Welcome to the New AlterNet

As you have probably noticed, AlterNet is looking quite different today. We hope you agree that we have a great new look for a new decade. After reader surveys and lots of feedback, we have added a number of key new features we are confident will build your engagement with AlterNet. Our goals are to provide readers with more opportunities to express their opinions;to give our community more avenues to "Take Action" on the issues you care about most; to provide more coverage of breaking news, with our new Progressive News Wire; and to give you new special coverage areas based on your interests.

There is much more to tell. For the details, read our press release sent out to the media this morning:

ALTERNET, THRIVING PROGRESSIVE NEWS PORTAL, RELAUNCHES

Web site unveils new community tools and a striking redesign.

SAN FRANCISCO, Jan. 26 / AlterNet.org/ --As it enters its 13th year, AlterNet.org, the award-winning, highly trafficked, issue-oriented Web magazine unveils a spiffy new redesign for a new decade. Relaunching today, AlterNet has added a number of features that will increase the engagement of the AlterNet community and enhance its role as the leading progressive news and information portal.

SoapBox, a user-generated opinion blog, will allow AlterNet users to post directly to AlterNet's front page, while a second "superblog," SpeakEasy, will feature dozens of top bloggers from a wide spectrum of the Internet, who will also post directly to the site.

"We want to engage our community as much as possible and give them an unfettered, visible voice, especially in this period of political frustration and anxiety," said Don Hazen, AlterNet's executive editor. "We have also added a new Take Action section so that readers will have multiple options to dive into making change, after reading content on the site and feeling motivated to act."

AlterNet is also launching the AlterNet Progressive News Wire, which will compile news and analysis many times each day from more than 25 top sources, including Raw Story, The Daily Kos and MotherJones.com. "It seems obvious that there is more than enough fast-breaking progressive content and we need not be so dependent on sources like AP and Reuters for breaking news," explained Hazen.

"AlterNet has always been a hybrid of staff writing, assigned content, and material harvested from several hundred published writers and sources," Hazen added. "While the term 'portal' went out of style years ago, we still think it is the right word for what AlterNet does, and should be resurrected. Unlike any other political and news site on the Web we have special sites for fourteen issues, each with its own editor and newsletter."

With this relaunch, the site is adding two new content areas: Food, the issue in which AlterNet readers have shown the most recent interest; and Investigations, which will emphasize our commitment to investigative work and showcase the work of other key sites. Just two weeks ago, an AlterNet article by Jessica Pupovac was instrumental in bringing about the release of an innocent man in Chicago, after being wrongfully imprisoned for 23 years.

The AlterNet redesign was executed by Biro Creative from Vancouver, BC. "We had a very creative process with Biro over the past nine months," said Roxanne Cooper, associate publisher of AlterNet. "Together we have produced one of the most strikingly designed sites on the Web—certainly in the news arena. In the past few months, we have rapidly expanded our Twitter and Facebook marketing, enlarging our following by thousands and dramatically increasing the many ways readers find their way to our content."

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