• Tuesday February 9, 2010
return to the vita.mn metablog

Welcome to vita.mn 2.0

posted by matt on Oct. 4, '07 at 9:02 AM

posted by matt on Oct. 4, '07 at 9:02 AM
It's been more than a year since we launched this website, with the goal of giving you a fun and easy way to make the absolute most of the Twin Cities. Well, it just got funner and easier. And, um, prettier.

Since launch, we've won an award, given out a lot of prizes, and gradually added feature after feature -- photos, karma, event comments, RSS feeds, and more -- but the core design we started out with hasn't changed ... until today.

We've spent the last few months tearing the site apart and building it up again brand new, as well as adding a lot of features we think you'll enjoy. If you click around a little bit, you'll notice:
  • A clean, shiny new design, with a brand new masthead
  • Boffo new sections, featuring recent lists, guides and discussions
  • Interactive maps on event and venue pages
  • You can start discussions on restaurants, bars/clubs, movies, music, art and performance right from the section fronts
  • User-submitted photos all over the place (not to mention more avatars!)
There's a ton more, but our hope is that you won't actually notice it, just revel in the subconscious enjoyment of it.

If you're checking out vita.mn for the first time, start here: we've compiled a handy guide to using vita.mn to make the most out of the Twin Cities.

And if you're a familiar face, please click around and tell us your thoughts! (Right here in this thread is fine; you know how we do.)

We're not done. Within the next couple of weeks, you'll be seeing even more new features, including the arrival of our first vita-blog. Meanwhile, enjoy all the new goodness.

(By the way, all credit goes to sopheava and the developer ninjas.)
posted by thejackal on Oct. 4, '07 at 9:09 AM
It took a few refreshes to clear my cache of the old masthead, etc, but it's looking amazing now.

Great work.
posted by Aurinko on Oct. 4, '07 at 9:14 AM
I love it!
posted by thejackal on Oct. 4, '07 at 9:18 AM
Google Maps!!! Well done...
posted by peterHDK on Oct. 4, '07 at 9:30 AM
purty slick! love all the additional pictures.

i do have a little error in the masthead -- but I'll email a picture instead of trying to explain it
posted by MattMartigan on Oct. 4, '07 at 9:34 AM
pretty sharp, nice and clean...
posted by matt on Oct. 4, '07 at 9:57 AM
Heh, just noticed the tags we're using to pull lists, guides and discussions onto various section fronts are still the tags we used on our development site. We'll fix that soon! Pardon our dust. (Also, don't look at any movies pages for a few hours. :)
posted by jscheeler7 on Oct. 4, '07 at 10:17 AM
Wow! Lookin' purdy neat!
posted by s4xton on Oct. 4, '07 at 10:38 AM
Woo Yay!
posted by CityGal on Oct. 4, '07 at 11:01 AM
::toasting the ninjas::
posted by p_saarinen on Oct. 4, '07 at 11:34 AM
The team did a good job.
posted by elmauter on Oct. 4, '07 at 12:03 PM
Pretty! I do really like that new masthead.

*scampers off to poke around*
posted by booders2311 on Oct. 4, '07 at 12:21 PM
yay to you guys!. Its beautiful!
posted by leslie on Oct. 4, '07 at 12:38 PM
Totally hott. Great work!
posted by matt on Oct. 4, '07 at 3:35 PM
Thanks for the feedback, y'all! (Yes, even you, MNspeak, although I think I could have written that thread a month ago with astonishing accuracy. Which would be a fun game, actually ... )
posted by MattMartigan on Oct. 5, '07 at 9:34 AM
Matt, The "Favorites" function still isn't functioning, they don't stick in your profile. Nor is the system saving which tags you personally put on a venue/list.
posted by CityGal on Oct. 5, '07 at 9:42 AM
That mnspeak bullpuckey is whack, yo. Let's cyberstalk 'em.
posted by peterHDK on Oct. 5, '07 at 9:51 AM
re mnspeak: yeah, pretty predictable. Que the one dood saying "I have no idea how to use it" in 3 . . . 2 . . . oh, wait, nevermind, he already said it.

ah, whatever, it's a "who's the biggest hatah" contest there everyday.

Martigan -- I came across that tag problem a while ago, but I think it's actually working. Sometimes it doesn't look like it's registering but if you look in the tag cloud to the right it will be there, and if you look at your tags in the profile it should be there too.
posted by matt on Oct. 5, '07 at 10:21 AM
Thanks for the report, MattM. I'll follow up with you over e-mail. Anyone else seeing this favoriting/tagging problem?

Heh, I don't mean to snark out MNspeak. It's a good blog, and Max has been a great editor. But y'all are my posse.
posted by Aurinko on Oct. 5, '07 at 2:20 PM
Wow...what's in the water over there?
posted by wr3n on Oct. 6, '07 at 10:25 PM
I'm a newbie and was only on maybe a few days before the changes. I dig it.
posted by CRocka on Oct. 10, '07 at 6:55 PM
LOVE IT!
posted by CRocka on Oct. 10, '07 at 7:05 PM
How do you get your photos in the USER PHOTOS section?
posted by matt on Oct. 11, '07 at 9:14 AM
Every time you load the home page, a random set of recently-posted images to venues and events show up. Ditto on the section fronts.
posted by CRocka on Oct. 15, '07 at 11:53 AM
Coooool
posted by scarlasc on Nov. 27, '07 at 3:19 PM
You guys ever think about adding something so you can comment on movies? That might be nice.
posted by matt on Nov. 28, '07 at 10:43 AM
Oh, the things we'd like to do with movies! Better searchability, comments, mapping. All of that is in the cards, definitely.

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Favorite foods for Superbowl /Final Four /Olympics /World Series -watching

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Things I will be doing on Superbowl Sunday

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if I were a superhero: name & power

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