Updates and big changes for Libr8

[Project Libr8 http://www.libr8.org]

Hello,

Now that some things in my life have changed that make it a bit more feasible, it's time to get on the ball again with developing Libr8.  I've decided not to axe the project, and instead to work on focusing it and giving it a more pronounced direction than it's had in the past so it won't be so easy to get bogged down in the future.  This will mean axing some parts of it, though.

On the chopping block:

- The blog.  Neither Lauren nor I have ever been good about updating it, and it really hasn't served any significant purpose.  It's mostly been a distraction, although there may be some material on there that can be expanded into articles.

- The store.  I've had so many issues with it and so few orders, it's just not worth it.

- The news feed.  There's not really any good reason to keep it.

- The about page.  The stuff on there will be transferred to the index page to replace the news feed, eliminating the need for a separate page.

- The forum.  It's been utterly inactive and I don't really have the spare time/energy to rebuild and administrate it.

- The Spanish pages and links thereto.  I'd still like to get the site translated, but until we do there's no good reason to keep the placeholders up.

Basically, I'll be paring it down to the essentials, centered around the media gallery and the library, and focusing on getting more stuff up in those places.  Libr8 is an informational site dealing primarily in evergreen stuff, and I'm finally realizing that the web2.0 model just doesn't work well with that sort of site.  The mailing list will stay up, and I'll keep posting significant updates on facebook, to keep interested people in the loop.

Additionally, especially with some of the stuff I'm going to axe, the project has long been hovering in a sort of netherspace between being aimed at educating people new to anarchism and commenting on the anarchist movement itself.  I've decided the site and this format work far better at the first aim, so from this point forward that will be the primary and stated focus of the project.

After these changes are finished, my next priority will be finally finishing the update to the Anarchist-to-English Dictionary that I started however many months ago, and we'll go from there.

Solidarity,

Ryan