New site design

[Cyclista]

This change is a disaster. The use of Flash is simply terrifying. I don't believe any amount of effort can resurrect this update project. It really needs to be discarded.

Please go back to previous clean and pleasant format.

I'm not a stodgy tech-phobic person. I design computer interfaces in my day job. During this job, in fact, I enjoy sneaking a quick peek at CN several times a day. The peek is no longer quick and it is not relaxing.

 

[timwelch]

Any chance of running a poll perhaps?

1. Love the new site; man, you guys are whingers.
2. The new site is ok; I'll put up with it and see how it goes.
3. What were the editors thinking? This sucks
4. DNS change immediately! http://www.cyclingnews.com <--> autobus.cyclingnews.com

 

[I hate the new website]

Where are you seeing this?

Cheers
Greg Johnson

http://www.cyclingnews.com/races/73rd-tour-de-suisse-2009-upt/stages/stage-3/report

If the full results are somewhere else then they are too many clicks deeper than the old way of getting to them.
But it doesn't matter because you already announced in the headline who won so you lost me already.

 

[krebs303]

Lost the ability to get to where I want from the home page with one click.
new layout has a lot of empty space. text on home page looks double space.
headlines for race results need to go. want to be able to one click live reports from home page with out seeing who won. just too much navigation and wasted space. simpler is better.

"Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius — and a lot of courage — to move in the opposite direction."
Albert Einstein

 

[toppermost]

I HATE IT. I liked CN before because of its ease of use. This is at trainnwreck. Ill probably be going to l'equipe now.

 

[ElChingon]

Any chance of running a poll perhaps?

They haven't done a poll for good reason, mainly to not have to face the numbers on a bad decision by somebody. Maybe we can get WADA to do an investigation to see who pulled the brain fart in switching it before really testing it?

I wonder if Bill is cringing when he see's the site now, wow what a way to go out.

 

[elapid]

I don't mind the new layout, but the criticisms of the race summaries are fair. The information is just not there in regards to full/brief results, profiles, etc. I also quite enjoyed getting the News updates. It was like opening the newspaper with all the stories. Now you have to pick and choose from individual stories. I'll get used to the latter, but you should fix the race summaries IMO.

 

[davestoller]

I HATE IT. I liked CN before because of its ease of use. This is at trainnwreck. Ill probably be going to l'equipe now.

Agree except for the L'Equipe part.

Poor form.

 

[cycutza]

Greg, When i first got onto CN a few years ago I thought I'd stumbled into an advertsing information debarcle. As I got used to it though I loved the way information could be accessed. I think the guys at CN have their work cut out for them in 'teaching old dogs new tricks' but were kind of forced to change things up so new users weren't deterred. The new site looks great but I miss the links to race details, stages etc. I think if CN can now just watch the posts and gather as much information as possible from users, then it is a great start. I hope they do.

 

[joelpace]

Oh God, you screwed it up....

Really? You thought this was a good idea? You changed the one great cycling news website and turned into . . . well, crap.

Sometimes you really just need to leave it alone. Just because you can change it doesn't mean you should. If this isn't fixed quickly, you are going to lose a lot of viewers. The new site is, in a word, HORRIBLE. It's as if you actually tried to kill it.

The beauty of the old site was its basic simplicity. It wasn't fancy. It just worked. Go back to that...quickly. Please.

 

[BroDeal]

Just looked at new site with one of my computers that does not have Flash installed and has Javascript disabled. It is a bit more like the old site.

Seriously, though, do not go the Velonews route.

 

[180mmCrank]

The people who like it will not say much the folks that don't will have plenty to say I am sure we all go through... Shock Anger Denial Resistance Acceptance on our way to...what was all the fuss about!

Wow - that's an awful lot of shock anger denial and resistance! I am not sure anyone would have anticipated such a negative response.

Might be fun to be a fly on the wall in the CN office right now

It reminds me a little of when Coke changed the flavour of their core product

Personally I will play on the site for a week and then make up my mind

 

[ElChingon]

No the old format was CN's bread and butter. Many read it mainly because it was readable! There's a thousand cycling news sites, blogs, and such all over in many languages! But! CN had the market cornered on English written plain old down to the nitty gritty text! That was their maket or corner on the cyling news market. Now its gone! Change the market equals change in buyers, pretty simple really. Good thing somebody threw the New Coke example out, no better example, where's the New Coke now?

 

[slcbiker]

Classic case of over-design and web designers who think more is better. It's not.

I've been coming to this site for more than 10 years. Could always count on it for brief, to-the-point news. This new revision definitely isn't that.

I understand the viewpoint that more pages is better from ad view standpoint. But its not good if fewer people are going to those pages.

Slow to load on my home PC with a 5Mbps DSL connection. Ridiculously bad on my Blackberry Storm with a good Verizon connection.

I have to say, if you stick with this, and someone comes up with an alternative that looks and functions like the old one, I'd leave despite the 10 years.

 

[nmwildog]

I logged onto the CN site today for my daily fix of bike lore...

Felt like I'd just seen my dog run over by a truck...like I'd just had a dear friend die a grisly and painful death. I'm going through those stages of grief: shock and remorse. But I don't think I'll ever get to the place where I get over it.

Looking at the new, improved site has quite literally made me sick.

CyclingNews has been my #1 default setting for cycling news for years. I visit multiple times a day. What has set it apart from ALL the other sites has been its simple, easy-to-navigate, easy-on-the-eyes format.

Now all that is gone, swept away by a tsunami of bad taste and glitzy, flashy garbage. There really is no way to overstate this: you have just committed a very public act of commercial suicide.

Many others in this forum--some with extensive web design chops--have already enumerated the failings of the new site. I can't address the tech side of it, but will just note a few things others already have...

• Way too gaudy and flashy. Navigation is klunky. It's bad enough that your sponsors feel the need to have their banners blinking on and off and bopping around endlessly. Now you have to do it too? In the big, fat, middle of the page? Do you have any idea how irritating it is, when you're trying to read something, and all around the copy block, lights are flashing and photos are winking in and out of focus? Anyone who thinks this constitutes good design has a head full of rocks.

• Where did the Live Coverage go? Anytime I couldn't get TV or streaming video on a stage, following along in your live descriptions was the next best thing...great fun, and often full of little details that didn't make the final report on the stage.

• Whose bright idea is it to announce the winner in the title bar? See above item about enjoying the suspense of reading along in the Live Coverage.

• What happened to your contact address, where we could write you notes about your content? Just a week or so ago, I had a pleasant exchange of e-mails with one of your writers about some roads in the Giro. It was nice...like there are real people at CN whom we can talk to. Now? I looked everywhere on new site, and I didn't see a "Contact us" link anywhere. Don't you want to chat with your readers anymore?

Lots more gripes of the same sort, but others have already mentioned them. I'm just adding my 2 cents' worth in the hope that weight of public opinion will force a rethink on the part of the site managers. Not likely, I expect. They have a lot of time and energy invested in this change and won't want to admit they absolutely laid an egg.

Hey, as angry and frustrated as I am about this, I still feel some compassion for the folks who did this. Nobody likes to be told they failed after they worked hard on something. But, sadly, there really is no other way to spin this. It's just a complete disaster, from start to finish.

So beginning today, my search begins for a new site for racing news.

For whatever it's worth, my views on this come with some design sense behind them: I've been a commercial illustrator and graphic designer for over 30 years. I know good design when I see it...this is not good design.

I also write a monthly column about cycling at BikeCal.com called On The Road...

http://bikecal.com/index.asp

I know what my July column is going to be about now: the total destruction of my favorite bike site.

Bill Oetinger

I agree 100%, when Gerard sold cyclingnews I just knew this was coming, another great idea ruined. I guess I need to find a new home page, I can't turn my computer on to this every morning.

 

[lanceolot]

The New Site Blows Chunks - My Dear John Letter

I'm sorry. I've been a loyal reader since 1999, when it was a cottage type affair run out of Australia.

The new site is cluttered, slow, and not user friendly at all. I will be breaking up with you to date VeloNews, DailyPeleton, CanadianCyclist, CyclingQuotient, Pedal, maybe even Pez (gasp) if I become really desperate and lonely.

I'm sorry, but we seem to have grown apart this past while. I'm sure the new cyclingnews site is a technological marvel that other web engineers will envy, but it does nothing for me when I want to relax and browse.

Thank-you for the memories. Nothing good lasts forever I suppose.

 

[nmwildog]

the live race reports. Although those as well as race reports in general have gone down in quality a little in the last couple years. It seems you have gotten more writers who clearly are not as knowledgeable or experienced in bike racing. In the early years of reading the race reports and play by play it seemed as though it was written by a true racer who knew the sport inside and out.
).

How true, whatever happened to guys like Martin Hardie who could make you feel you were there, watching the race? Now the live reports are extremely perfunctory and filled with quotes from news articles and interviews I've already read. There is no sense of drama imparted in the coverage, and now with the "new look" we get to be told who won the race before we read the "live" report. The quality of this site has been going downhill steadily for the last few years and this is just enough to make me abandon it altogether. Please someone tell me where there is another site that will give me my cycling fix.

 

[manolo]

I'm sorry. I've been a loyal reader since 1999, when it was a cottage type affair run out of Australia... I will be breaking up with you to date VeloNews... if I become really desperate... We seem to have grown apart... Thank-you for the memories...

You my friend are a poet! Well said! It made my eyes water.

By the way, can you guys at least stop scrunching the text in your articles to the right-hand side? It might make it more apealing to read. I hate it. Prettier. But I hate it.

 

[hulkgogan]

Classic case of over-design and web designers who think more is better.

Hehehe. You know web designers these days are pretty good. It ain't 2000. My experience on this stuff in every fracking gig I've ever had is that the design always - ALWAYS - comes from some business "manager" who knows nothing about design. In fact, ironically enough, they tend to know nothing about business either. And I mean literally design it. As in tell the professional designer and information architect where to put stuff. First draft design proposals from the designers usually are orders of magnitudes better than the final product. Like my designer friend who wants out of her gig says "These days everyone's a designer".

 

[lanceolot]

Flash Technology Sucks

Flash ruined the eBay site, and it is a contributor to the failure here.

Just google: flash technology sucks

Even Steve Jobbs says it sucks. I'm sure flash is an asset and blessing for certain applications, but maybe just not for reading news.

Adobe must be promoting it like mad?

 

[The Dr]

Notice a trend here?

The "NEW" site is not a step in the right direction, it's a step backwards! Anyone been to Bikeradar lately? The "NEW" Cyclingnews site is almost a carbon copy! What a joke....... Impossible to read and difficult to navigate. Bring back the old Cyclingnews......it did everything it needed to. All the info on one page, easy find and easy to read. I for one DID NOT vote for a change and going by the posts in here not many people like the new site. If this site stays as is I wont be coming here. Please bring the old site back!

 

[hulkgogan]

Wow just started actually looking around and agree with all you guys about the design but speaking as a professional developer and project manager, holy nothing works! This site was not tested at all. Wow, haven't seen that in a while. Feel bad for you guys. Your development team must be sweating it about now.

Lots of classic mistakes. Have somebody read a Steve C. McConnell book next time.

 

[Alpe d'Huez]

Okay, spent more time on it. I posted earlier I was shocked and rejected it at first, but warming up to it. I'm still in that state but took the time to really study the front page, and here's a visual of what I concluded. I'll give more comments later, but this is a real succinct note. Let me know what you guys think:

 

[BroDeal]

Flash ruined the eBay site, and it is a contributor to the failure here.

Just google: flash technology sucks

Even Steve Jobbs says it sucks. I'm sure flash is an asset and blessing for certain applications, but maybe just not for reading news.

Adobe must be promoting it like mad?

I refuse to put Flash on a some of my computers. It is abused all the time, making it hard to get the information I am looking for.

True story (that has happended several times): While researching a product to buy using reviews and comments in forums, I have gone to the manufacturer's site, found that it is a total Flash site, and decided that if they want to make it hard to get simple info about their products then I won't purchase anything from them.

Sometimes when browsing I just want information, not eye candy.

 

[unsub1]

Wrong. Flash doesn't suck any worse than any other technology, but its misuse certainly does, and this is a prime example. However, I would argue the good ol' design behind the new site is the real problem here. I don't see myself coming back here much after over 10 years or hardcore readership.

By the way, Steve Jobs' company created Flash's biggest rival, Silverlight. They've invested millions of dollars clumsily copying Flash, so old Steve must think there's something there.

If any of you have seen the recent South Park with Indiana Jones, that scenario certainly comes to mind here.

Flash ruined the eBay site, and it is a contributor to the failure here.

Just google: flash technology sucks

Even Steve Jobbs says it sucks. I'm sure flash is an asset and blessing for certain applications, but maybe just not for reading news.

Adobe must be promoting it like mad?