Article layout/design

[EvilGardenGnome]

Sorry if this is double-posted, as I didn't see anything else about it. Also, sorry as it gets ranty.

Back at the end of the year, we saw different article designs for the 12 giveaways. The last day or so we've seen a very similar design used more often.

Is this the new default article view for WC?

If it is, I'm going to have to stop visiting the site and only read the text version in my RSS reader. I know advertising revenues are a big thing, and that by staying off the site you lose that, but I simply can't use this layout. Just to be able to focus on it I need to zoom the screen way out, and I'm not changing my browser settings for a single site.

Keeping the design fresh and new is important. This, however, is not good design in my opinion. There's a lot of scrolling, half the screen is eliminated by the by-lines and header pictures, and having to click a button to get a new paragraph is annoying as all hell. Sure, you call them slides, but they aren't. You've merely replaced the scroll wheel with a button click.

If you're moving this way for the articles, please, please, please, reconsider.

 

[James Falconer]

Thanks for your feedback. Sorry to hear you did not like the 'hidden gems' article templates we designed and used. The vast majority found them beautiful and easy to use. That said, we understand there are always problems that pop up.

If you have any actionable feedback for us to take and work into NEW designs, that would be extremely helpful for us. Let us know the device and browser you're using as a start... and if you have more specifics other than having to zoom out to view the page, it'd be appreciated.

Let me know here, and I'll make sure our tech and design teams take a good look before we put anything new into play. Thanks!

 

[RHoudek]

I also don't know if there is a better place for this, however I very much agree, the new re-design is terrible.

Visually, it looks good at the header, however it requires too much scrolling and leaves too much space for ads, which btw are looking too much like the regular content and are confusing.

Also, I do not think the new font themes are working. It doesn't look like a uniform styles, it looks disjointed. Also, I've noticed some articles with 3-4 different font styles, which really harms the continuity. For example in the recent article about the Microsoft band SDK, I see at least 5 different font styles. Doesn't work.

I also agree with the above about having to click to see all content on one page. I really don't want to have to do that.

Again, I think it looks nice, but its usability has taken a step backward.

 

[James Falconer]

@RHoudek - do you have any examples of what 'sucks' with the new templates on your end? Are you viewing them on mobile or desktop? Which browser? Any concrete examples you can share (screenshots illustrating any problems!) would be absolutely awesome. We can address them in our next iteration. Thanks!

 

[EvilGardenGnome]

Thanks for your feedback. Sorry to hear you did not like the 'hidden gems' article templates we designed and used. The vast majority found them beautiful and easy to use. That said, we understand there are always problems that pop up.

If you have any actionable feedback for us to take and work into NEW designs, that would be extremely helpful for us. Let us know the device and browser you're using as a start... and if you have more specifics other than having to zoom out to view the page, it'd be appreciated.

Let me know here, and I'll make sure our tech and design teams take a good look before we put anything new into play. Thanks!

Thanks for the reply. Though I assume you have internal tracking to assert that the vast majority enjoyed the re-design, I hope you'll understand the accessibility concerns in your layouts. As a result, feel free to treat this as a biased user acceptability test.

With that in mind, here's a few things to look at:

1. Default zoom
   • My resolution is 1366x768 on FireFox, and this was chosen based on the distance I sit from my monitor when using my laptop (W8.1).
   • The current zoom level/font size on WC articles (new design) plays havoc with my myopia and other vision problems. Turning on list view, rather than slides, doesn't fix this as the zoom is still very large.
   • Due to the loss of negative space at the margins of the article view means, with the large font, my viewing range is changed. Personally, this means I'm swinging my head around and just looking at it causes headaches.
   • Additionally, the loss of negative space means the definition between article, related content, advertising, etc becomes very blurred.
2. Scrolling/Clicking
   • Related to zoom, the larger font means more scrolling. The answer you've added is slides.
   • Slides with a single paragraph mean a lot of clicking to get through an article.
   • Slides with pictures (now larger) and text still require lots of scrolling, so now I'm scrolling a lot and clicking a lot.
   • Full view, with increased font size, means A LOT of scrolling but no clicking.
3. Inconsistent application
   • Currently the site is using three types of article views: Old, New with slides, New without slides
   • If the goal of a new design is to refresh the site, I debate the efficiency of a convoluted roll-out.
   • Due to relying on changing my zoom on WC when I visit the page, this convoluted roll-out creates another (temporary) problem.

Things that are good in the new design:
[*]Headers look great. Also, scrolling them off is neat.
[*]Bigger by-lines are awesome.
[*]Overall cleaner, modern design is attractive in appearance (just not in use).

As I mentioned before, these are accessibility items that do limit my ability to visit WC. While I won't stop reading your content, I would have to do so in a RSS reader which means you'll be losing out on ad revenues (small for a single person, admittedly).

 

[James Falconer]

Excellent. Thanks for breaking this out into bullet points. I'll send along to our design team!