gorilla.cd

31 Responses to “What do you all think of this website so far?”

1. grantvt Says: 15 Oct 2008

   I think the site is great.

2. jean-claude S (France) Says: 15 Oct 2008

   I like it very sincerely. I found all what I want to know in your RDC. The video, the photographies are very lovely. With your new présentation I can know all your field team, your campaners, also the donors. But I like to see the faces of Diddy, Innocent or Balumba… also those of gorillas. Each day I open my computer to know the last news. Sincerely your présentation is very good. Félicitations and thank your for your work…

3. Samantha Says: 15 Oct 2008

   Thanks Jean-Claude. That is great news. We will actually soon be adding more profiles, about 20 Rangers. Hopefully next week. We want to profile everyone who works in Virunga! So watch out for those…

4. jean-claude S (France) Says: 15 Oct 2008

   http://fr.youtube.com/watch?v=2XpYjozfpZA

   Samantha, thanks for your answer.

   Have you seen this video? It’s fantastic and the pictures speak for the safeguard of the mountains gorillas. Please look at it.

5. irisk Says: 15 Oct 2008

   Hello, Samantha! What do I like best? Difficult to say, the website is great! I talked yesterday to a young man who is working on creating a website for an orphanage and told him about Gorilla,cd. Since we both had some spare time, we looked at it together and he was full of praise for your work and creativity, and for your cause as well. I saw that you have ironed out all ‘wrinkles’ and that now the archives are in place. Will have to spend hours reading all the old blogs… I will enjoy seeing more field team profiles: the rangers have wonderful histories to tell. Lovely to see Diddy, Jean-Bosco and Innocent with big smiles on their faces! Take care, Iris

6. irisk Says: 15 Oct 2008

   If you go to http://www.nationalgeographic.com click on ‘watch video’ and enter ‘rumangabo’ as key word you will find ‘Rebel Attacks Threaten Gorilla Park - Dramatic Video’: a long article and Pierre’s video. Sorry I couldn’t give you the link, I’m on a funny old computer that doesn’t do what I want it to… Jean-Claude, thanks for your link to the wonderfull video “Gorillas On Wheels’! Iris

7. Timi Says: 15 Oct 2008

   Just a quick comment for now - your RSS feed stopped working several days ago and is still broken.

8. Emmanuel Says: 15 Oct 2008

   Many thanks for all the helpful comments. One question I wanted to ask, how would people feel if we used your full names when we acknowledge donations (in the blue box on the right)?

9. Samantha Says: 15 Oct 2008

   Thanks Timi. I have just told our developers. Great to get the heads up. Should be fixed asap.

10. Alberto Says: 15 Oct 2008

    a warm thank you on behalf of the coding and design team here… just to give you heads up on coming releases, we are now working on making registration simpler and faster, making personal profiles richer and easier to update and making the site more easily findable on Google (and yes, fixing the RSS feed :-)). As usual, we look forward to receiving reports of bugs or suggestions for improvements.

11. lisah Says: 16 Oct 2008

    Really loving the site. I have not had the time to start using My Virunga, but am very much looking forward to using that feature. I have not been able to donate funds in awhile, but have no problem with you using my last name when I do. Lisa

12. lisah Says: 16 Oct 2008

    Oh, forgot to say that I love seeing Innocent, Diddy and Jean-Bosco with the Virunga stickers. I love my Virunga sticker. I proudly placed it on my car, along with my Obama for President stickers. Lisa

13. dee Says: 16 Oct 2008

    very nice to see you smiling! the site looks great.. I hope more people become aware of your missions and circumstances.. I agree, profiles on everyone involved is very interesting and appreciated..
    I feel much compassion and gratitude for all the extremely important urgent work that you are doing and pray that all the challenges and obstacles that you face are brief & temporary. Also, I feel immensely indebted to for all your contributions in protecting the remaining wildlife and helping to preserve their habitats. thank you.
    thank you is not enough, but please know it is truly heartfelt.

    the only thing missing on this site is current footage of those magnificent gorilla families.. sincerely hope they are all well and safe and hope to be able to see them soon..

    everybody (and their families too!) stay strong and safe, much love and respect!

14. dee Says: 16 Oct 2008

    hi Samantha! also, funds are tight at the moment but would hope to monetarily contribute soon… I do not use paypal or any other format pertaining to donating online..
    Is there an address in place to send by mail a check or money order to? and write out checks payable to? who?
    thank you!

15. irisk Says: 16 Oct 2008

    Hello Emmanuel! About donations: would it be possible to give donors different options: anonymous, first name or full name? I noticed that paypal has a little instruction box to the seller - gorillacd.org in this case - at least the French one does. Personally, I would prefer my last name not to appear. May I suggest that donors who have not joined gorillacd.org have their name appear anyway? Also that ‘friends’ who donate stay ‘friends’ instead of becoming ‘donors’? Am I being high maintenance? Iris

16. Sara Says: 16 Oct 2008

    It rocks, not sure if a good idea, if someone updates their blog, is it possible to see on the home page - that there is a new blog, a bit like facebook, when someone writes on their wall. Otherwise Hope all of you are well and keeping safe. Sara

17. Samantha Says: 16 Oct 2008

    Hi Dee. You are right about the gorilla footage… an eternal frustration for all the Rangers, as you can imagine. Re donating by check this is absolutely possible. Please go to the Who We Are section under the Team tab at the top and you will see the address where to send the check in the name of Virunga Fund Inc. Thank you.
    Iris - thanks also for your suggestions. I am going to run them by Alberto and his team and see what is possible. Our initial idea was that you kind of upgraded from Friend to Donor, but maybe actually you could appear on both lists. Also - we really want people to become Friends, as it is all about this global community, which is why at first your name does not come up when you donate if you are not a Friend. But again, we need to always be looking at all of this.
    Sara - that is a super valid point and another thing on the list. Perhaps a little box under the Join Now box that shows the last few posts so that when you go on the Home Page you can see if there are any new posts since you were last on the site.
    THANK YOU EVERYONE FOR THIS FEEDBACK. IT IS ABSOLUTELY INVALUABLE.

18. Global Voices Online » D.R of Congo: What Do You Think of the New Wildlife Rangers Website? Says: 16 Oct 2008

    [...] rangers in Virunga National Park in the Democratice Republic of Congo have launched a new website: “It is now exactly 2 weeks and 1 day since we launched and we would love to know what you [...]

19. louisedemerode Says: 16 Oct 2008

    I am really enjoying gorillacd.org. My two cents worth; would be great to have is an RSS feed on recent comments that cut across all the blogs, including comments on campaigners and field team pages.
    Secondly it would be good if all new posts, including those on campaigners pages came up in the recent posts page, or otherwise in a second box on posts from recent field team and campaigners. It might provide great incentive both to post, campaign, comment and to read. Great work everyone.

20. dee Says: 16 Oct 2008

    thanks so much Samantha for your reply!

21. Samantha Says: 17 Oct 2008

    Thanks Louise. Excellent point and I have just put it to Alberto to see if we can make that a priority. Hope to see you here soon

22. Samantha Says: 17 Oct 2008

    Timi the RSS feed is now working!

23. Global Voices in Italiano » Congo: il nuovo sito web del Parco Nazionale di Virunga Says: 19 Oct 2008

    [...] ranger del Parco Nazionale di Virunga [it], nella Repubblica Democratica del Congo, hanno inaugurato un nuovo sito web, gorillacd.org [in]: “A qualche settimana dal lancio ufficiale il 6 ottobre scorso, vorremmo sapere cosa ne [...]

24. noseprints Says: 19 Oct 2008

    I love this website! I like that the main content on the front page links out to other areas of the site without looking crowded. I like the tabs running across the top. It’s well organized, I can find everything and it feels like a community.

    I think that the font size is a little small (maybe it’s because I’m on a tiny laptop?). It would be great if there were options to increase the font size like I’ve seen on some websites.

    The web developer, designer and related staff did a great job with gorillacd.org. Thanks for giving us this site!

25. dylanpresman Says: 21 Oct 2008

    I am fairly new to the site but have found the content very moving. It is an impressive tribute to the dedication and bravery of the Park rangers and staff. I think that the site does a great job of telling the story of what is going on in the park. It is inspiring and informative. Well done!

    I do have a couple of suggestions.

    1. You should include a description of what is means to be a “Campaigner” or a “Friend”. On the “Campaigner” and “Friend” pages respectively, you should start with a description that says something like “A Campaigner is someone who ….” and then lays out the elements that go into such a designation.

    2. I could not see a link to change my profile. I see that some people have photos linked to their name and I was going to upload a photo but couldn’t see where to do that.

    3. In terms of fundraising, the organization should look into getting itself listed in the Combined Federal Campaign (CFC) of the US government. The CFC is the workplace giving program of the US government. Thousands of local and international non-profit organizations are listed through the CFC (ranging from Oxfam to the Zambia Scholarship Fund to the Virginia YMCA). As there are 3 million people employed by the US government, it is worth getting your foot in that particular door.

26. Samantha Says: 22 Oct 2008

    Hi Dylan - 1. Point taken. We did include a bit in the Who We Are tab but that is clearly hidden so I can add it to the top of the Campaigners page.
    2. Dylan you need to login. So go to My Virunga, login with your username and password that you got when you first became a Friend, and then go to Profile. The first tab is Picture and that is where you can upload your photo and crop it as you wish. Would be good to see you in person
    3. Thank you for this heads up. I will ask Robert Williams to look at this who helps us out quite a lot and is based in Colorado.
    Look forward to seeing your picture Dylan!

27. Samantha Says: 22 Oct 2008

    And thanks Noseprints. The font size is the same as Google I believe - I actually had the same question as you when we first launched but that is what was chosen because of Google.

28. dylanpresman Says: 22 Oct 2008

    Hey Emmanuel, In answer to your question about using last names, I really like the way this website uses first name. Clearly, one of the goals of this website is to create an online community in support of the Virunga National Park. Using first names, and lots of them, builds a level of informality and comfort that strengthens the personal involvement and “buy-in” of the members. Using last names may raise some privacy issues for some people. But more than that, it might erode the comfortable sense of personal involvement that the use f first names evokes.

    Along the lines of building community, you may also want to add to the site a messageboard. There are lots of free online apps that can be used to create fairly sophisticated messageboards. That is a wonderful tool for building a virtual community — the cyber-age’s village square, so to speak.

29. Samantha Says: 23 Oct 2008

    Hi Dylan. Thank you for the tip about the message board. I will look into this. And also for your comments about first names and last names. I think for now we are going to leave the donation reporting box as it is - in an effort to encourage people to join as a Friend… in a month or so we will review

30. Robert Williams Says: 24 Oct 2008

    Thanks for the tip about the Combined Federal Campaign, Dylan! We will most certainly look into this.

31. junys Says: 12 Nov 2008

    i think this site is so great.