Yéle Haiti

The tragedy of the past week left us, like so many around the world, speechless. While the full impact of the quake was slowly becoming clear, we sat here wishing there was more we could do to help.

Every once in a while opportunity drops right in your lap.

On Wednesday, January 13th, we happened to run across a particularly high-traffic site that had just been created. It didn't take long for us to realize who it was. "Yéle Haiti? Isn't that Wyclef's relief organization that we just saw on CNN?" Within minutes we had emailed the link around to the entire office and verified that this was the real deal.

We were hosting an organization that was on the ground, making an immediate impact towards recovery. We immediately reached out to the Yéle Haiti folks to see if there was anything we could do. 

Apparently, on the first day of the earthquake, their previous web host had crashed under the strain of traffic brought on by people around the world looking to learn more and make a difference. The Yéle Haiti team looked to move to a platform that could handle this increased load and decided on Squarespace. They quickly redirected yele.org and our cloud infrastructure began immediately serving more than 10,000 uniques to it every hour. With the immediate traffic issues solved, Senior Designer Krystyn Heide jumped in to work with Yéle Haiti team on fine-tuning the design.

Previously, their site was static and difficult to update. As Yéle Haiti's mission is now shifting from long-term projects to immediate earthquake relief, the flexibility of Squarespace is critical in allowing multiple staffers to quickly edit content, whether in front of a computer or in the field via email or our iPhone app.

We are so excited to be able to help and sincerely ask that you do the same. Watch Yéle's live press conference from yesterday to hear more about their organization's recent efforts.  If you would like to make a tax deductible donation, you can either text "YELE" to 501501 on your cell phone (a $5 donation will be charged to your next cell phone bill), or donate online.

Our hearts go out to everyone involved.

iPhone App 1.0.7 Updates

The Squarespace iPhone app has been steadily improving since it's initial launch.  We've been listening to user feedback, fixing bugs, and rolling out lots of new features.  If you don't have the latest update v1.0.7, you can grab a copy here.

So what's new in the latest release?

• Orientation - The entire app can be viewed in either landscape or portrait mode.
• Editors Accounts - It's now much easier to register an editor account.  
• Syncing Posts - When saving a post, either publish directly to your website, save to your website in draft mode, or save offline to your iPhone.  Syncing posts between the iPhone and your website is now much easier.
• Multiple Account Switching - Add as many accounts as you need.  Or even add the same account several times, with each one using a different journal.  You can quickly switch between accounts by selecting the drop-down title bar at top.
• Image Sizing - In the accounts page, you can now set up default image sizes for each account.
• Image Editing - It is now much easier to add images, rearrange them, and delete them from your posts.
• Speed - We've made a bunch of speed-related optimizations.  The app now feels much more fluid.
• Bugs - Yup, we had a few.  But we're working hard to squash these as quickly as they come.  Keep sending in support tickets if you find one!

Additional upgrades are around the corner.  Some of the new features you can expect soon are:

• Post comment approval and management.  Also, the ability to receive push notifications when you receive comments.
• Tight integration with your Twitter account.
• Advanced ability to edit the positioning and sizing of images.
• ...and a few more surprises! :)

Thanks again for using the app!