I was looking through my Bloglines feeds earlier today and checked out a Topix.net keyword search feed. As I did I noticed that they’d changed their logo on the feed so I clicked through to their site to find that they’ve done a redesign. The old crusty looking blue is gone and its now a lot more open and orange (almost looks like ProBlogger colors). Check it out at Topix.net.
Another change that I noticed (or maybe they had it previously but I didn’t see it) is a ‘Blogs’ link in their top menu that says it indexes the ‘top stories being discussed in weblogs’. Looks like a useful page to keep the finger on the pulse of the wider blogging community.
While I was there I also noticed that they’ve added comments sections to stories which makes them a lot more blog-like. For instance this post on Iraqi Americans voting in Iraq’s elections now can be commented upon on Topix.
It’s an interesting move that indicates that Topix is definitely moving in a new direction – away from purely being about news to something more interactive. This comes on top of their recent move to index not only newspapers but also blogs.
The question I find myself asking though is how will bloggers feel about another site running a comments section on their stories? Take for instance this post over at Neil Kennedy’s Weblog which has a comments section for readers to use but which now also has opportunity for comments to be left at the page that links to him at Topix.
Perhaps it’s no different to another link blog linking up and having the opportunity to leave comments about the link to the blog but it does seem a little odd to me for some reason. I’m not sure where my concern comes from and perhaps after a good night’s sleep it will go away – but I’m interested on other’s thoughts on the changes at topix.net
What do you think?
update: Of course I should have gone straight to Steve Rubel when I noticed the changes as his company does do some work with Topix. Steve gives a bit more information on the Topix Changes.
udpate II: SiliconBeat also writes about the changes (they also declare that they are cousins with Topix as they’re owned by the same company). They talk about how the changes are about building community on the site. This is definately new ground for a news aggregator.
