Thanks to the amazing talents of Ryan Moss (Thanks Ryan), we have a new web site. Please check it out and tell me what you think.

Also, Ryan is available to do more web design. His email is on the site.

Doug Binder
www.mountainmodels.com

Doug, I like the looks of he Urban flyer, but see it's not out yet. So how do I get one anyway?

Fred,

You wait.

I have a lot of time and money invested in the UrbanFlyer and want to release it so I'm pushing hard to get it done. On the other hand, I've got a reputation to maintain so I want to make sure it's done right!

I'm hoping it will be done in a few weeks. There are a few builders evaluating it as we speak (write?) so I should wrap it up soon.

Doug

But I'm not one of them!!!!!!

Sorry Fred. I snuck the request for evaluators deep in another topic. Look at it this way - you won't be building some junky half designed prototype, you'll be getting a shiny new production version, complete with real instructions!

Doug

Not sure if I should or

Looks nice. Here are my comments, and please forgive my bluntness!

* I don't like web pages that force me to sit thru an intro or click something to get to the stuff I really want to see. This case is particularly bad because I have to look for the little word "here" and click on it to get into the site.

* If I click on "Home" while at the Home I get a "404 - Not Found" error.

* The pictures are smaller which is okay especially for those with slow connections, but it would be nice to be able to click on it to see a bigger version. It's hard to see much detail on the UrbanFlyer pictures.

In other news, my friend and I thermalled the DuskStik this afternoon. Lots of fun!

Tom

(edited because it might be hard to tell that by "biffer" I really meant "bigger" )

[This message has been edited by tom_yellowblue (edited 08-03-2001).]

Doug,

Your website is working horribly for me... I have an old computer and a dialup modem, I try to skip over the Flash stuff to go directly to the site and it is a dead end....
I can't view your planes

FF, that's no good! You can always go to www.mountainmodels.com/main.htm

Tom, I fixed the Home problem. I can change the UrbanFlyer photos to thumbnails. How about the first screen read "See Intro" and "Skip Intro"?

Ryan put a lot of effort into that flash and it would be a shame to toss it but we want to keep the customer happy.

Doug

Three words: It looks great!

Hi Doug,

The Home link works now. I don't think you should throw away the flash intro, I watched it the first time and thought it was good. I just don't want to have to watch it every time and I would like to be able to quickly get to the main page. Having a "Skip Intro" is fine, especially if it is big and easy to find right away. Maybe a big "Enter" or "Skip Intro" under the big logo at the top.

Some web pages like www.parkflyers.com start playing the animation right away, so maybe it's possible to auto-detect if the web browser supports flash. As an aside, they have a tiny little "skip intro", but it's aggravating for me because it's small and the color is red on a black background. I'm partially colorblind so I have a hard time seeing it, thus it usually takes me a little time before I'm finally able to click it and get to the information I want. I know it sounds kind of petty, but little things like that can impact how people feel when they start viewing your site.

Tom

Tom,

The first page is a bit cleaner and the UrbanFlyer page has thumbnails.

This is a slow process!

Doug

Hi Doug

Ok, I found out what the problem is.... I couldn't click on anything on your website while using Netscape on my computer..... Netscape always seems to have problems on my computer...but their "bookmark" system is SOOO much better then Explorer's "favorites" system that I just can't seem to want to get rid of it yet...

Anyway, I opened Explorer and now I can see your website..... must be part of that Microsoft plot to destroy Netscape and take over the world

I liked the old web layout much better. It was clean, fast, easy to read and you could quickly and easily go to what you wanted. Maybe I'm an old stick in the mud (I've been working with computers since the 60's), but the only thing I see fluff and eye candy doing is slowing down the page load and making it harder to find what you want. People will maybe look at a splash screen/intro. once, after that they will immediately click through it and all it will have done is make them wait for an additional page to load and cause them additional work to click through it. On a positive note, I like the thumbnails, saves the download time on the big images if you don't need to see them.

The UrbanFlyer looks good. When can we get some info on what kind of motor, and servos it needs? Will HS55's work?

Jim

*sigh*

Can only get to the front page, and some applet "fphover" crashes. I'm using Netscape 4.5 behind the Boeing firewall. I'll try Opera 5.11 from home and see if it works from there.

Simple is better!

The Flash intro was kinda nice - I like the Duskstik outlining the mountain, but I'll probably only watch it once more (to see if it works in Opera) then, never again.

[This message has been edited by BCawley (edited 08-03-2001).]