We are very pleased to announce the release of JReviews 2.1 beta. This release is the result of several months of work and includes many brand new features and improvements to existing features. We hope to have a stable version in a few weeks.

A few of the highlights:

* Improved moderation: There are new moderation menus that allow you to approve, hold or reject pending items and send predefined or custom emails to the submitter. You can also write an admin note for the moderated item.
* Criteria ratings can now be optional: The criteria manager interface has been improved and there is a new option for each criterion so you can make it optional.
* Listing owners can reply to reviews: Now listing owners can reply to user reviews to defend themselves from a negative review, to thank the user or to simply post a comment to the review. Replies can be moderated.
* Review discussions: Users can now start discussions around user reviews with this new mini forum-like functionality.
* Multiple editor reviews per listing: It is now possible to allow all of your designated JReviews editors to review the listings.
* Claim listings: Let users claim a listing as their own so they keep the information updated. New claimss are put in the moderation queue so you can verify the information and ownership is automatically changed when the claim is approved.
* Listing inquiries: We have simplified the process to allow users to contact listing owners. The feature comes with several email options and requires a single line of code to be added in the detail theme file.
* Four new menu types: Latest user reviews, latest editor reviews, latest reviews (all) and latest discussion posts.
* New slider effect for pagination in modules: The ajax pagination has been taken to a whole new level with this change that adds smooth transitions between pages.
* Improved Jomsocial integration: activity feeds and points are now included

To read the full release go here:

http://www.reviewsforjoomla.com/newsletters/jreviews2.1-released-with-exciting-new-features.html