As you may have noticed, FactCheck.org has a new look. It’s been in the works for months, and it’s more than just a facelift. We’ve added some new features. We’ve also tried to make our content easier to read and easier to find.
Here’s some of what you’ll find:
- FactCheck Wire items (you are now reading one of them) have become our staple, so they are now much more prominently displayed on the home page, in the left column.
- Our traditional Articles (with a Summary followed by a detailed Analysis section) have now become “Featured Articles” and are displayed in the center column. These are usually longer, more detailed stories about such things as presidential debates or major campaign trends.
- A new “Viral Spiral” page is now specifically devoted to Internet rumors, those chain emails that often spread like a disease. It takes the place of our old “Hot Topics” page. You can reach Viral Spiral through a prominent link in the right column.
- A “2012 Players Guide” gives brief profiles of the groups — like the conservative American Crossroads and the liberal Priorities USA — that will be spending large amounts of money on TV ads and other campaign messages in this election cycle. The “Players Guide” for the 2010 election cycle will remain accessible. Both can be reached through a prominent link in the right column.
- A new mobile/smartphone version of the site is more functional than our previous, mostly-text “mobile” site. You can read more about that in a Wire item we posted earlier today, with some helpful screen shots included.
- The Archives page can now be browsed by subject matter as well as by date, and by type of article.
We hope you’ll take some time to explore the new FactCheck.org. Let us know what you like, or don’t like, or want to see in the next upgrade of the site. Drop a note to editor@factcheck.org with Website Redesign in the subject line.
A lot of good stuff remains unchanged. You can still take our weekly, three-question Quiz to see how well you have avoided some of the misinformation that politicians have peddled recently. Our current Ask FactCheck response is shown on the home page even more prominently than before, and you can still browse through the Ask FactCheck archive for answers to other recent questions. And you can still send us your questions via the Ask Us page (but please, only if you have not found the answer by looking at the Viral Spiral page or by using our word-search function.)
We still feature selected messages from readers in our weekly Mailbag — both the bouquets and the brickbats. And if you really like what you find here, you can still use the Donate feature to make a tax-deductible contribution.