Marple Carnival Website

[admin]

Thank you everyone for your comments and suggestions in this thread, which is now unlocked.

I'm pleased to have been asked to help Marple Carnival Committee set up their web site and can advise that a new Marple Carnival site, sponsored by The Marple Website, is now on-line here:

www.marplecarnival.org.uk (note that this is a new domain but the plan is to merge old and new together).

A Facebook page has also been set up that is readily accessible from the web site itself and we now need some "Likes"!

Information about this year's carnival, royalty and attractions are still needed and will of course be added as soon as it is available. So it is still a work in progress but we feel it's ready enough to be viewed by the local community.

Criticism will be listened to, positive comments and suggestions will be most welcome  

[admin]

That's enough. As you can read on the home page of the site, the matter is being addressed.

[marveld]

Don't see anyone having ridiculed it.

Let me ridicule the orange text on a red background -

http://www.marplecarnival.co.uk/id53.html

"Our Charter - Some organizations have a formal charter; many do not. If our organization has a written charter, we'll include it here. If not, we'll use this area to discuss the reasons our club exists and what our goals are."

[Heritage]

Don't see anyone having ridiculed it.

[Miss Marple]

Well I think the website is great !  Well done to all concerned for taking the time and the effort to set one up!  If some of the people on this site put as much effort into being productive instead of constantly ridiculing the efforts of others Marple might have a fighting chance.  

[Heritage]

Sure - everyone wishes you well with the website....but it might be an idea to relaunch it in a more developed form rather than add 'bits' on. Hard to say without appearing uncharitable....but people tend not to re-visit websites which they have seen and found to be rudimentary on a promise of 'new features coming soon...' As someone else has said, Facebook is the natural way to go for this as a quick-fix, especially to appeal to young people who you need to hook into supporting the carnival. My primary-school aged children found the current website a bit lame compared to the stuff they create at school....sorry! Just trying to help....get a Facebook page going at the very least and I'm sure we'll all follow it. 

[Mr Marple]

Technology can be seen as a race track for athletes, there are hurdles but set at differing heights and the carnival website can be seen as the athlete, jumping over one hurdle and heading towards the next.

The first, current, website can be viewed as a warm up and also a type of template for the development which is underway.

The Carnival Committee are thankful to Sally Baker and her husband for setting up the first, current,  website. They can be seen going into the famous Marple History books as the ones who initiated the first site!

As said before, we are developing our site further from this point. We are adding interactive features amongst other elements.

You'll spot changes and see improvements. You will not see the improved site until its admins release it.
So watch this space for updates!

[Lisa Oldham]

There is an FB Group ( separate to the MIA page) of which Mark and I are admins but its the sheer effort of it that stops us doing it!  Jobs, life, kids, cleaning dogs!  etc  If I had the time I would however when we started it it didn't really get the activity we thought it would so we didnt really go for it.. having said that FB Groups and the way they work have been overhauled a number of times since so I may well revisit sometime

its at... and because of the change only me and mark remain! http://www.facebook.com/groups/31633194908/

twitter again takes time.. in fact more time than the rest!

[rsh]

Quite involved in web design myself and can only agree with Howard and Lisa. A Wordpress blog, a Facebook page, a Twitter account - all free and relatively easy to use, and definitely more valuable for actually getting people involved in something like this. I doubt many people will venture beyond the first page of that new site. The effort is admirable, but I can't help but feel it's probably wasted energy, wrestling with what looks like an archaic website builder.

A single page with the carnival logo, a bit about the committee, a few photos, and a link to Twitter and Facebook (where all those old photos and posters could be uploaded into albums within seconds) would be enough.

Having said that, I'm surprised The Marple Website itself doesn't post updates to either of those.

[Heritage]

I would imagine that the Marple Carnival Committee have done their very best to establish a website with the very best of intentions. What I've found in my own experience of using websites for business promotion is that a poorly-constructed product is actually counter-productive, because it puts people off on the basis that an 'amateur' site reflects 'amateur' administrative abilities and a less-than-perfect product. Of course this isn't the case with the Carnival issue, but I would say again that if any local company would give only literally an hour of its time for web design, it would probably sort everything out for them...

But the Carnival Committee will either have to be sensitively cold-called or have the idea to ask themselves, it seems.

[admin]

Maybe the owner of the marple-uk website would help!!!

I wondered how long it would be before somebody put me on the spot in this thread - I could see it would be coming.

The Marple Website has always been an keen supporter of Marple Carnival and has hosted community pages free of charge for the Carnival since 1999. I have always publishing as much information as the Carnival Committee were able to provide each year and done my best to promote what I think is a very special event in the local calendar.

Here are the current pages: www.marple-uk.com/carnival

As most people will know there are also extensive photo galleries of the Carnival on the Virtual Tour.

I was told about the new site last year but I haven't been asked for any help or advice by anyone on the CC about setting it up. I know most of the committee pretty well and if they had wanted help I would have expected them to ask. The email I received telling me about it made no suggestion that help was required:

Dear Mark,
 
I am writing to you on behalf of Marple Carnival Committee.  We would like to formally thank you for all of your work advertising the Carnival on the Marple website; it is very much appreciated.
 
I felt it was only right to let you know in advance that we will be setting up our own website soon to help promote the Carnival and to make it easier in the future for sending out application forms etc.  The other local Carnivals have started doing this and I thought we ought to get into the 21st century!) My partner has a little experience in this and has offered to help me set up the site (nothing as professional as your's I'd hasten to add - I never realised how hard it was!).
 
We would very much like to put a link to your Marple website if that's ok with you and would be delighted if you could still include the Carnival information on your site as you currently do.
 
Thank you again for all your support - I now realise just what a committment you give with the time needed to set up and run a website.
 
Kind regards,
 
Sally Baker
Marple Carnival Committee

After seeing the site I will say that I'm disappointed none of the people I know well on the committee have spoken to me about it but I don't want to go into any more detail than that here as I have no idea of the circumstances involved.

[PhilB]

Maybe the owner of the marple-uk website would help!!!

[Lisa Oldham]

Who ever put it together can carry on doing it quite easily by using word press...its blogging software ( rather than content management, which can be quite hard going sometimes for non geeks) but it does for websites where people are not that technically minded but do want to add their own content with the minimum of fuss and without bothering or paying for other people, also great when the content needs to be continually updated! 

....And then theres the obvious choice on here     though hes quite busy with life and you lot! 

[alison]

Brilliant idea and good start. Sadly I wouldn't have a clue about designing web pages, if I did I would volunteer my services, but I might be able to dig out one or two photos from years gone by - I've even got one of me on the girl guides float kicking around somewhere!

Best wishes

Alison

[chris]

I agree with simpelton that it is good that the carnival is moving forward with a website at least it is the start of getting the carnival information onto the web which then serves as stepping stones to build on so lets see the site go from strength to strength.