UK Action for ME - policies, actions and publications - discussion thread

Revamped new website is live.

 

Haven’t read through it all yet,definitely needs more on severe M.E. but was thrilled to see ‘Pacing should not be seen as a treatment, but more as a way of coping with the impact of ME’

 

The website is better organised but not sure on the new logo. It all cost £43000 though - which is a lot. But maybe that's what branding and websites cost these days?!

 

That's a lot of money! Do you mind if I ask where you saw that figure?

 

Sure it's on their website
https://www.actionforme.org.uk/our-new-website/

 

Thanks! Wow, these things cost a bit. But I suppose that if they're getting a quarter of a million visits a year, it's worth a one-off investment to fix it up.

 

It is for much bigger organisations

I’m not sure what has been involved here etc though and don’t know how much that figure would be in proportion to size (as it relates to amount of work I guess)

 

I don’t think it’s that expensive. If they update every 10 years then it’s £4,300k per year.

 

No, it doesn't sound out of the way. Especially as the job usually involves creating a set of assets that are used elsewhere, it's rarely only a website.

I don't know what one of my former employers paid for the redesign of their logo, but it's been in use for at least 35 years with (I think) only one relatively minor tweak.

 

I have always thought a national charity that has that name and now uses that bold new logo should take on the job to lead campaigns yet Action for ME , in contrast to the MS society & parkinsons UK closed their short lived campaigns network a year or so ago. I couldn't see much difference in the website as I briefly use it, which isn't much. Most striking to me & i don’t know if this is new , was the listing of staff in alphabetical order, rather than in order of seniority which put Sonya Chowdhury last not first, the deputy CEO role seem to have gone and surprised that The about the staff section was a “lite” brief what do you enjoy or why did you join and then a question about a hobbie, meal or movie.

 

I think the logo is unhelpful. I can understand Action for ME continuing to use the term 'ME' on grounds of continuity but isolating it in orange like that is a bad idea.

It is time we moved away from talking of 'ME'. It was an idea for an illness that isn't even the one we are interested in and turned out probably not to be what was claimed. It is also associated in the public mind with yuppie flu and self-diagnosed tiredness.

And the style hardly makes the organisation look serious and authoritative.

 

I see your point, but what are our charities to do? AfME, the MEA, MERUK, IiME - they've all got the same problem. It costs a lot of money to change branding, and what if we suddenly discover something that leads to a genuinely pathology-based name? They'd all have to change again, along with changing their website URLs, and they could lose a lot of confused, inattentive or uninformed PwME in the process.

I was persuaded by your arguments for using 'ME/CFS' and have started using it myself instead of 'ME', but it's nevertheless a very awkward name, with connotations of our BPS masters. Moving to that as an interim measure when things could change doesn't seem like a good move.

I agree.

 

You miss my point, Sasha. I am not suggesting that AfME change their name. I am just saying that it doesn't help to now have the 'ME" scrawled in bright orange. Until quite recently the major US journal for rheumatology was called 'Arthritis and Rheumatism' despite everyone agreeing that rheumatism was a meaningless term about fifty years ago. It is as if the journal rebranded itself with the 'rheumatism' in huge wonky orange writing. Nobody would ever take it seriously again.

 

Fair point! I just googled 'medical charity logo UK' and clicked on 'Images' and saw a whole load of (admittedly boring) logos where the medical condition isn't emphasised in the design. It could have been done.

 

Doesn't look or feel like a professional makeover when this is the first page that comes up:


I can't seem to get rid of the pop-up and the 'back' tab doesn't do anything.

 

No, it doesn't clear on Safari unless you click one of the links above it. And it's not one of those screens that gets held up because the cookie options box needs to be dealt with first—I'd already declined cookies.

The "back" link works on Firefox and Chrome, but takes you away from the site to a blank page.

 

Not a fan of the logo or colours, however having experience in charities I can imagine it ticks a lot of boxes. I am personally creating a fantasy in my mind, entirely made up, that they want to get their house in order pending a big reveal by Decode ME later this year….I can dream

 

I like that story!