A few weeks ago we noticed that the printed page view numbers on iReport.com stories seemed awfully low. So we did a little digging and learned that the number of views that appears on every iReport.com story page wasn't being calculated the right way. That meant that stories like kbc9393's amazing video of this week's China earthquake was marked as having about 5,400 views when in reality it's more like 237,000. That's a big difference, and it reveals one more accurate measure of the impact iReport.com stories can have. So today we're happy to announce that the bug is fixed. From now on, new stories should get the right view count (and we're working hard on adjusting all the old stories, too).

That fix was part of a few site updates that rolled out this morning. Also included: a new "last updated" date on stories so you can know when they were edited and support for thumbnail images in our RSS feeds. Hooray! Hope you like the updates as much as we do.

Posted by lila // 3 days ago
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Posted in: site

iReport.com will be down for maintenance for about 15 minutes starting at 8 a.m. ET on Wednesday. If you've got news that can't wait while we're down, please send it to ireport@cnn.com. Thanks!

Posted by lila // 3 days ago
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Posted in: site

iReport.com will be down for about 20 minutes starting at 7:30 a.m. ET on Wednesday. If you have breaking news to share while we're out, please send your stories, videos and photos to ireport@cnn.com.

What's going on, you ask? Our engineers need to make important updates to keep the site running smoothly. You may have noticed we were out for about 15 minutes Tuesday afternoon -- we're doing the fixes Wednesday to (fingers crossed!) keep that from happening again.

Posted by lila // 2 weeks ago
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Posted in: site

iReport.com is expanding as each day of news and reader commentary passes by, and we're welcoming tons of new users to the site. Some of our newest contributors are sharing really awesome stories and we want to take a moment and recognize them.

An outstanding iReporter by the name of brettbum sent us amazing video he shot near the Colorado River resort community of Laughlin, Nevada, while mitchthrower documented a shark attack near Solana Beach, California. And don't forget BDrenning, who showed us lights over the sky of Phoenix, Arizona, as well as cute baby chicks. iReporter sankofa1867 spoke up about Sen. Barack Obama and aumaster, has documented aspects of life in Flagstaff, Arizona. Finally, matthewmilam submitted videos about cyberbullying and the Sean Bell verdict.

Posted by nsaidi // 2 weeks ago
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Posted in: community, creative, site

A perfect storm of terrific stories -- check out Skip Wilson's take on gas prices and nohelpca's plans for his tax rebate -- and controversy and comments over the Sean Bell verdict overwhelmed iReport.com's servers this afternoon and brought the site down for about 30 minutes. We're back up now, and working hard to make sure we're ready for the next big day before it happens. If you were trying to upload a new story and it failed, give it a try again now. And as always, let us know if you see something that's still not working.

Posted by lila // 3 weeks ago
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Posted in: site

We're glad to be back online after a short outage this morning. If you had trouble uploading earlier today, please try again now.

Posted by lila // 3 weeks ago
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Posted in: site

You may have noticed the site was down for about an hour today. We're happy to report that we're back in business, and are working hard to fix what went wrong. Meantime, if you see anything not quite right, please drop us a comment or send a note to contact@ireport.com.

Posted by lila // 1 month ago
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Posted in: site

Phew -- the problem we had this morning with new stories getting stuck on their way to iReport.com is fixed. Please upload away! We're still working on un-sticking some of the stories from earlier this morning, and will post updates right here. Thanks!

UPDATE: I think we've got all the stories that were stuck. If yours is still missing, please e-mail us so we can investigate.

Posted by lila // 1 month ago
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Posted in: site

Good morning -- we've just discovered a technical problem with our upload engine that's keeping new stories from posting to the site. We're working hard on a fix right now. Stay tuned to the blog for updates. Thanks!

Posted by lila // 1 month ago
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Posted in: site

Good news! We're up and running again after some fine-tuning this evening. Uploads should work again as normal. As always, if you see anything that's not quite right, please just drop a line in the comments or send us an e-mail.

Posted by lila // 1 month ago
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Posted in: site

We need to take the iReport.com upload tool offline for a few minutes tonight to make important updates. Please note: you will not be able to upload new stories starting at 9 p.m. ET. We expect the outage to last just ten minutes, and we'll update you here when everything's back to normal. Thanks for your patience while we make improvements!

Posted by lila // 1 month ago
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Posted in: site

We took the site down for a few minutes this morning to send out a new version of the software. A few of the notable fixes:

• No more lost comments!
• The "Latest" and "Most Commented" sorts on the homepage and iReports page will now display the newest and most commented stories IN ORDER!
• Photo views fixed on IE6 (we used to have trouble displaying more than 6 images on IE6, but no more)

Posted by lila // 2 months ago
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Posted in: beta, site

Great news -- we just released a new patch to the iReport.com software that fixes a few things that were bugging us. My personal favorite, the truncated story headlines you used to see on story pages. Before the fix went out, the headline on the story page would get chopped down to just the first line, which resulted in some fairly silly stuff: "BREAKING NEWS Ketchup" instead of "BREAKING NEWS Ketchup assassinated," etc. Actually, that one's still pretty silly even with the full headline, but you get the idea. Also, we added in ellipses to homepage headlines that get shortened to fit in tight spaces.

We have more fixes coming in future releases. Here are a few of the big ones:
- Comments that disappear
- "Most commented" sort on main page not always right
- Posted time not always accurate on stories
- Stories with multiple photos not displaying on IE 6

What's missing? Please tell us! Leave a comment below, or fill out a comment card by clicking on the "Feedback" link near the iReport.com logo at the top of every page.

Posted by lila // 2 months ago
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Posted in: beta, site

In the week or so since we rolled out the beta site, many of you have taken the time to send us your thoughts through the feedback links found throughout the site. We really appreciate it! Thanks to everyone who has given us some insight into how we can improve this site and make it more useful and user-friendly for everyone (and please keep it coming!).

Many of you have told us that you found the beta site engaging, visually appealing, easy to use, and that you'd even recommend it to your friends (thanks, we hope you do!). You also told us you were able to find what you were looking for easily, and that you enjoyed rating, sharing, and commenting on iReports. We're paying special attention to your feature requests. Soon, you'll be able to utilize RSS feeds, embed iReport videos into your own blogs and sites, and have the ability to edit your story after it has been submitted. If any part of your experience on the site was less than ideal today, please let us know about it so that we can fix it -- your input is invaluable to us as we keep working to get it right during the beta period.

Have some feedback for us? We welcome anything from compliments to complaints, and we read it all. Look for the Feedback link next to the iReport logo on all pages, and let us know your thoughts. We'll do our best to address your input.

Posted by klu // 2 months ago
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Posted in: beta, site, feedback, user_experience

The iReport.com beta is less than a week old, and already your stories are being used in CNN's global news coverage. I just wanted to share a few examples with you:

• iReporter Aferdita uploaded celebratory photos she took of Kosovo's declaration of independence. Those images were incorporated into a story on CNN.com.
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• iReporter jackieingles snapped images from a memorial for students slain in a tragic campus shooting at Southern Illinois University on February 16. Her photos were part of a CNN.com photo gallery.
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• iReporter and Second Life enthusiast Janey Bracken wrote a story about autism in a virtual world. Her report was published on CNN's SL iReport blog.
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• And DanMcDermott holds a special place in iReport.com's early history.
  Dan's audio slideshow from the Virginia Primary elections became the first iReport since the beta launch to be incorporated into CNN's news coverage on CNN.com Live.
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  How will you know if a story on iReport.com has been used by CNN? Look for the "On CNN" stamp. You can see them all right here.

Posted by tyson // 2 months ago
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Posted in: shoutouts, beta, site, cnn, news