dwain wrote:
ugly is subjective. what do find ugly about it? what do you find unusable about it and what do you mean by unusable? when you offer criticism it is also helpful to offer a solution. also notice the url of the site: http://TEST.inkscapegallery.net.
sometimes plain, like your site, works for readability. i must say that the sideways text links on the inkscape site makes readability for old eyes like mine hard to read and i do find the site to be a bit busy, but ugly? no.
the image links don't help seo very much and i don't know if it is that important.
again, criticism is good only if you offer a better soultion.
regards, dwain
Yes, I noticed the URL. Yes, I know it is a test site. That's why it is UGLY!
What is UGLY about it? Images off page. Overlapping text. Run-on text. Images without any indication why they are present.
And that's the technical aspect.
From usability:
No indication of what the site is about.
No indication of what I am looking at.
No indication of what the links will lead me to.
It's like an acid trip without the acid. At least with drugs, even bad drugs, it will have to end sometime. This website just goes on...and on...and on...and on.
And don't get me started on white-text-on-black. oO
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A better solution?
There are plenty of better solutions. I have spent 20 years of my life at finding a better solution (with profit to myself, of course).
What truly saddens me is that people who create websites like that can't seem to do better. They know what they want but the can't make it happen. "The soul is willing but the flesh is weak."
Some of it is ignorance; but most of it is arrogance.
The three principles for any website site are: usability, readability, and accessibility. Good looking is not not on the radar.
Put yourself in your reader's shoes. And they pinched. Really hard. And the baby is crying for it's bottle. And your mortgage is overdue. And your spouse has just walked out the door. This is the competition your website will face.
Yes, that's the real world. Well, maybe not so dramatic.
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And no, I'm not offering a better solution, or any solution at all.
But it is still ugly.