It’s only March and we’ve already seen a couple of high profile website redesigns. Most notably — on the day of Barack Obamas’ inaguaration, the new whitehouse.gov website was premiered. The difference was so bold that it captured big time attention from big media. In some instances it was used to signify the difference between Obama’s new hotness versus Bush’s old and busted. Since then, ESPN rolled out of their beta and pitchfork.com (indie music website) premiered their new website this weekend.
It’s All About Change
A comment that some made was that Bush’s whitehouse.org was absolutely perfect. It was perfect because it kept people disinterested in what he was doing! I can see the creative brief now: lull and bore the dissenters into a coma. It uses a traditional three column layout with nav on left, content in center and some call-outs on the sidebar. It’s competant but I think most people would agree it is not inspiring — which it should be as we found out this past election.
Obama on the other hand, is about change and his web team was not afraid to defy convention of what we think of as a government website. He uses many common website layout features such as:
- “Hero” graphic — is the single most important visual element on page. Typically communicates the single most important message.
- Blog — frequently updated content in a very accessible format.
- Newsletter — keepin’ the old citizens informed.
- Usability — trafficking people to where they want to go.
The Worldwide Leader in Sports Websites
Moving on to websites I’ve been visiting daily… ESPN has always been the big dog in sports websites in terms of everything. Technology-wise, they were first to move out of table based layout. Content-wise, they were the first to have staff writers for online reporting (I only have testimonial proof as I am a big sports fan but SI re-purposed writers, whereas ESPN had online only writers). New media-wise, they were doing video, fantasy and podcasting right before the other guys were doing it wrong. Even ESPN though was able to make some great moves:
- New Media — they killed the stupid auto-play and just built the videos right into the main story area.
- Headline Thumbnails — with sports, I think it benefits the user to visually browse the main stories.
- Big Ass Scoreboard — nobody likes to scroll.
- Big Ass Front Image — they have always had a good photography department. Nothing captures the emotion of sport like photography.
- Simplified Navigation — trying to find anything on the ridiculous sport orgy they called a nav bar was “ridonkulous”.
9.2
Pitchfork, to those of you who don’t know are a Chicago based website that reviews indie music and publishes news of that genre. They are known for their ridiculously precise reviews (9.2 for instance) and clever writing styles (as well as their sage-like music knowledge). I liked the overall look of the former website but as someone who used it everyday… it drove me crazy after awhile. I found it hard to scan because some parts of the homepage was updated frequently, like the news and reviews but other parts remained static like the best new music header (contingent on an album coming out being better than what was previously there). Another problem was that I was getting eyestrain scanning the entire page trying to figure out what changed from yesterday. The main improvements:
- Scan-ability — now it makes sense from going left to right. News > Reviews > New Media (Same as before you say? Yes, but now they share equal weight and the nav doesn’t get in the way.)
- Equal Opportunity For Reviews — in the past they featured two thumbnails and left the other review crying in a corner. Now at least they show the cover and I can roll-over it to learn more.
- Simplified Content Buckets — bigger text with more metro-sexual white space. It takes a real man to manscape his website.
- Improved Search — the former search technology they were using sucked ass to the 100th degree. Now it works.
FOLLOW @typesett
SUBSCRIBE!