By Denis Campbell

Welcome to the All-New UK Progressive! We begin our second year of operation in a very big way. As you navigate around the website a number of changes both cosmetic (our new logo with an American flag waving on the background of the Welsh dragon) and technical (all the live feeds) will become obvious.

We work night and day to bring news and public events to life. In addition to our traditional insight, analysis and critical looks from columnists and analysts across the globe, we also are thrilled to also bring you numerous live feeds from several sources across the political spectrum.

What’s new?

• Live News RSS/XML and Twitter Feeds galore: if you are not familiar with it, Twitter is a global micro-blogging platform limited to 140 characters. It is how we Journos (Twitter-speak for journalists) talk amongst ourselves and communicate with our follower fans. A huge shout out must go to our Web-Guru, the extraordinary Ian Shaw of Divazzy Ltd. He has “mashed-up” several political feeds from thought leaders around the globe into a series of ginormous feeds. Basically if something happens, we want to bring it to you as close to live as possible. The ‘instant’ world of Twitter allows that, especially since Twitter is where journos broke the Hudson River and Schiphol plane crashes, G-20 riots, US torture memos, swine flu outbreak and we’re very focused and listening to the best and brightest.
• We’re also proud of the new Welsh/UK Political news mash-up we created to bring you the best feeds from blog sites across Wales and the UK. With an election coming sometime in the next year, you can see exactly what each party and commentators all have to say in one convenient place.
• We’re also bringing you the live feeds of Tweetminster and Capitol Tweets. These are the actual, live Twitter Tweets of members of UK’s Parliament and the US Congress. This insight allows you to see what the issues of the day are from their perspective.
• We’ve also built a third bespoke feed covering the Executive branches of both nations as we follow WhiteHouse.gov, Recovery.gov and Number 10 (Downing Street’s) feeds.
• As for the news and analysis you have come to expect from UK Progressive, we have four daily lead stories covering a variety of Political, Business and UK issues. We’ve reduced the total number of categories to focus on what you told us we do best:

US Politics,

Business and The Economy,

UK and Welsh Politics and

a category we’re calling Reflections On… (which if this were the telly game show Jeopardy would be called potpourri!).

• We also have a video archive and larger media player that allows you to scroll along and see several of the best videos we’ve compiled over time. I’m happy because I no longer have to worry and/or limit the amount of time a video appears or fear losing an important one too soon. You can see and watch them at YOUR leisure vs. ours! (Yeah!)

Poor Ian has not slept this launch week tweaking the Twitter and RSS mash-ups to get them to appear as we envisioned them. Simply, news does not wait for you or I so this site, with great thanks to Ian, will not wait either. You don’t wait for the BBC 10 O’clock News or have the time to watch NBC Nightly News at 6:30. You likely download a podcast or visit a website or… take most news on your handheld device. We understand that news is news to you when you want it, vs. when we choose to give it to you.

That is why we are working on a new model that political parties and news organisations can use to bring news in a customised format to viewers.

It is a very exciting time to be in the news business.

A second shout goes out to Craig Whitney, Andy Grainger and Lee Hersford-Evans of the branding agency Grainger and Whitney in Bridgend, Wales. They are responsible for the redesign of our logo and branding. We will shortly launch companion websites An American in Wales and Using Obama’s Best Practices to help businesses and political campaigns use these ever expanding tools to set them apart in the coming election and/or survive and thrive during this crushing recession.

So onward and upward and thanks again for following us.