boston.com's makeover
What do you think?
My first impression is the very first screen of the home page is very nice, although I'd hope they can splash a big headline across two columns for big stories (last night, they had the Pats' score, probably the biggest story of the night, squished into a single box). But scroll down and you get into a jumbled mess with no apparent hierarchy - where do you look? How do you find things? But cool they're integrating forums and non-Globe blog posts on the right side.
Articles are nice and clean and readable, i.e., simple and not larded down (then again, I would like the look because it's the same basic layout I'm using here on Universal Hub) - and should help boston.com with search engine optimization (see how they have the story on the left? Means search engines will give the words there more weight than if there were heavy toolbars and stuff on the top and left).
Dan Kennedy gives a thumb's up, although he wonders if the site will do a better job of integrating the Globe newsroom and the online effort, which has been something of an issue in the past. Speaking of which: The old version had a news blog where Globe reporters kept us up to date on breaking local news during the day. Where is it?
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Meh
The top of the page is fine, but you're right, it's just too messy as you scroll down. I love the simplicity of this site, but then, Universal Hub doesn't have three columns of stories going across the page.
I prefered the old Boston.com
Boston.com meets NYT
It was just a matter of time before they adopted the NYT model. The jury is out until they complete the build and we can see how the secondary pages look, this is where the old design really broke down. We can only hold out hope that the gigantic page swallowing flash ads are gone for good. I like the NYT sidenav better and their headlines jump more with a darker blue than what's used on Boston.com.
Yuck
I find the new page to look really cluttered and hard to read. Honestly if the page stays this way I will have to boycott it and get my local news somewhere else.
one bennie
for the first time I'm actually getting (a trickle) of people to my blog from their page...maybe the local blogs box on the home page is the reason
Too cluttered
They're just putting too much stuff on the main page, in a confusing three-column format. The news that an MIT team placed 4th in a robocar race is higher on the page than the civil strife in Pakistan.
news blog
This one, yeah?
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/city_region/breaking_news/
Did there used to be a link to it from the front? I can't remember.
I think it's an improvement for sure. Yeah, too many modules, but all the wasted real estate they used to have on either side of the page drove me insane. Love the bigger tabs in the nav bar, too.
If you're a terrible person like me and use Adblock for Firefox, the page looks positively uncluttered :)
Hating it, and a question
Adam Reilly doesn't much care for it, especially the continued refusal to let readers comment on stories.
Oddjob60 wonders what sort of user feedback guided the design.
Like Tara Reid before the boob job
Totally flat, exclaims the Missus:
Thank goodness they finally changed it ...
I am very happy to see Boston.com finally emphasizing real news, instead of readers' puppy photos and random lifestyle tidbits.
However, the lack of comments is a problem. Whatever the reason -- limited technical infrastructure, trolls ruining the threads, fear of being criticized and their old-media authority being undermined, etc. -- it can't last. People want to respond, and if they can't do it on Boston.com, they'll start going somewhere else to do it. Universal Hub and BostonHerald.com seem to have benefited a lot from letting users have their say, how long will it take the Globe/NYT to come around?
Trickle?
" ... for the first time I'm actually getting (a trickle) of people to my blog from their page...maybe the local blogs box on the home page is the reason ... "
I got more than a "trickle" ...
In the hour my blog was featured, 166 people clicked through ...
That's some good exposure.
The design baffles her
On Living Reflections from a Dream, Amy explains why the new design makes no sense: She finds the whole site a confusing labyrinth now. She concludes:
Old School had reasons
I took one look and said "what the %&$! is that?".
Then I saw a newspaper on the newsstand and thought "that's what it SHOULD look like".
Newspaper has a side bar with an index. Website does not. Newspaper has a central area with highlighted news. Website is way too egalitarian.
I could go on.
There is a reason that newspaper looks like it does, but the web designers just don't seem to understand why the web site might want to incorporate those best features and practices, albeit on a rolling, faster changing basis than newspaper.
While I agree that this new
While I agree that this new layout has some issues, trying to make the website look like the newspaper is a horrible idea, and is what most print publications are trying to break free of in their online presences. Those "best features and practices" only have bearing on the medium onto which they are applied, and things that are best for print layouts are not the best for online layouts.
The websites need to divorce themselves from their print versions, and display/organize content that makes sense in a website, rather than just being more or less a pdf of the paper.