What I wrote at Lib Dem Voice

February 05, 2007

The worst of Times

Is this perhaps the ugliest, slowest, cruddiest newspaper website around?

It’s like stepping back 10 years in time. Admittedly, it’s slightly less illegible in Firefox than Internet Explorer… but only just.

The guys responsible for TimesOnline's re-design talk about it here.

Maybe a little less time choosing the colour, and a little more beta-testing might have been in order?

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

OK i was going to say 'i hope they are paying you commission for putting so much traffic their way' but it took so long to down load the page i gave up half way through - so i guess you have a point!

Anonymous said...

Totally true.

Laban said...

It runs like a dog. And all my previous blog links to Times stories return 404s.

I spit on their web designer's salad.

Stephanie said...

The design is vile, especially the lime green.

And there is no longer any opportunity to browse the whole week's articles, or to link to anything: "Just a day and then you pay" must be their new slogan.

Tom Whitwell said...

Hi Stephen, We had huge server problems yesterday - the page you screengrabbed was broken - with no CSS. That's fine, but a bit like reviewing a newspaper which has been dropped in a puddle and saying 'Their new 'soaking wet and all stuck together' look is rubbish, what were they thinking'. The site is running better today - still not 100% - would be very grateful if you had another look. Tom Whitwell, Online Communities Editor, Times Online

Stephen Tall said...

Thanks for taking the time to post, Tom. I'm sure you've had a hell of a Technorati trawl to do...

I take the dropped newspaper analogy - but if a publisher drops their paper in a puddle don't expect me to read it!

I've had another look, and, in fairness, it's running faster, and the text size issue has been sorted.

I still find it distractingly laid out; and killing all your old links doesn't earn you friends among those of us who run websites, and have linked to Times articles in the past.

Anyway, I'll keep visiting for CommentCentral and Matthew Parris.