By Laura AP Boylan
Scifi.com is a competently designed and well laid out site that serves
well as both a site for the network and a source of original material.
The main page starts out with a tasteful logo. Underneath that are
six or so headlines linking to SciFi Wire, the scifi.com news service.
In the top center there is a large ad for some part of the site, and
next to that an easy to read listing of what's playing now and for
the next few hours. Most banner ads are promotions for other parts
of the site. The ads for other sites are generally small and not very
distracting.
"Scifi.com Presents" has a variety of content. They have
flash animation weekly series, classic and original science fiction
stories and downloadable short films from "Exposure", the
short film program that airs on the SciFi channel.
What makes the site not just useful but interesting is the original
content. The "Seeing Ear Theatre" produces streaming audio
drama. J. Michael Straczynski, creator of Babylon 5, writes an anthology
series, "City of Dreams". "Tales from the Crypt"
continues the long running comic and television series in yet another
medium. The Original Playhouse has original works along with adaptations
of science fiction stories and novels. They are free to listen to
but can also be purchased from audible.com.
The Colony section contains some chat transcripts, message boards
and allows members to create homepages, but doesn't have that much
content.