Selected events?

Has anyone seen this new feature in the event postings area of the new website?

How does this work exactly? Is it randomly selected?

Thanks everyone!

I've seen obvious spam events come up as well as ones from small groups, so I'm assuming they're randomly selected from the events currently showing in your list (i.e., only Education events show up if you have the Education category selected).

If they are random, then I'm very happy with the idea. Gives smaller events a bit of a spotlight they wouldn't have otherwise. And with the obvious spam showing up in that spotlight, it might motivate LL to start cleaning the event listings up.

The Selected Event is the one you've selected by clicking on it in the listing. I've just run a test by opening the event page, and being very careful to avoid clicking anywhere on the page. The Selected Event panel has remained blank for at least a minute.

The fact that you have to ask this is indicative of poor usability. There are at least two usability flaws that I can identify. One has already been mentioned in other threads, namely that on many layouts, you don't see both the Selected Event panel and the event listing at the same time.

The second is that the highlighting of the currently selected item in the event listing is too subtle. It changes to a pale blue background instead of a pale bluish-grey.

Another problem, arguably, is that within the Selected Event box, the event title isn't given enough prominence. I think it's a problem, but I don't know if it contributes to the inability to associate the Selected Event with the event listing.

Finally, I've observed a bug in the JavaScript. Selecting an event in the event list seems reliable about changing both the background color and the contents of the Selected Event box, but is inconsistent about changing the text in the event listing to bold face.

For me, it shows new Selected Events immediately, even when I haven't clicked anywhere or had my mouse anywhere near the listings themselves. If you do select an event, that becomes the Selected Event, but if you don't, it selects one for you (randomly, as far as I can tell).

I wonder if your test was bugged by the same slow-loading problems other people have reported. I'm shaking my head in puzzlement over those; with my older computer, I'm usually the first to experience speed or loading problems in-world or on the web, but I haven't had any problems at all with the new site. (Well, not _those_ sorts of problems at least!)