Is Facebook becoming too much like MySpace? That’s what people have recently been asking, mainly after Facebook released its applications API and allowed anyone to code and display applications within the previously surgically clean interface.
It is well known that offering the chance of interface customisation to users nearly always ends up with a wide spectrum of results from the meticulous and beautifully crafted to the downright blinding. For good examples off the top of my head, consider MySpace, Geocities and Microsoft FrontPage. While Geocities and FrontPage may be pardoned because as web page creators, they have to offer some level of customisation, MySpace certainly cannot.
Facebook has done well with its conservative and non-changeable interface, and MySpace would be good to follow its lead. However, considering the large user base that it has, any changes will come with their own share of complaints at the “lack of freedom” offered. However, this main difference between the two most popular social networking sites also affects their respective audiences. While Facebook’s users are considered to be more professional, grown-up and well-off, MySpace users are generally younger and less inclines to worry about interface design judging by some of their profile pages. Twenty audio and video files playing at the same time is something that MySpace users are used to, while in the Facebook world, it would be unheard of.
The development teams also contribute a lot towards these stereotypes and audience inclinations. MySpace is seen to be more sloppily coded than Facebook (indeed, MySpace’s general default design and mixture of ASP and ColdFusion code alludes to this) and this gets reflected in profile pages.
The big question after all of this, however, is “Is Facebook becoming too much like MySpace?” Like it or not, this question has generally negative connotations (most Facebook users are proud of its clean layout) and the answer is not as clear as it would seem. User-created and installed applications have added some clutter to the interface as well as introducing inconsistencies (some coders code more sloppily than others), but there are still some limits to what people can do. The banning of auto-start videos and restrictions on code help preserve the general layout (unlike MySpace), but the very fact that Facebook encourages third-party apps while MySpace is only too keen to ban them really shows which one is the more flexible and customisable. You might not be able to change the layout of your profile page, but the fact that you can rearrange it and add to it means that you don’t need to anyway.
It’s my view that it’ll take a lot for Facebook to even get close to MySpace’s complete lack of organisation or taste on profile pages, and applications certainly don’t move it any closer.
Well the title of this post should certainly grab the attention of many of the readers here!
Have a look at the Zune’s misguided marketing effort and tell me it isn’t an attempt by Microsoft to be hip and cool with the younger generation of music listeners.
How many parents would approve of this? Not many, I guess. How many kids would be enticed by this? Probably most of the males. Does it make it a correct decision? Doubtful.
I can see where Microsoft are coming from though. It certainly does make you forget all about the error reported to the left of the screen when you see what’s going on to the right…
Three days ago, Andrei Herasimchuk, the well known ex-Adobe interface designer wrote an open letter to Adobe, posted on his blog, with regards to the poor state of typography on the web.
The gist of the letter is that Adobe, as a typographical leader, should release maybe eight to twelve core fonts into the public domain, so that they may be integrated into operating systems and other software, therefore making their availabilty nearly ubiquitous and allowing web designers to use them.
For Adobe, any consequences which may amount to a small loss of revenue from selling licenses to these fonts will be more than catered for by greater support of their actions by many designers around the world, who will, for the first time, be able to confidently use fonts other than the usual Arial, Georgia, Times New Roman and Verdana (most of them released by Microsoft in their Core Web Fonts package, since discontinued).
Talking of Microsoft, Jeff Croft has also replied to Andrei’s post, but this time urging Microsoft to distribute some of their newly-commissioned fonts Calibri, Cambria, Candara, Consolas, Constantia and Corbel more widely. Currently, they are set to be shipped with Windows Vista and Microsoft Office 2007. He also urges Apple to license these fonts from Microsoft and include them with Mac OS X.
Although I’m not a typography connoisseur or expert, I fully support both of these calls as I can see the immense benefits that it will bring to the web community at large. Having more than one or two fonts to reliably use will make every designer’s job so much easier and rewarding, and will make the web a much nicer and prettier place.
The master list of websites accepted into the 9rules network is going to be released to the public next week. My fingers are crossed that wackomenace makes it into the network. I look forward to being a part of a great blogging network along with a whole host of much more prominent bloggers, if I make it in.
Let’s hope so!
I recently signed up to the much-talked-about MySpace to see what all the hype was about. I couldn’t understand why it was so much popular than some of its rivals in the form of Xanga and MSN Spaces, among others. I was expecting a site with plenty of wow-factor, but most of all, flexibility to be able to truly make your profile “your own”. Once I’d signed up, however, I was struck by the complete opposite.
Continue reading "MySpace is not pimpable enough" »
Well, I’ve submitted this site to 9rules and I can only wait and hope that it gets included in the network (fingers crossed)!
In other news, the second installment of the Webguide will be coming your way tomorrow, in which I will go into deeper details about the first of the four main service providers I use - registrars - and how I integrate them with each other.
I don’t know exactly when Odeon updated their website (seems like a couple of weeks ago), but it was a long time coming. They had promised a refresh for many years, and I’m glad that they say the merger of Odeon and UCI as a good time for this.
In terms of accessibility, the old site was absolutely dreadful. If you want to see for yourself, then try reading through the minefield that is Firefox Bugzilla bug #80479 (going on for a few days under five years!) or have a look at my Odeon UK Site Fixer, written for Greasemonkey.
The new site itself is much better, and although it still doesn’t validate as any version of HTML, it is a step in the right direction. Thank goodness that script hacks are no longer needed for that site.
Well done Odeon!
Hello and welcome to the new wackomenace! Of course, it’s time for the May 1st Reboot 2006. The design you’re looking at right now is wackomenace version 6. Here are some new things that I’ve included for your viewing pleasure:
- Excerpts on mans pages on the right hand sidebar
- A whole new lot of accesskeys and a legend for them all
- A new accessibility statement
- Nice shiny new wackomenace feeds (accessible from the footer)
- Revamped pages, including the portfolio (which itself has some new content coming soon!)
I will also be posting in the coming months about both this site’s redesign and some new projects that are taking up my time right now…
As we all know by now, Internet Explorer has dire support for PNGs, especially for alpha transparency.
While building wackomenace 6, I came across yet another transparency bug in Internet Explorer. 8-bit PNGs using alpha transparency are displayed with jagged edges. I used the Internet Explorer non-standard CSS filter to load the PNG in order to make the transparency work in the first place, but this was the next bug.
Continue reading "Transparent PNGs and Internet Explorer" »
Well talk it about being a little while, more like a month to me! Anyway, the special thing to do with the site is that this year, I will be participating in the May 1st Reboot. Basically, everyone who participates in the event has to develop a completely new site design and release it on May 1st. It’s an initiative to promote creativity as well as refreshing designs every year to stop sites from becoming stale. I started the new wackomenace design (which will become version 6 when it’s released) a few days ago and it’s coming along very nicely. I might provide a sneak peak at it in a few days time when the bulk of it is finished. This is not only a redesign but also a chance to add lots of new features. I’ll be blogging about these in due course. Until then, enjoy the layout as it is now, and make sure to look out for some small updates to keep you lot going until the day!
