Partly these confusing web sites the big guys mostly seem to have these days represent a tension between the art designers, the computer people and the management.
The creators of HTML made something that would allow you to make pages look the same, more or less, on any platform. The text would resize according to your needs, and always wrap no matter the dimensions of your screen. Backgounds could tile to fill the space evenly.
Unfortunately, it was *uuuuGGLeee*.
So artists have gone around the html by using embedded graphics, cursor maps, frames etc and made some nice looking stuff, sometimes. Unfortunately, all of it only looks good at one screen resolution and too small or too big at all other resolutions. Pictures would be displayed with a standard palette or in RGB, for reliability, across all platforms.
Meanwhile, back in the marketing/sales/distribution departments everybody wants just one more item for themselves on the front page.
And don't forget those inflated executive egos, with their demands for front page opinion columns to show their visionary nature. (Yeah, I know, look who's talking.)
Is it any wonder a web page visit for something simple turns out to be like the 1/2 hour ordeal at Safeway when you just wanted a gallon of milk.
What's the answer? Scalable graphics, for one. All of those GIFs and JPEGs need to rezise according to the display resolution. And the display resolution (and location, and customer preferences) have to be accurately logged for the designer (and Java programmer.) And when the graphics are scaled they need to be antialiased. That will take care of the jaggy pre-rendered type. This would be entirely in accord with the web ideas of portability and scalability. Plus make things a lot easier on Java programmers.
The other thing that would help is if a practical design and business culture develops for the web. At a newspaper, the layout/art department has a great deal of authority over the placement of items. If they tell the editor, 'OK, if you want that on page one, we have to move this off' the editor's answer is not a simple 'NO' as it is so often at web shops.
Web designers need more clout. As well as more professional background. I think it's telling that some of the best laid out web sites are those run by newspapers and magazines with decades of experience in print. They have the right culture, expertise, and visual sense, properly adapted.
One more thing: You can't have a publication with a 'layout design du jour' and please the customer. Changing the look is something that print publications approach very carefully. It is almost always preannounced. Readers want to go to the same place for their favorite features every time. No kidding. They don't want them to change too fast even when they are substandard. This is the principle that made McDonalds and (fill in the blank) great big companies.
Obviously, both Microsoft and Netscape could use some of that on their sites.
Netscape errs toward clutter. Microsoft errs toward treating the front page as a blank slate for this weeks PR and advert blurbs. It's like falling into the middle of a press kit. Unappetizing.
BTW, I have worked in newspaper layout departments and graphics shops as well as programming, if you couldn't tell. I have been a graphic artist, a columnist, a circulation manager, and an advertising space salesman at one time or another, so I have some insight on the tensions that can arise in putting together a publication. I don't believe web sites are fundamentally different in all ways from print.
Chaz |
