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Custom "Read More" Text for Block Template "Email card: Summary horizontal"
I came across the block template "Email card: Summary horizontal" (among
a few other Core email block templates) that don't support custom "Read
More" text.
I needed this feature for moving an obits newsletter from Zen to Flex, the text for the custom block template on Zen was " View Obituary / Sign Guestbook," which is more sensitive and empathetic than "Read More" I would imagine there are other use cases for this as well.
However, I did notice that the Core block template uses the macro email_assetLead in the Core Flex Email component.
Blocks using that macro can use "read_more_text" as a custom property to
support custom text.
I made a custom copy of the Core block template "Email card: Summary
horizontal" for now, but of course it'd be nice to have this in Core.

Are you #LocalMediaProud?
In newsrooms everywhere, our customers are gathering, analyzing, and presenting the news and information that is vital to every healthy community.
To help spread the word about the critical work you're doing, we've created the #LocalMediaProud hashtag on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook. We'd love to see pics of your team, in the newsroom and on the job. Don't be shy, we know you're out there. :)
Share your newsroom pics to #LocalMediaProud today!
Aaron Gillette
Marketing director
TownNews

Tracking widget traffic
Our sites use some variation of a block that updates with trending article links - they may be autopopulated based on defined rules or editor selected or some combination of both. We're trying to track the traffic that jump from these links into our articles.
Currently, the only solution available is entering UTM code data in via the block settings. This appears to be part of TN settings to only offer it this way.
However, as UTM codes are only designed to work with referral traffic and not from the same domain/GA property as the destination, there's a known issue where it can essentially 'break' the current user session.
What will happen is that when a user clicks on a same-domain/GA property UTM coded link their current session will end and a new session will begin on the new page. This creates a data accuracy issue that can't easily be fixed without abandoning the UTM tracking effort.
There are 2 other known solutions to track this traffic - hashtag anchor fragment usage or TN events.
Preferably would like to use TN events as long as it's clear which widget the action occurred on and where the user went. Would think this could be accomplished by labeling the Category as 'Widget Tracking' (or something else that makes it obvious), the Action as the name of the widget as it appears on the site, and Label is the Page Title for where the user jumped to.
Alternatively, appending a url with #widgetname instead of UTM coding would be searchable in GA's All Pages report but requires making some GTM updates https://www.simoahava.com/gtm-tips/track-url-fragments-as-pageviews/ - this could be a messy process if it interferes with other GA manipulations.
Either would have to be developed.

Webinar | What’s new at TownNews
Webinar recording now available.
What’s new at TownNews
Engage your audience and earn more revenue with these features and updates you may have missed. At our November customer webinar, Christine Masters, director of product management, and Susan Bell, product manager for BLOX OTT and the BLOX Now app, will highlight the recent advancements you need to know about.
Topics will include:
- An overview of our revamped mobile reporting interface
- New revenue opportunities in BLOX Business Directory
- Improved home screen navigation for BLOX OTT
- The latest BLOX CMS speed and security enhancements
- . . . and much more!

ICYMI: Find the webinar recording and slide deck here.

Webinar | Video 101: Producing live events for local media
Webinar recording now available.
When local events happen—from public forums to sporting events to live music—your community looks to you for quality coverage. At our October customer webinar, Derek Gebler, vice president of broadcast and video, will show how easy it can be to produce live video coverage of local events, and distribute your video content to the world with TownNews.com’s integrated digital solutions.
Topics will include:
The benefits of producing live video during local events.
A pre-flight plan, including a gear checklist, equipment testing, and working with the venue.
Camera placement, sound recording, and off-site monitoring.
Using VideoLink to live stream to Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, and your own website.
Post-event editing, distribution, and analytics.
. . . and much more!
Ready to get started? Watch it today.

We are looking at integration options for audience tools like OptinMonster.
Any experience, success stories, killer integrations with tools like these?

Expanding the class CSS to individual links on menus
Allowing for a simple class='' option on each menu link. Once that option is available, then it will be up to the end-user (us) to define the class within your system, and chose to use it on the link. Updating would be as simple as changing the class name on the link in the editor.
You already do this for each 'block'. It just needs extending to the links within the menu blocks. Fairly simple feature, and one that wouldn't impact much on your system, but it would bring a lot of flexibility to the entire system, especially if you extended it to other items as well. Each 'item' (html entity) then has a class='' field that contains a user managed variable that could be controlled in your editor. I can imagine some very fancy work done, using this alone, and without you having to do anything extra after implementation.

Anyone else getting spam redirects on mobile devices?
We've had several people call about spam redirects on our website in the past couple of weeks. And we've already had three in the past hour. I submitted a ticket to TownNews and they said it isn't coming from our website. They said it comes from insecure websites and apps.
I think it's coming from Outbrain. When I load a story page with Outbrain enabled the page doesn't load securely on my phone and I get redirects. I disabled Outbrain and the pages then load securely. I also stopped getting the spam redirects.
So I decided to turn Outbrain back on. The page stopped loading securely and I started getting the redirects. Turned it off again, no redirects.
If this isn't originating from our website why does disabling Outbrain stop the redirects? And if this isn't originating from our website why do we have a noticeable influx of complaints?

Twitter Timeline Ads Program
We got an invite to this new program, anyone else currently participating or have thoughts to share?

A new view option for our uploaded publications.
We need the ability for optimal, simple navigation of our archived pdf publication by being able to
1: view either one or both pages full-screen without cutting the pages off. They need to fit the screen, and
2: then the ability to zoom in or out as one pleases.
3: This ability exists within an Adobe pdf, of which our publications can be downloaded, but some of our readers are not interested in downloading instructions or aren't fluent at downloading files so we need them to be able to easily read the publication online as if they were in an Adobe pdf, so that it takes as little thought as possible.
4: Also, to retain the option to view in the current format. The current format which doesn't allow zooming is still a good format, it just lacks the option to zoom in or out, or to view the spreads on screen.
5: The default format should be the one we are requesting, the "Adobe Reader pdf" format with spread viewing and zooming capability.

Option for a native PDF reader?
How PDF documents are displayed is a bit underwhelming.
Are there any plans to have a PDF reader added to BLOX so that we can display a PDF in the browser, rather than making the user download it just to view?
Adding in something native in like https://pdfobject.com/ would be simple, but I would love something more robust like https://issuu.com/ or https://www.scribd.com

Templates and GIT
It would be great to use GIT version control system to be able to get updates from TownNews base skins to be able to keep our modified (or branded) skins up to date. This would be easier to maintain up to date and helpful with trouble-shooting as tools such as diff could be used to see what has been changed.
Pulling updates, merging and pushing to git repositories or remote points, that would be then used by blox as source for the templates/skins would be amazing!

Modify Public-facing "Create an Event" form for multiple but non-recurring events
Quite often the "Create an Event" tool that is hosted on our website for
the public to enter events into our calendar labels events as Spam.
This occurs especially when someone is trying to create an event that
occurs multiple times but doesn't exactly meet recurring event criteria -
like a theater show that is performed three days in a row, but at different
times of day; or a presentation that happens 2 times in one day.
Because they can't use the recurring events function they attempt to
create a separate event for each date and time, typically the first one
they enter works but the subsequent events are rejected as Spam.
As a result, we fairly regularly receive emails or calls from people who
are getting tripped up by this. The solution we are trying now is to
simply turn the Spam filter off. Time will tell if this solution is
worse than the problem.
My idea is to modify the public-facing "Create an Event" form.
The form currently has an "Occurs" selection field - with options for
Once, Daily, Weekly, Monthly and Yearly - to handle the recurring
events. When the recurring choices are selected the form adapts and
presents more fields to define the recurrence in the When section.
Could there be an occurs "Multiple" option that would then present
additional Date and Time fields? When "Multiple" is selected a secondary
selector field could appear asking "# of Additional Times" with options
for, say, 1-10. With that selection the form would then present the
extra Date and Time fields, for instance labeled Date #2, Time #2; Date
#3, Time #3; Date #4, Time #4; etc.

Feature request: Add credit card swipe option to subscription portal
We would like to sign up new subscribers at events and festivals, etc. We have Paypal portable credit card swipers similar to Square and would like a way to connect this to the Blox subscription portal.
Customer support service by UserEcho