It was a beautiful day ... way too nice to be inside. So we really appreciate the 25-or-so folks who attended our Cinco de Mayo Web town meeting on Friday. Sorry we couldn't offer magaritas, but, well, you know how that goes.

After walking folks through our research process and findings and some of the basics of what we're envisioning as the navigation for the new site, we opened it up to conversation about the site. I offered that Dartmouth's Web site is a shared concern: it's not just what we think the site should be, but that everyone at the College has an interest in how Dartmouth is represented on the Web.

That said, there weren't any surprises (at least to me) in what folks wanted to talk about: how we get visitors to the site to content, how the search engine works, how the life of the College is highlighted on the site. We also ran an exercise on imaging: a series of "mood boards" showing a variety of images of the College that represent various aspects. Again, not surprisingly, folks prefer dynamic, energetic images of teaching, learning and living at Dartmouth. They were less enthusiastic about the more conservative, traditional campus beauty shots of flowers and architecture.

It was, we think, a good conversation. One that we're likely to repeat soon.

Martin's got some more formal notes; stay tuned for a posting on that. (Likely to come early in the week ... we're spending some time this weekend getting out from behind our computers and enjoying the spring.)