old one.

[Terry 19 Apr 2007 14:13:29]

Not so sure on the design. Its very black and white which is familliar to the early websites.

Red is your colour and you should use it, not over the top but to structure the site. Make titles bold and clear, the links are very hard to navigate & with a 1024x768 resolution they scroll off the page. It would be better to use drop down menus.

Also it would be awesome to have a page that can truly be made as a homepage, thatd bring more people your way. The clock may have only copied the system time but it was clear and in your face. How about offering the ability to have local news based upon your location, weather reports and also the scrolling banner?

Everything these days is sterile, just becasue your the news doesn't mean you can't have a colourful and interesting site!

[Ian, Birmingham 19 Apr 2007 14:10:56]

I can't say I like the new look - I got so used to the old one. It was much easier to navigate.
The new look is too plain....I want coloured borders!!

[Justin, Buckinghamshire 19 Apr 2007 13:57:43]

Is it change for change sake? This now looks like the BBC news website. The main reason I preferred your website is the clarity and ease of use, and I didn’t even have Sky News tv! (I do now through Freeview). No doubt I’ll get used to it and grow to like it.

[Mark Evans 19 Apr 2007 13:41:59]

Glad to see the improvements to this page much easier to see and read now - still one problem tho - whats wrong with your blog clock? I didnt write my post at 2.43AM more like 10.43am

[Sarah.. Fareham, Hants 19 Apr 2007 13:28:16]

Great design on site.. when i can get on.. log sky news on when i get to work and log off when i leave everyday and i do like the new layout but good lord it's slow loading the pages.. i'm sure it's just a blip and will be fixed but have given up a couple of times and dare i say it logged onto the bbc site instead as the pages have loaded quicker.. (and the bbc site is not one i want to use).!!

[swev 19 Apr 2007 13:01:47]

looks well at first but you still have a lot of work ahead of you before its up to scratch. I hope the video is good as the BBC video sucks.Infact the BBC suck.
unlike CNN pipeline.

[Scott from Manchester 19 Apr 2007 12:59:56]

Hi I don't think thins new look is so good I mean it looks ok just the old 1 loaded fine this 1 I cant read the full stories or check pictures and videos, each time I click a link it says error or doesn't load