Slowing to a Crawl, Taking Time to Reflect
This being the deadest week of the year save the one between Christmas and New Year’s, we’re going to take the opportunity to start unpacking after our move last week. As a result, all we’re going to serve up this week are the morning links to give you something to chew on. That, and one…
This being the deadest week of the year save the one between Christmas and New Year’s, we’re going to take the opportunity to start unpacking after our move last week. As a result, all we’re going to serve up this week are the morning links to give you something to chew on. That, and one discussion question.
As we start to approach our one-year anniversary in October, we think it would be a good time to solicit feedback about the site. We’re happy to hear any criticism as long as it’s given in a respectful tone, so please let us know what you like about Brownstoner and what you don’t as well as ideas for new features or services you’d like to see in the months ahead.
Thanks,
Brownstoner
At Curbed it seems like the quality has gone down considerably. They are presenting opinions as facts and are pissing off the wrong people. I’d hate to see Brownstoner follow the same path.
I am thrilled by the quality of the site and quantity of the posts. It’s your site and your voice, and I would hate to see it become more generic. You have a unique perspective and obviously you get a rise out of people.
Some of my favorite blogs: Gawker, dooce and Go Fug Yourself have done away with comments, and it’s not nearly as fun to read them anymore. The comments on your site do get snarky at times, but you shouldn’t take it personally. It’s amazing to see people debate and challenge each other–and you. To me that’s most of the fun.
I know it’s a lot of work, but I wish you would create a searchable directory of reader-recommended tradespeople. The forum doesn’t get nearly enough responses. Perhaps you could form an advisory panel to answer inquiries. Again, a lot of work, but it would really improve the site.
It has been a pleasure to see your labor of love. Good luck unpacking and settling in. Welcome to the hood.
Love the site, brownstoner, and thanks for all your hard work in maintaining it. Easily the most useful feature for me is the FORUM. Reading other folks’ experiences with solving specific problems is both helpful and reassuring (let’s face it, some renovation issues can be scary — termites and rising damp, anybody?). I have also called various tradespeople as a result of postings and am on the verge of hiring a painter through a recommendation on the site. Which leads me to a request: Is there anyway to create an archive of referrals/recommendations, sorted by — say — specific skill? This would be a huge resource for home owners and might also provide a platform for advertising to support the site. I’m not suggesting that anyone be allowed to pay to include a referral, of course, but if you’re looking up “Painters” there could be CLEARLY delineated ads on that page from painters, kinda like Google. As regards the civility issue, I guess everyone has a different idea about what’s robust discussion and what’s just plain rude. I prefer to err on the side of politeness coz it makes life a little nicer and there ain’t enough nice to go around these days. Personally, I would also like to see a little more respect for the fact that many of the brownstone communities of Brooklyn have been gentrifying at a rate that makes many people very uneasy — especially those who’ve been here a long time and have been priced out of owning in their own neighborhoods. While the changing nature of some of our neighborhoods is a reality, folks might want to think twice before, for example, trashing a new commercial outlet just because it’s down market when it might infact be offering an important service to the community. I guess I feel the same about the endless commentaries about house prices. If you can afford to buy a brownstone, you know who you are and you presumably have a plan for making it happen. If you can’t, some of your enjoyment of the site might be diminished by having to wade through so many discussions about sky-high prices. Finally, thanks again for making this site happen.
Sadly, the more I read Brownstoner the less I like it. Initially I found the renovation tips and sources to be great. As I read the site more and more regularly, I became annoyed with the only-Brooklyn focus and, honestly, the occasionally superior and/or defensive tone taken by both posters and Mr.B. The gentrification issues are interesting and rightly controversial; Mr. B defending himself as “I’m just an ordinary guy” when he’s clearly bought a very expensive house and renovating it in full in super-expensive NYC is verging on hilarious. Although I make a nice living, a high-six-figures-plus-tasteful-reno house is not in my future, nor, I suspect, the future of most people.
I really do like the renovation blog, though, and I would love to see more of that in the future. (Perhaps I’m just a gawker)
Basically, I think Brownstoner should narrow its focus in either one of two directions: 1. Brooklyn or 2. brownstones/renovating generally. There are many many brownstone neighborhoods outside of those in Brooklyn, and as a non-Brooklyn resident I’d rather see the focus be narrowed to architectural history, feature stories on certain buildings, and renovation.
I love the website and i read it every day. i like the fact that brownstoner and mrs. brownstoner have set the tone of the site, and that should stay.
besides some of the things mentioned already, I would love to see a map of brownstone brooklyn (delineating the different neighborhoods).
Brownstoner–
I’ve been reading the blog most every day since December. Thanks to you and your readership I chose not to purchase a home in Prospect Lefferts that my wife and I had an accepted offer on and were prepared to sign contract… all to say the blog has been a source of valuable information. I’d suggest a few things:
1) expand the site beyond Brownstone Brooklyn. We just moved from CH to a Queen Anne Victorian on LI (we were priced out of CH/FG and wanted to get into a good school district as we couldn’t afford private school and nanny). I still read the posts to keep up on Bklyn where we often venture anyway (and also because I’ve gotten tips on the major renovation we’re doing right now). There are really a few different blogs at work in my opinion (there’s the Bklyn celeb/restaurant/”Blimbie” focus which elicits some intense (and often hostile) response and then there’s the renovation blog which in months passed has included not just Brownstones but also, for example, a story of a NJ couple renovating a Victorian). In my opinion the renovation blog could be much less narrow geographically than just Bstone Bklyn because each renovation you read about can teach you something to do/not to do. I think you do a terrific job and bring real value. I also agree with prior posts about guest writers. In several posts, readers will get off topic with thoughtful and interesting questions — these could often be “highlighted” on the main page. Also, I’d love it if you could somehow link back to archives (especially the stories that resurface, more than anything to see how ideas/trends change and take shape). The ongoing Blimpie opening is a case in point. I think a few posts covered it effectively but to link them might be interesting. Just a few rambling thoughts.
RE:archiving function. More specifically, if you’re looking for a specific string, if you quote the string google will search for that whole string as a single term (this generally works with google, this is just using it in combination with google’s site-specific “site:” search).
For example:
site:brownstoner.com “8 unit building in Park Slope”
I bet if you had a paypal link on the site, you’d get donations.
Archiving feature: Try google.
As in:
jk site:brownstoner.com