Eugene Field, poet and editor of the Star's rival The Kansas City Times, circa 1880 Subscribers to the Kansas City Star web site are well informed. When the user enters the site, the front page boasts a bold, colorful masthead with a major story ticker beneath it and a barrage of choices on the top bar and side bar. The side bar has an index similar to a printed paper, with 29 options ranging from local news, business and sports to comics, kids, classified and the Yellow Pages. There is a dominant daily advertisement on the front page under the masthead with a graphic that flips or flashes. Although the masthead ad is conspicuous and the user is led out of the Star when clicking on either of these aforementioned sites, the Star's entire site for the most part is commercial-free.
Online articles are identical with the printed version.
The major news stories of the hour are prominently center screen so the news-hungry are not confused by ads or otherwise distracted, but the user must scroll down to read the bulk of the story. At least one of the headline news articles is accompanied by a related picture and caption. When the user jumps to read the full article, a smaller Star logo rests in the upper left corner with a tiny banner of sports, business, FYI, local, and showtime at the top of article. Related links or other articles similar in content are posted conveniently at the beginning of the article and the columnists' phone number and email address footnote most articles. At the bottom of the front page are eight larger icons with links to diverse sites.