This may not be a big deal but I find that most pages on the giffgaff website follow a clean graphical look apart from the community page. I have done a mock up of a possible solution.
In response I have to say Im not the best when it comes to the technicalities of the website. However I believe the most recent topics are slightly irrelevant because they change so quickly and are so small. Plus there is a recent topics box below already. Also this layout would simply hyperlink to the current community pages (e.g blog, ideas etc) so I think lithium would not be an issue. I see also though it is between providing a service for users and contributers. Looking forward to further discussion.
Hi driatheef I used screen grabs and a mixture of adobe illustrator and adobe photoshop to produce the mockup. Also thanks for showing the other link. My response to the other link is that that idea was just to add pictures. This idea is to simplify and bring the community page more in line with the rest of the website. Thanks
@highlander There are subtle differences to the two ideas but just thought I would bring that up to see if everything is okay with the duplicators. Just a measure that's all and reading from your perspective I agree that the two ideas are different in their own way. By the way: The mockup looks fantastically simple yet effective, I would like Giffgaff to implement this layout ASAP!
Have a look at http://lithosphere.lithium.com/ which shows a combination of visual section headings accompanied by the other modules such as recent posts. Something like that using the graphics from this idea as a navigation bar might also work, thus making maximum use of the page space whilst retaining plenty of room below for the topic and posts modules, thus getting the best of both worlds... Oh and I do love the mockup, it's just I like to maximise the use of the visible page...
Lovely idea you've got here so thank you for spending the time to produce your mock-up.
The idea I feel would work as Darren has mention, simple and advanced. By default newbies see the simple 'attractive' layout and then a JavaScript function can call the other layout.
An example of this in HTML is the mobile view and desktop, this is how I think this idea should work .
Love your idea! And appreciate your hard work! Actually agree with you you do have the recent topics below so maybe you have covered all aspects keeping it nice and simple And visually looks a lot nicer!