The Onion - Regular Features

Regular Features

Regular features of The Onion include:

• "STATshot", an illustrated statistical snapshot which parodies "USA Today Snapshots"
• The "Infograph" (a.k.a. "Infographic"), with a bulleted list of items on a theme.
• Point-Counterpoint
• Guest opinion pieces and regular columnists
• Bizarre horoscopes
• "News in Photos", a feature with photographs of seemingly common or inconspicuous things labelled with captions revealing a hidden thing about it; the photos may also be of people, both famous and anonymous.
• "The ONION in History", a front page produced in the style/format of newspapers of an earlier era, from the book Our Dumb Century
• "In the News" photograph and caption with no accompanying story (such as "Frederick's of Anchorage Debuts Crotchless Long Underwear", "National Association Advances Colored Person", and "Owls Are Assholes".)
• "American Voices" (formerly called "What Do You Think?"), a mock vox populi survey on a topical current event. There are three respondents, down from the original six, for each topic, who seem to have been chosen intentionally to represent a diverse selection of ages, races, and socio-economic classes. Although their names and professions change daily, photos of the same six people are almost always used. One of them is often described as a systems analyst.
• An editorial cartoon drawn by "Kelly", a fictional character; the cartoons are actually the work of Ward Sutton. The comic—the most controversial feature in The Onion—is a deadpan parody of conservative cartoons, as well as editorial cartoon conventions in general. Roughly half of the cartoons feature the Statue of Liberty, usually shedding a single tear.

The website was redesigned in 2005:

• All archives were returned to being free; and Onion Premium, a failed attempt at a paid-subscriber model section of the site, was discontinued.
• "What Do You Think?" became "American Voices," with the question updated every weekday, and only three responders for each question, instead of six.
• "In the News" was retitled "From the Print Edition"
• The Onion began publishing web-only content on a daily basis, such as a daily fictional stock market analysis titled "Stock Watch" (one of which appears in the print edition every week), a web opinion poll titled "QuickPoll" (since discontinued), "National News Highlights" of three regional stories, the cover of The Onion Weekender (a parody of PARADE magazine), The Onion Magazine (a parody of The New York Times Magazine), and OSN The Magazine (a parody of ESPN The Magazine) and The President's Weekly Radio Address.
• The nationally syndicated Onion Radio News, a brief audio clip read by anchor Doyle Redland, became a daily feature. In early 2006, Onion Radio News podcast was launched, and quickly shot to No. 1 on the iTunes list of top podcasts.
• A sports section was introduced, having archival material from old issues in addition to new articles (such as "Matt Leinart Wins Beauty Portion of 2006 NFL Draft") and rotating headlines such as "New York Rangers Honor Proud Madison Square Garden Tradition by Losing". This has since been expanded into the full-fledged OSN section.

The Onion website is updated every day, most significantly (and historically before the move to daily updates) on Wednesday afternoons; and The Onion newspaper is distributed on Thursdays. More recently, the website was moderately redesigned. Changes included:

• The President's Weekly Radio Address was discontinued.
• A new navigation bar was added to the top of most pages, excluding OSN, with links to video, ONN on TV, Sports, Politics, the other sections (see below) and News Beat.
• A new section termed "News Beat" was introduced, gathering fake weather reports and featured quotes, interactive quizzes and polls, the cover to the most recent editions, and what stories are popular right now.
• The Opinion, Local, Sci & Tech, and Entertainment sections were linked at the bottom of the home page, filed under 'More' on the new navigation bar.
• A new video series titled The Onion Review showcasing some of the top stories in The Onion and related media from the week.
• ONN online segments had their graphics updated, specifically to match the ONN TV series in the lower-thirds.