Geeks on the radio
01 October 2008
The redesign of Facebook's wildy popular site has raised a few eyebrows and upset quite a few users. Local radio station, Radio Broadland, decided to run a poll to see what the good people of Norfolk thought. The over-riding feeling from Joe Public was that they didn't like the site (although I think you could question the scientific nature of the research).
To balance this view, Broadland dropped us a line and asked if we'd give an expert opinion as to whether the new design was an improvement or not. We were very happy to oblige and Victoria Mayo from the news team came down and carried out the interview. Jason Wolfe, our Director of Business Development, fronted up and gave the view of the Geeks (after first checking with the rest of the team what they all felt).
The view inside our Thorpe Road offices seemed to be something of mild ambivalence, tinged with a fair bit of "whatever". Nobody seemed to feel too strongly about the new design, one way or the other. The general sense was that it was probably a stronger design, catering for further expansions and enhancements that are bound to come in the future. It also "tidied up" a number of elements that had effectively just evolved to the state they were in, rather than being designed to work that way.
Hear the interview by clicking 'play'
It is often the case when an iconic web design is changed that there are some fairly vocal detractors (this has happened before in cases like Amazon, eBay and the BBC), but these are massively outweighed by the majority of people who, over time, accept and embrace the new interface.
If you'd like to talk to us about how you might refresh your own web presence, please drop us a line.