The following is a look at the machinations and plots behind the scenes at the Nation Network. If you don’t care/don’t want to know please click here to read a riveting piece about the Oilers overcoming an early season insistence on using the swarm defense. You have been warned.
Late at night while everyone is asleep in their beds, little elves are hard at work redeveloping the 9 site Nation Network. This will mean a new look and new functionality across the sites, especially NHLNumbers.com. Once this Herculean task has been completed and the sites are all working from the same technology playbook we will get back to growing the Nation Network in terms of writers, sites and functionality.
The Nation Network continues to grow year after year. Believe it or not we now see more traffic on a month to month basis in the US than in Canada and our sixth busiest city is now Helsinki, Finland. While we try to wrap our collective brains around those two facts and attempt to compute the direction in which we must head, work goes on mashing all our different outposts, 18,000 articles and 631,000 comments onto a new platform without losing a single precious word or well constructed comment.
We are currently 4 months into the redevelopment project working with contractors in Toronto and should start seeing some new babies pushed screaming out into the world in the next few weeks. From there we will begin work on the Nation Network App which will pull in data and articles from different sites and will include a sequel to the ever popular Clash of Clans.*
The team is growing too – we now count 56 writers on our roster and 6 FT staff at Nation Network World HQ and Car Wash in Edmonton and a second office now open in Toronto.** And today we are very pleased to name Thomas Drance as our Editor-in-Chief.
ALL HAIL TD
Thomas Drance – a legit good guy if ever there was one – was one of our very first contributors to CanucksArmy back in 2011. Despite the notable handicap of having to write about one of history’s greatest abominations of a hockey squadron he did an excellent job and was named Site Editor shortly thereafter. Then we lost him in a gunfight to The Score but won him back with promises of “being cloaked in immense power” working with a company that is “totally clothing optional.”
And today he follows in the footsteps of yours truly, Kent Wilson and Brian Sutherby being named our fourth Editor in Chief.
What say you Mr Drance?
“So today is my first day as the Editor in Chief of the Nation Network. I’m honoured and excited to be entrusted with the opportunity of managing Canada’s biggest independent hockey blog network, and I’m dedicated to preserving and improving upon what you all love about the Nations Network.
—
ANALYSIS
Fists fly forever?! Man, that’s dope. Please leave any comments you would like the new boss to peruse in the section below. And while Drance consolidates his power and shows little mercy to his enemies during the come up we will get back to tasering our contractors in Toronto.
Good luck Thom.
* Seriously imagine it did? That would be sick. That game runs my show.
** No actual office exists yet – just awesome folks working FT from coffee shops and their homes.
Led by a Canucks fan? I’m outta here.
But it was led y a Flames fan for years, so…
Even Flames fans have hockey knowledge, I have yet to meet a Canucks fan with any knowledge of the game of hockey!
Please prove me wrong TD
Evidently ignorance is bliss.
Very good choice. Level headed guy, intelligent, wise in the way of words and calculator. He’ll be crazy by Christmas!
Welcome Drance!
where to drop off resumes.for the car wash, and seriously every post on the leafs and the nucks nation you only see 4 to 5 comments only.
Canucks fans cant read and Leafs fans can’t type so that is a hurdle much bigger than the Nation can overcome.
Seriously hey? Crazy times.
I suggest you insert the phrase “NUMBER SIX IN HELINSKI!” in future podcasts.
I know it doesn’t make sense.
Don’t even think about stealing my coffee mug, Drance!
Wait a minute. Wanye. Wilson. Sutherby. Drance. Are you ‘rebuilding’ the Nations’ network previous rebuilds? As Oiler fans, we can spot those a mile away.
Hell no! We have been killing it since day one around here. All those guys are here in a different capacity unlike the Oilers who retain their former managers in different capacities. Hmm.
Typical oiler guy!! Hire someone already in the system!! Did you pull an Oiler and not ever bother interviewing other candidates?? Bet you even broke the news to kent via Skype!! Lol
First of all, Kent has not been the overlord for some time. Second of all, that is all.
trying to be funny… Apparantly im not very good at it I guess
I laughed.
Leave Lychan alone. He is either ill informed or out of touch and thinks that people associated with the Flames are still current and relevant– that means he’s now ready for Oilers’ management. Welcome aboard Lychan.