The AfterElton Agenda: New Contributors, New Content, All Thumbs

Greetings and salutations! It's almost the end of the month, my first full month as editor of this site. I have to say I'm exhausted but pretty happy with how things are going. Thanks to our readers for sticking around and staying engaged in the comments and forums. And big thanks as well to our 20 or so regular and semi-regular contributors who lend their distinctive voices and make this site what it is, particularly Ed Kennedy and snicks who have really gone beyond the call of duty and saved my butt this past month.

You can check out profiles for many of our writers on our updated AfterElton Contributor Page (And for all you past and present contributors who aren't yet included, send me your deets and I'll get you on there!)

I'd like to start off here with some announcements about new contributors and content.

First, I'm pleased to introduce Jim Halterman. Jim lives in Los Angeles and specializes in entertainment reporting. He's previously written for Edge, Futon Critic and many other websites. Jim recently interviewed Sean Maher for us after the actor's coming out. And this week Jim landed us a great interview with Days of Our Lives' Freddie Smith as well as video clips from GLSEN's Respect Awards Red Carpet.

You'll be seeing a lot more of Jim's work in the coming weeks, including a profile interview with the very handsome Alan Ritchson (Smallville's Aquaman, Blue Mountain State) conducted this past Monday at The Abbey in West Hollywood. Hope to have that up for you early next week!

Photo credit: Clinton Gaughran

Jim is also going to be launching a weekly TV Q&A column here on AfterElton. If you have a TV show complaint, some high praise or a burning question about your favorite series – or you just want to hear about upcoming spoilers – send word to Jim@JimHalterman.com He'll try and respond in his column.

I'd like to mention again how glad I am to have Brian Juergens back in the fold here at AfterElton. His hilarious and insightful American Horror Story recaps are quickly becoming a must-read for fans of that show.

Brian is also contributing a weekly trivia quiz (those things are HARD!) and our movie guessing game "Still Got It." Plus, various other articles, like today's massive Die Laughing: 50 of the Most Hilarious Horror Movies. You might have noticed, Brian has a thing for horror!

Davis Mallory, now relocated to New York City, is back with his column New Music Mix ... and making me feel like my life isn't nearly interesting enough. Damn you Davis, but welcome back!

1 girl 5 gays has returned for a third season. We'll continue to run new episodes on Tuesdays.

Brian Davis had no time to recuperate from his tour of duty covering The A-List New York before he threw himself on the live grenade that is recapping A-List: Dallas. The result? Some hilariously scathing snark. Brian really pulls no punches.

And finally, JT Riley's advice column "Ask JT" has officially launched, and he's serving up sage advice along with suitable libations. If you need any light-hearted words of wisdom, drop a line to jtadvicecolumn@gmail.com.

And the stuff mentioned above just scratches the surface. We've got a lot more cool content coming down the pike, but I want to hold off announcing until we have firmer dates.

On the tech side of things, big changes are imminent.

First, a site platform upgrade. AfterElton is currently built on top of the Drupal platform, version 5. This version is seriously out of date. It's the website equivalent of still running WindowsXP on your computer. Okay, maybe worse. We're not as stable as Windows XP.

So we're making the big leap to Drupal 7. More stable, more bells and whistles. We'll finally be able to develop some new features to make it easier to navigate, post comments, etc.

When that platform upgrade happens (possibly as early as next week) you won't see a huge immediate change to the front end of AfterElton. But one change you will see – the star rating system will be gone, and in its place will be a more binary thumbs up / thumbs down voting system.

Once AfterElton gets past that platform upgrade our development team will turn to redesigning/reskinning the site. We've been two years now with the tan background, the grey hexagons and the blocky header fonts, etc. It's definitely time for a facelift! And at the same time we can start adding new features such as photo galleries, better navigation tools, etc.

Hey, if there are tech features on other websites that you really love and would like to see incorporated into AfterElton, drop us a line and let us know what they are. We've set up a special forum for just that purpose: "Site Features I Really Wish AfterElton Had."

Finally, a word about nudity.

Okay, I figured that would get your attention. This past week we came across that memorable James Franco cover for FLAUNT Magazine, the one that shows a close-up of his furry rump. It's a more artistic than sexy shot, not particularly salacious. But it being James Franco and all, that image was certainly newsworthy. 

Our dilemma here at AfterElton: When reporting on this item do we actually show the FLAUNT cover? Truthfully, I didn't feel there was anything all that risque about the image. But we have a pretty bright line rule around here - and that is no nudity. I can't tell you how distressing it is when a new AfterElton member who doesn't know the rules gets a little porn-happy and starts posting salacious photos on their profile or in the comments sections. Yuck. Our great moderators work very hard to keep things like that under control. For purposes of policing the site, a bright line rule (no front or rear nudity whatsoever) is really helpful.

But sometimes I feel like this bright line rule winds up making us seem prudish. Anyway, it's a discussion we've been having around the AfterElton offices. Is it time to relax the rules a bit to allow for the posting of occasional newsworthy content that isn't prurient, but that might randomly show someone's butt (or breast)? Or would moving away from this bright line rule open the door to an epidemic of rude pics, with some members continually testing the limits of what is appropriate and what is in poor taste on a PG site?

Is there a way to avoid the slippery slope?

I think for now we'll stick with our bright line "no nudity" rule, but I'd really appreciate our readers' opinions on this matter. Are we being too prudish? Should we have posted that magazine cover of James Franco's butt? Or maybe you think we currently aren't being prudish enough. Either way, let us know in the comments.

Well, I think that's everything on AE's Agenda at the moment. I hope you all have fabulous Halloween parties to attend this weekend!

Sincerely

Dennis