Newsroom has some positive news to share. This morning you are reading this story from our new-look website.
Our original site served us well but after seven years it was time for a refresh.
The layout is improved, with more stories visible, whether on desktop, tablet or mobile. We think it will be easier and faster for readers to get to the stories they are most interested in.
We’ve streamlined the number of sections on the page, updated the navigation around the site and will now publish our subscriber-only Newsroom Pro stories on the home page as well, signposted with a red Pro flag, in amongst free-to-read stories. As now, the paywalled stories are generally open access later on the site for general readers. It’s also clear and easy to subscribe to Pro or become one of the regular donors who help Newsroom do what we do.
The new layout seamlessly blends our text journalism with data projects, designated commentary and video and podcast shows.
Our commitment to independent, in-depth reporting and analysis remains paramount, focusing on the Things that Matter and areas of content not covered sufficiently elsewhere in the media.
Importantly for our journalists the systems driving the new site are intuitive. This means they will have more time to do what they do best – investigating and reporting on matters in the public interest.
Newspack, the California-based company providing the new platform, was founded by journalists with a deep understanding of digital innovation. It has access to world-class engineering talent through its parent company, Automattic, the commercial arm of WordPress. Many of you will be familiar with WordPress, the open-source publishing software that powers more than 40 percent of the web.
As with any major software changeover we expect a few hiccups, although we are confident they will be minor. Please let us know what you think of the new site – your feedback has helped us go from a start-up in 2017 to the strong, independent news organisation we are today.
Please email us at contact@newsroom.co.nz with any questions or feedback. Happy reading.
The new look Newsroom is beautiful, very impressive.
It feels like a step ahead, very ’21st Century-ready’.
If only our governments would do likewise.
It all looks promising. having a new look and nice presentation. However I tried to change the way I pay my subscription with a new credit card and got a response that the change could not be processed. Tried twice – same result. Don’t you want my money?
Looks great and works well. Logical throughout. Well done!