More than a few of you had an opinion about our extreme makeover. Most of it was so overwhelmingly positive that we couldn't help but make it the sole focus of today's Rants and Raves. Or should we call it Raves and Raves?! If only Sally Field could be here to paraphrase how we feel:
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Re: Wired News Homepage
By Wired News
From: MP3
Good site! Thanks. Bye.
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Re: Wired News Homepage
By Wired News
From: USA
Nice site. Thank you!
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Unfortunately, not all the feedback was so glowingly positive. A small minority of readers had some minor quibbles:
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Re: Wired News Homepage
By Wired News
From: David Fiorito
I just opened up your site for the first time in a few days. Hate to say it but the new layout stinks. I see all these blue category lines but the actual headlines are not very easy to scan through. I have been a daily visitor to the site for quite some time but now I may just have to remove your site from my bookmarks and maybe even my feed burner. For the longest time you guys were the leaders in design but now it looks like you have jumped the shark.
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Re: Wired News Homepage
By Wired News
From: Emmett Merwin
To which middle school art class did you farm this out?
This "new look"' is awful. Chunky, clunky and non-intuitive. Giant images alongside large text makes it hard to navigate or even decide which story links to follow.
I'm all for modern progressive design but please, think of the user first!
If UI improvments aren't made, I probably will use Wired.com less and search for a site that is better organized and easier to comprehend.
Good luck!
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Re: Wired News Homepage
By Wired News
From: Matt C
No. No. No. Bad Wired. Surely this is some cruel joke because you withheld pizza and caffeine from the html coders, yes?
Hard to read, ugly, not anywhere as user-friendly as previous layout. Good God, 72-point type headlines on a web page? Did you give the layout authority to some high school journalism students? And where are our beloved icons that told readers with but a glance what topic the story was under? Change it back, please!
If I was but a casual surfer (instead of a regular reader and know what quality you're capable of) and stumbled across your news page with the beta layout, I would never revisit.
Seriously, it's terrible. It's hard on the eyes and distracting. Less useful content is immediately visible onscreen upon page load. Did I mention ugly?
Bring back the standard layout, please.
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Re: Wired News Homepage
By Wired News
From: Mark Rosal, Creative Director
I'm a big supporter of Wired.com as well as the print mag. I'm also a creative director (specifically interactive these days).
The print magazine has a tremendous design history and deservedly so. The online presence has been very good. Even in the past 2 redesigns, the homepage has been inviting, informative and easy to skim.
This new redesign is altogether jarring and disappointing. The flow of content now seems scattered and the ability to pick headlines is a more difficult process. There were some odd design decisions – notably the full column of white space to the right of your graveyard-and-tombstone-like field of headlines.
Please either re-examine the new design or revert back to the previous version. Otherwise, you've more or less lost a reader – not on content mind you, but instead, on poor presentation and organization of said content.
Good luck.
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Sorry to be blunt, but what the hell have you done to your homepage? It looks like a big oversized kiddie page.
Now maybe it's because I'm looking at it via Safari (though I would assume your usability people have looked at multiple browsers). But my choice of browser has nothing to do with the animated, music-blaring ad that started automatically upon load. Very annoying.
Sorry guys, but I'm done with Wired.com.
Of course you may reply with what I tell the users of my free site when they complain: "I'll be happy to return every penny of your subscription."
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Re: Wired News Homepage
By Wired News
From: Ron Lawson
Just wanted to give my two cents about your beta homepage. It is very hard to scan the stories and doesn't make me want to stay and read. Please go back to the old homepage with one story per line. Cheers.
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Re: Wired News Homepage
By Wired News
From: Vilo Ivanic
Why do you mess up a perfectly good thing? I liked it very much how your site was organized before. It was easy to spot my favorite sections. Now it is all just the same. Recently News.com changed its design. My attendance to its website dropped 80 percent. To change the design of the website is same thing as changing the logo of the company. Not a good thing. Your website was cool. People felt at home there. Now it is all messed up, indifferent and boring. Put back the good old design!
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Re: Wired News Homepage
By Wired News
From: Serge van Neck
As a longtime Wired mag subscriber and daily Wired News reader, I'm appalled at the ugly format of your redesigned website. What I loved about Wired News before was its clear structure, legibility, reverse-chronological order of articles (making it easy to find new ones) and general clean look. Now all I can say is, yuk! The headlines are fuzzy and too small (what's wrong with text headlines?) and the column format is confusing. And what's with the goth color scheme? The drop-down menus have tiny dark blue on black text and have nothing to offer in terms of ease of use. The whole site now also has a definite tabloid feel to it. In fact, when I first landed on your new page I was worried that your site had been vandalized!
I guess I could get used to it eventually, but I think you made a big step backward. Sorry.
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Re: Wired News Homepage
By Wired News
From: Emmett Merwin
How do I get the old layout back?
I've subscribed to the Wired print magazine for several years and have been an avid reader of Wired News for what now seems like forever. Of all the layout designs that have been used by Wired what I found today is by far the worst. I will have to stop visiting and reading Wired News until the next redesign if this is all that is offered.
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Re: Wired News Homepage
By Wired News
From: Justin
Your new front page redesign is amazing!! I love it!! Great job, and the 3-D dropdown menu is genius. Rock!
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Re: Wired News Homepage
By Wired News
From: M Wong
I like the new layout but it will take some getting used to. That it is organized into categories is what catches me first. Much easier to navigate than a list of random articles. Although showing new articles within each category somehow would be nice. The instant-on music from the ads is very annoying. Picks up from MySpace is something Wired.com should seriously consider losing along with the pop-up rollover ads. Even though they aren't pop-up windows they seem just as annoying. Makes me dislike the advertising more. Why won't advertisers get it through their heads that annoying the customers won't sell product? Other than that I'm enjoying the new layout.
