Changes due to feedback on Neowin 5

[Steven P. Administrators]

Sorry but I don't like it.

So you see, you can never make everyone happy Richard.. in a perfect world however.....

Here's my constructive criticism of it (unlike many posts I've seen bash this new design)

The ad on the right pushes down ATW stories out of view, we've catered for low screen sizes too.

The Theme bar is too "cramped" and not how we envisioned it, in it's current size (default, fixed) the 2 promo images wouldn't fit and they can't be any smaller than they are now.

[Andrew Lyle Global Moderator]

That's perfect, Neobond take a look at this design, I think it makes more sense and looks much greater!

I don't like it :no: the top menu is overly "busy" and doesn't really flow

[sundayx Veteran]

Having the square ad in the dead center and having it slightly to the right does not significantly change CPM and ad revenues does it.

Anyways thanks Neowin for listening to us, good to hear it's being improved so quickly.

[Richard Hammond]

Id rather the top be busy then having a massive ad in the middle of the page it puts me off wanting to read the articles.

[+Steve B Subscriber²]

I can't point out the exact reason but, with the old style when I came to Neowin, my eyes would just be automatically drawn to the main page articles...which is what I would first read on Neowin anyway and if I wanted to read the ads I could. Now, with this new layout it doesn't happen. I think with the old style there was a bit more emphasis on the news articles and less on the side items. Now, it seems more balanced and with less on articles, more on side items causing my eyes not to be automatically drawn to what I would read anyway. I like the old way better....don't get me wrong, it looks nice in all but, I feel the old way was better. LOL, I really hope that makes sense.

[Andrew Lyle Global Moderator]

If people clicked on the ads a little bit more, maybe they could use fewer ads :o

[digitalsoft]

Love the new tweaks, crazy how little but big the difference is when reading it. well done!

[-Hiroshi-]

Would the graphical changes come to the actual forum now as well? They don't look very similar anymore and it would help unify the entire website.

[Rappy Veteran]

If people clicked on the ads a little bit more, maybe they could use fewer ads :o

Then get done for fraud mass clicking is not allowed as far as I know.

[BrewNinja]

Richard Hammond and Steve B hit the nail on the head. That mock up is perfect. Its too hard to read the news now...and isnt that what the site is intended for?

[Fourjays Veteran]

Much better. (Y)

Amazing what a difference such small changes can make to the readability.

[+Mystic MVC]

Looks even better to me. Great job!

[qdave]

these improvements are great!

[Scirwode]

I've been really busy with work so the whole new "Finity" design flew past me. It took me a while to get myself up to date so I'll now voice my opinions. So far, I'm very much impressed with the design as I feel it does make Neowin look a little more cheery rather than the previous design, which was more professional but gave out a more cold vibe to those who visited it.

As for the ads which everyone seem to be so vocal about, I don't see anything wrong with it. I am trying to see how it impedes or tarnishes the design but I just can't find it. My eyes are still attracted to the articles beside it. One thing I do miss is the ability to change the home page colour, as I really like the Graphite option, but I'm not really complaining :p .

Good job to the coders and those involve in making the "Finity" design a reality (Y) .

Scirwode

[LittleNeutrino Veteran]

i have a suggestion not really a complaint however is there a way to make the feed readers on the right auto update instead of having to refresh the page every minute or so.

[Spyder Veteran]

i gotta say, the extra space around news articles really REALLY improves the readability, at least on my part so big thanks for implementing that. i noticed it immediately when loading the page. I do wish there was just a slight bit more size difference between the news header text and the body text but as it stands its way better than it was before.

love the new stretch button - it makes the square ad in the middle bearable.

anyways..cheers on listening to feedback and making a few small changes - it makes a big difference.

[Steven P. Administrators]

We strive to serve :p

[vip]

I don't see why people are griping. The new design is rather nice. As you can see by how fast they've "fixed" or implemented a few new things since launch, they ARE listening. The whole thing about the ADs is annoying, the placement isn't that bad.

[Richard Hammond]

They are annoying to the point where i dont want to even look at the front page articles which kind of defeats the object of having ads, Neowin is one of the very few places that i whitelist and actually click on ads but the ad placement has put me right off.

[Wannes]

Thanks for the heads up guys!

[brentaal]

I'm liking the improvements. (Y)

[Fourjays Veteran]

Adverts look fine to me. Seen much worse.

[shakey_snake]

That ad in the middle brings in more revenue and allows Neobond to turn off intellitxt on the front page, thus speeding up it's load time.

And this is GREATLY appreciated, by me at least.

Do I need to post this 3 times to cancel out each of Richard Hammond's complaints?

I coded it to work on a cookie basis.

And you are awesome because of that. :D

[Smigit]

(Y)

Its still in the middle of the page just set to the right.

Here's my constructive criticism of it (unlike many posts I've seen bash this new design)

The ad on the right pushes down ATW stories out of view, we've catered for low screen sizes too.

Yeah I agree with NeoBond on that one and I've been fairly consistent with my "move the square ad" remarks. I had thought about the potential for the Ad to go there but as Neobond points out, the around the web content gets sacrificed then.

I think for the ad to go in the right bar you'd have to move both the latest community activity and news filter & poll boxes over to the left as they were in shift. Then that Ad would be further up the page and around the web wouldn't be pushed right to the bottom. That may then cause congestion at the top of the left hand column but. Still, thats how I would move the content if I was to attempt to retain everything and I'm sure that would have issues of it's own.

[Calum Veteran]

i have a suggestion not really a complaint however is there a way to make the feed readers on the right auto update instead of having to refresh the page every minute or so.

This has already been discussed & answered previously in this thread. The 'auto-refresh' option has been taken out for usability reasons, however, they have a 'refresh' button specifically for each little section. Therefore, you do not have to refresh the whole page - just click the little handy 'refresh' icon of the small section you wish to be updated.

I too became annoyed with the 'auto-refresh' at times, when an article at the bottom would disappear & I could not find it.

Thank you Neobond & staff for the new Finity update. It's actually made me change my bookmark URL from the forums to this & instead of keeping up-to-date with the news through the feed & Windows Live Alerts, I am actually visiting the frontpage more!