Morning Bell: Welcome to the New Foundry.org

Welcome to the new Foundry.org! Today, The Heritage Foundation is excited to re-launch The Foundry, the foremost conservative blog for public policy news.

It was only 18 months ago that we introduced you to our former Foundry design. Since then, Washington policy debates have grown even more critical, and so has keeping you informed of their impacts. The face of digital news and media has also changed tremendously, and we are committed to ensuring that our product remains a pioneer among our peers.

With the new Foundry.org, we can offer better navigation and content, more compelling video features, enhanced commenting and reader engagement, and superior ways for you to share our content and spread the conservative message.

If you’re a regular visitor to The Foundry, you’ll notice the striking new ways you can interact with us immediately:

Customize: The Heritage Foundation offers analysis over a vast array of issue areas. Our Leadership for America initiative offers 10 critical breakdowns that help visitors focus in on specific issue analysis. Some visitors care more deeply about one of these issues than the others. Now you can choose whichever issue you like from the menu at the top of the page and get a fully functioning customized experience specific to your wants.

Navigate: With issues percolating — like Obamacare, the debt limit, the budget, Libya, oil prices, Afghanistan and so on —it’s hard to keep track of what’s important to keep your eye on. We hope to help. At the top of the page, you’ll see “Trending” issues that will allow you to quickly find stories on the news of the day. Below that is a scrolling feature of some of the most relevant stories of the day.

Share: There’s a familiar joke: “If you don’t like the weather, wait a day and it will change.” The same can be said for social media. We have built the new Foundry to house the primary elements you need to share content and spread the conservative message today. And when social media offers new tools, we’ll be incorporating them. One new feature you’ll notice is Google’s “+1”. The Foundry is one of the first sites to integrate this new sharing tool that allows those logged into Google to offer advice on search results. Facebook and Twitter remain a core sharing feature for us, and we encourage you to “like” and “follow” us on there today.

Engage: Below each blog post, you’ll see a new comment section. As you could before, you can still sign in as a guest and leave civil feedback, positive or negative, to our stories. But now, you can also log on using social media accounts to share your thoughts more broadly and personally. You can also react specifically to other user comments. We encourage a lively debate and discussion, but we also remind you to be respectful of one another. We’re all here on behalf of the same great nation.

Investigate: Scribe is a new section we are thrilled to introduce. Rob Bluey, Director of Heritage’s Center for Media and Public Policy, is leading our investigative reporting unit that will dig deeper into stories the mainstream media ignores. Whether it’s the drilling moratorium, Obamacare, union intimidation, or other government overreach, Bluey and his team will be covering the story.

Watch: The Foundry houses brilliant video products that deliver compelling conservative messages in a short minute or two. With new pop-up video boxes, it’s easier than ever to watch a video without leaving the page. On the right hand side of the page, you’ll see our daily featured video. We encourage you to click and watch. And if you haven’t already, find us on YouTube and subscribe to our page.

Sign Up: The Morning Bell is the signature e-mail product of The Heritage Foundation offering you a quick conservative analysis of the most important news of the day. If you’re having a debate around the water cooler, the Morning Bell will arm you with the facts to help persuade your audience. If you’re not already receiving it, please sign up. And if you are already receiving it, thank you! Please ask five of your friends to join the nearly 200,000 daily individual subscribers.

These are just a few of the new ways you can connect with us at The Foundry. We hope we’ve made visiting our site something you’ll enjoy doing on a daily basis. And if you’re on the go, check us out on your phone, Kindle, or iPad, where we offer magazine-like browsing within your browser. We’ll be rolling out incredible new mobile apps as the year progresses.

As always, thank you for your loyal patronage and involvement. Without you, we wouldn’t have 345,000 fans on Facebook or 142,000 followers on Twitter. Without your support of The Heritage Foundation, we wouldn’t have over 710,000 members and growing. And we wouldn’t be able to offer you this amazing content from some of the greatest researchers, analysts, and policy experts around. Please check it all out. Leave a comment and let us know what you think. We look forward to seeing you again.