Yay!

(I guess I could have done this comment in all caps but I went with all exclamation points instead!)

(…Okay, commenting is a little funky right now — no exclamation point for this sentence.)

Being in the advertising and design field, I can appreciate a refresh of a brand. But unfortunately, I have to call this one a big FAIL.

The clean design from before that used to be so easy to read has now become a giant cluster that gives me utter eye strain. There is no hierarchy to this design. I don’t know where to look for things and what I am looking at. I feel like I have gone back to the early days of web programming when people didn’t consider usability.

The type is hard to read. It feels like overload. Too big in some places. Too tight between lines.

While I can appreciate your desire to return to some of the aspects of the 80′s zine and the old bOING bOING photocopy days, but there are things we have learned about design, readability and usability in the 30 years since then. Since this is a much different medium, that should be kept in consideration.

I would really ask you to rethink this revision. I’m not saying go back to your old version, but I’m not for this solution at all.

… the ‘display case’ is my biggest beef: dark, distracting, doesn’t actually draw your eyes anywhere useful, pushes the article out of the first screen, and is not a useful feature for obsessive compulsive readers such as myself (and/or its purpose is unclear).

The reply to comments feature is much appreciated though.

People will protest whenever there are changes, and I’m certainly not immune to this problem, but tweaking these two items would go a long way to making this more viewable.

Did you do any user testing on this new design perchance?

This new ‘reply’ thing simply does not work. At the end of the thread it says I replied to anonymous – no way to identify in this long thread where the comment is that I was replying to.
BRING BACK NUMBERED THREADS!

Tell Rob B to do it NOW!!!!!!!!!!

Good grief.
————-
PS In fact its worse – how many anonymous posts were there? Which one was I replying to? Nobody but me will ever know, I suspect. Look – either provide numbered threads or automatic quotes populated into reply. Otherwise the ‘reply’ thing is just a waste of pixels. Really broke. I cannot imagine how this was ever for even a nano-second considered by any sentient web user (let alone an alleged designer) to be something that would work as currently implemented. Epic FAIL.

Doing a retro style logo is just plain gimmicky. Your old one was very good.

I know there’s the whole ‘You’ll get used to it’ and yes we will. But that doesn’t mean it’s not a good design

It looks to me like you’ve all been throwing in your two cents and have ended up with an incoherent design.

sorry, i hate to be negative about it, but it’s just so monumentally bad.

Also, the mix and matching of the font families it cluttering and busy and not helping the hierarchy issues.

Lastly, but not leastly, congratulations on the longevity of your fun!

Ow tiny red letters, no comment numbers, and no search without a ‘go’ button make me sad.

Also, watch the ‘most commented’ algorithm or the burqini post could be there for weeks, reflecting more of an all-time high than a most active.

The decreasing-size-of-posts-over-time kinda works, will it continue into ‘older posts’? Cause that could be handier still — skimming yesterday’s headlines.

But what is it with sites like gawker, gizmodo, the entire group, and now Boing Boing that convert the entire top of the page into ad like boxes and make people scroll down for content??

Is there some kind of research that proves people have no problems scrolling down for content, and don’t care if the first fold in the browser is full of blocks of graphic, ad-like content??

Somebody please enlighten me…

The design is getting better!

The articles on the bottom, with less text and no pictures are a problem for me.
No longer can one read boingboing by simply scrolling down, because when you get down there, the content is hidden.
I really liked that you could just scroll down and read, and not reach some nether region with reduced content levels.

That aside, I am having trouble reading this site now. There is not enough differentiation in the font styles, and the font colors for the post authors and the date/time are not strong enough. The gray is weak. The font itself is not strong enough to carry and register light colors. If you choose to keep the font, please consider darkening your color choices.

Also the space given to the post text is too wide, the words don’t register as strongly. I find myself re-reading. And the right side of the post space is too close to the right column. I find my eyes straying off all over the place at the end of lines.

Overall, I’m having to strain to read it. The font and color choices are just not sticking visually. It doesn’t stand out. The subtlety and 2.0ness got taken a few steps too far. It’s more arty than functional. And that is a division that should never be made in a user’s mind.

Also please think about bringing back separation in header/footer and content spaces. Your footer with your title:subtitle and your rss/policies/subscription/licensing, just doesn’t work. It’s not separated enough from the community, recently section.

I like it less and less… I really did give it a while too… But it DOES NOT STAND OUT… at all.

Good ideas overall, a little cluttered in places. It’s a little unclear what each section does. Some indicator of the sections, like a “Featured” marker would be nice, especially on the right hand nav element.

The category markers are too hard to read. It’s also not clear that they are just filters, unlike the previous version wher BBG took you to a sub page with different stories and editing, and Offworld to you to another place entirely.

The clarity of the main text is good.
Navigation within the page is pretty clear.
The comments link is the only one that seems a bit unclear. The icon doesn’t convey a speech bubble well, probably because it’s filled in (solid black).
Additionally, showing the # of the comment is pretty much necessary unless you go over to a Slashdot type threaded comment system.

I would also move the “read the rest” link at the bottom of the page a few more pixels away from the content to more clearly show that it is not a part of the content, yet connected to the content (not too far away)

But on the whole a good change IMO. Like any other large overhaul it needs a little fine tuning.

And why might we have missed these great things? Because unlike before if you don’t come here every single day (sometimes more than once) the articles are reduced to a partial paragraph or worse merely a headline. I love the boingboing writers find but if I’m at all busy I can’t savor the articles every day. Now, with how they are shuffled off into headline oblivion I likely won’t bother to read beyond the current day. The old version allowed me to stroll through the weeks articles at my leisure.

You’ve put the look of your site ahead of it’s content. Shame on you boing boing for devaluing what makes (or is that made?) this place great.

I am totally excited by the new change. The old design was getting seriously blah.

In all things, change is good. Unfortunately, that also goes for your logo. Change WAS good from your original logo to the newer one that was around as of yesterday. Jumping back to the old one… well.. I think you guys became better graphic designers over the years.

Can’t you make it like the “new, improved” yahoo and let us keep the old one too?

Me, I think I like the new changes, but it will take some time to find out.

It looks fucking great. Completes the layout.