Welcome to the New WebWorkerDaily
If you’re reading this post in your news reader, I strongly advise you to head over to the site and read it there instead. As you’ll see — and as I am very pleased to announce — as of today WebWorker Daily has a whole new look.
As part of a network-wide overhaul of all our sites, we’ve been hard at work for months creating a new design for WebWorkerDaily that’s easy to use, is more social, and showcases our best content while still retaining some of the signature look of the previous version.
The new design is also aimed at giving us more flexibility as to the type of content that we can offer — we should be able to use more video and publish more image-heavy posts, for example. However, it’s important to note that while we’ve updated the look of the site, our focus won’t change: We’ll continue to deliver content that helps you to be more productive, more connected and more successful.
What do you think of our new look?
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Nice design, overall it looks fresh to me :) keep it up.
Thanks, Sam!
Very nice. Keep up the great work.
Thanks!
Love the new layout. It is fresh, clean, and crisp. Makes navigation easier.
Thanks Cynthia.
Nope, really don’t like it. Looks like many other sites. The former unique look has gone mainstream. (Where Have All the Flowers Gone…)
Sorry you don’t like it, Michael. Maybe in a future refresh we can bring some uniqueness back.
The new look is functional which is important to readers who do not subscribe via RSS as well delivering the content in greater convenience. Appreciate too, the continual commitments in bringing relevant and productive articles to the web workers!
Thanks, Jonathan.
Sorry to say that I preferred the old look, although I mostly follow the site via RSS. This new layout is not bad, it’s just quite… standard, and not really peculiar.
Sorry we’ve lost some of the unique look that you liked, Dario.
Looks great, apart from some horrible font rendering in Firefox: http://grab.by/1YIZ
???
that might be a TypeKit issue, Steven. Do you have similar problems on GigaOM, too? FWIW it renders fine for me with Firefox.
I am having the same horrible font rendering in Firefox…other than that, the site looks great!
Sorry to hear that, Shandy. Can you give me some more details (which version of Firefox, on what OS, and whether you also have a problem with the fonts on GigaOM) and I’l pass them on to our developer.
I’m using Firefox 3.5.7 on Windows XP. The fonts on GigaOM look slightly different between the two browsers, but not like WWD.
I’m using FF 3.5.7 on Win 7 and the fonts look fine.
Updated: It sounds like you have Cleartype disabled in Windows. It’s not as noticeable with the default Windows fonts because they are designed to look good without Cleartype. Here’s an article on how to enable it. If you still have trouble please send me an email at support@gigaom.com.
This worked for me. Thanks for the tip!
Yes, not having “clear-type” enabled was the issue.
Unfortunately, the text in my OS now looks like I’m using my computer underwater. “Clear-type” is a bit of an misnomer I’ve found.
I’m suprised that the wealth of expertise available to WWD has allowed them to require their end users to have an OS feature enabled to make readable something as simple, yet rudimentary, as the typeface of the site.
So, I take back my original “looks good” comment I’m afraid and must replace it with “could look good with more thorough testing and greater consideration for end users”.
Which is a shame, because I never had that issue on the old site.
I noticed some sites looked similar to your screen shot — it turned out I had a corrupt file of Calibri. I copied over it and all was right with the WWWorld again.
Looks great guys. Thanks so much!!
Thanks, Shannon
looks cool !!!
The new design is ok, old design was ok too. I’m getting a default favicon on load.
While we’re talking about design though… I find the post images consistently look very stock photo. It always jumps out at me–”wow that’s a very generic stock photo.” Does anyone else notice it?
We have a new favicon in the works (based on the new logo), it should be uploaded soon.
the reason that the photos look like stock is that we use often use stock photography, and I’m afraid we just don’t have the resources to shoot new pictures for every post. I’ll try and get a bit more creative with the image selection.
Always enjoy your content, usually only see it in my Google Reader, but this new look is great. Very nice work.
Thanks, the new design was all about highlighting the content, but of course for many people (like yourself) they never see the design :)
I love it! Great work! Very clean and crisp.
Thanks. I like the clean lines, too.
The new look is much more crisp and light. It makes it easier to read the articles. Thanks for keeping us up-to-date!
No worries, Paul, glad you like the new look.
Very, very nice! Friendly, inviting (I guess those would be “social, huh?) and easy to get around.
Thanks, Gregg!
Suggestion: change your favicon
The little smiley at the bottom left of the site is so cute :)
Yes, we have a new favicon on the way.
Ha! I didn’t know about the smiley until you pointed it out. Thanks. Adds a little character, doesn’t it?
Look’s great!
Too much white for me, missing Gestaltung und Form, the page looses the grip over the content
thanks for the comment, Thomas
I’ve just don’t recognize WDD!:-)
New design is very exciting, fresh and functional. Good job!
I am glad to see this new look. But i think this site should have some more colors specially in the header area because its looking completely white.
Thanks for the comment, Shahab.
AWESOME new design, very refreshing, clean and top notch new logo. Definitely on top of my favorite top blog designs
Thanks, Ilan.
I’m sorry to say that I feel it is a step backward. I really enjoyed the quirky aesthetic of the previous design, and as others have commented, while clean and well-crafted, this design doesn’t have much uniqueness to it.
Sorry you don’t like it, Scott, but thanks for the comment.
i sort of miss the old communist look. the new design seems like a cleaned-up version of ReadWriteWeb. but it’s not ghastly.
I’ll take “not ghastly”. Thanks for the comment, Dave.
I like the new look. I haven’t been around long enough to really miss the old one though.
I LOVE the drop down menus up top, very good idea to have a “feature” picture in the drop down. Great use of space.
Congrats, and I’ll be around more!
Glad you like it, Chris
Hey folks…sorry to say, that I’m a bigger fan of the old design. It’s funny, because I read the announcement in the RSS feed, where I generally get your content, and as I prepared to visit the site I was wondering if there’d be some cranky “I disklike change” type comments…which I tend to dismiss out of hand.
I’ll try hard not to sound cranky… :)
What I like – increased functionality. Very clean and well thought out placement of elements.
What I dislike…
- too much whitespace. On my 24″ monitor, the background combined with the judicious use of whitespace in the main body wrapper, is kinda tough on my eyes.
- Typography is OK…some of the fonts are rendering pretty thin on my XP/chrome box. Maybe over-sized fonts are a bit too common today, but it’d be nice to see a few things larger to give it some size contrast.
- Preferred the old larger logo…it had attitude. New one just doesn’t have the same ‘gravitas’. I dunno, maybe logos aren’t a big deal to people anymore.
Not trying to be a downer on your big day…really…it’s a solid effort and my criticisms are personal preference. I build websites and would love to be able to create something this nice.
It’s your content that keeps me coming back for more though.
Keep up your great work!
-Craig
Thanks for the considered comments, Craig.
Sorry Guys, i didn’t like the new design also.
I think it`s too much white, and all content (header, main column and side-bar), are just one plain-white-piece.
I understand the need to refresh the design (although i really liked the old unique design), but i don’t think the current result is good.
But, of course, the content is always awesome.
Cheers,
Leo Kuba
Sao Paulo/Brazil
I like the clean design and I like that you walk your talk of taking risks.