Comments on frivolous motion: ReadWriteWeb Redesign Analysis And Critique

Thanks for the comment, Si, and thanks for the lin...

2007-12-24T11:56:25.289-05:00

Thanks for the comment, Si, and thanks for the link to your post. Some good thoughts, there, and the Feedburner point you make is especially relevant to the RWW redesign.

I think you've really nailed some of the problems ...

2007-12-23T19:45:30.951-05:00

I think you've really nailed some of the problems with the redesign. One of the big problems I have is with overall hierarchy. You have the ad at the top of the page, then the header area, and then the content area. All are completely seperate and look like they could have been designed by different people working to different briefs.

I wrote a blog post while ago with some Blog Design Pitfalls to avoid. Nothing too controversial, just stating some well accepted best practices and pointing out obvious problems. Unfortunately, the new RWW design seems to fall into quite a few of those pitfalls.

I also completely agree regarding the logo. I actually find it slightly uncomfortable to look at. I can see the kerning problem is caused by the taller 'd' at the end of "Read", which would explain one of your complaints, but I think it's just badly conceived and executed.

Thanks for this response, Richard. And, of course,...

2007-12-19T09:10:03.908-05:00

Thanks for this response, Richard. And, of course, congratulations on the impressive growth of RWW.

Kevin, thank you for taking the time and effort to...

2007-12-18T21:00:02.162-05:00

Kevin, thank you for taking the time and effort to do this analysis. It is very thorough and you make some very good points. Plus as you are a regular reader of RWW, your feedback is truly important to me. I'd like to respond to some of what you said though:

1) You said: "I wouldn’t be so picky if I didn’t care."

RM: Fair enough ;-)

2) You said: "...among other things, he even goes so far as to state that he doesn’t respect certain commenters - not their comments - but as people. His justification for this is that they didn’t show respect for himself or the designers, and I don’t see this at all. Two of the three commenters he singled out actually had positive things to say about the design, and I fail to recall a rule somewhere that specifies that all opinions on the subject of design have to be justified by technical know-how."

RM: I stand by what I said -- if people are disrespectful, rude *and* make non-specific criticisms, I honestly have no respect for that kind of person. Sorry if that upset you. But it's not being elitist or anything like that, it's just simple manners. And it's nothing to do with lack of technical know-how or not being a designer either, it's that they made negative, rude comments with virtually no basis at all. If you're going to give negative feedback, particularly if it is disparaging of people, then you must back it up. If you don't, and show disrespect for myself or the design team, then don't expect any respect back. I honestly don't mind if people say "I hate the design" or whatever, but I don't see how you can expect to be taken seriously when you make disparaging comments about professional people *and* make nonsensical statements at the same time (note: it's the combination of the two that gets under my skin, so it's not about lack of technical knowledge at all).

Having said that, obviously I have a great deal of respect for your critique, because you took the effort to explain things and you didn't stoop to insulting me or the people behind the design. Likewise many of the other comments, negative or positive, were fine because they represent the opinion of our readers -- and were civil.

final thoughts...

I really do appreciate your detailed feedback here. I stand by the design though and I think it is a much cleaner, more professional, bolder design than our previous one. I like the logo too, for the reasons I listed in my original post. The new design positions RWW as more of a media property and the many links you speak of are designed to give people more ways to access our content.

Having said all that, I certainly respect your right to disagree - and I'm very glad you listed out point for point *why* you feel that way. We will take it all under consideration, I can assure you of that. Thanks for doing this analysis and I hope you continue to read and enjoy RWW :-)

regards,

Richard MacManus
Editor, ReadWriteWeb

Thanks, Tim!

2007-12-18T16:24:45.112-05:00

Thanks, Tim!

woaw, that's a hell good analysis of the re-design...

2007-12-18T16:22:56.697-05:00

woaw, that's a hell good analysis of the re-design of RWW. Great job !