Interactive Community Based Website -- "Am I the only one..."

[brainshart99]

http://brainshart.com/

Thanks to the wonderful free hosting offered here, I've had the right tools to mess around and create an interactive site.

The site, Brainshart, is centered around the question, "Am I the only one...?" Users from around the world can submit things, and have them posted as soon as I make sure the post meets site standards.

Please, come take a look at it and let me know what can be improved upon! I am using Wordpress, with a customization of the free theme "Suffusion". I just started allowing others to post recently, so there are only a few pages of entries so far. I would be very thankful if you went through and rated, commented, or even submitted your own Brainshart!

[solo1861]

Hi,
I think the design is simple and nice. Really clear and easy to navigate. I'm not really fond of the orange but that just personal preference. I love the logo.
The only improvement I can think of is adding the name (or username) of the person who submitted it. But other than that, works for me.
Regards

[brainshart99]

Thanks for the suggestions! I've been back and forth on colors forever, and still am unsure. Do you have anything in mind?

Also, I had it set up to have the name of the poster for a while, but I don't want to force people to sign up for the site in order to submit things. This created a problem in which some people didn't give a name, so I just decided to do away with the "Posted by..." part instead of faking their names or something. Do you have any suggestions on this end?

[intpsych16]

Good job on the design and navigtion. Personally, I liked the orange. Unique take on things people do. Good luck.

[renovatio_2143]

Interesting concept. I also like the simplicity of the site. ^,...,^

[Zenax]

I am in agreement about the colour orange not being used on the website ... I would perhaps use a really light shade of blue that would contrast nicely against the background you have at the moment.

The logo of the website looks brilliant.

I also agree with the fact that there should be some sort of username/name put underneath or above the post to say who posted it.

I can't seem to use your search box (I am using google chrome havent test other browser!!)

Other than that it is a really interesting and good concept.

[brainshart99]

I changed the orange and blue a little. Would you still say the orange is a no-go?

Again on the posting of the submitter's name, do you have any suggestions on how to do that effectively? I listed the problems with it earlier.

Thanks for the reviews guys, this is really verifying some of the things I felt were weak about the site. Hopefully we can work together to make it a better site! Keep it up.

[essellar]

I actually like the complementary colour scheme. It's not intended to be a passive site -- your visitors aren't there to read, they're there to engage -- and a monochromatic colour scheme tends to engender passivity. Yes, it's jarring and all "Web-2.0-call-to-action" and stuff, but that's kinda the point, isn't it?

And I'm good with the anonymity thing too. If the premise of the site is "I think I might be an oddball", then people who really think they might be oddballs are going to be a little bit reticent about airing their weirdness in public. If it even smells like you're encouraging identity (even an identifiable nick on the site) by "singling out" anonymous posters, then you're in grave danger of moving away from foibles and eccentricities into a "shock competition", and that will drive away the target user group (which, really, is everybody who doesn't have delusions of utter social conformity).

The site is different by design -- don't fall into the trap of sameness. And if not everybody gets it, that's okay too -- seven billion uniques a day is really hard to handle, even if they're all a little bit odd.

[brainshart99]

I just checked the search box, and sure enough, it's misbehaving. Thanks for pointing that out.

Thank you esselar! That was all very eloquently said, and it was reassuring reading how clearly you understood what I was going for with this site. I will try not to fall into the "trap of sameness" as you put it.