You may have noticed a few changes in the look of XGW:
A new logo, a few color and font changes.
More changes are planned, but first I wish to solicit feedback and bug reports from you, our readers. For example, does the layout work in your browser? Are the text or the comment boxes misplaced or awkward to read? What does that red thingy in the logo represent? 🙂
Please comment, either publicly or via e-mail. Don’t forget to include the name of the web browser or newsreader that you use to view the site.
It kinda looks like a happier version of the Empire symbol from Star Wars.
That’s an interesting use of the Muslim crescent in the banner.
I’m on a Mac using Firefox for a browser and NetNewsWire for a news reader. Works perfectly for me, and I think the changes are great!
Overall, it’s an improvement.
One minor thing (very minor) the footers at the bottom of each post and comment are in some type of narrow font, perhaps Arial Narrow: for those of us of a certain age, it’s a little difficult to read (even with bifocals). This began occurring a couple of days before the new look appeared, however, so it may have another cause which may not be changeable.
Should I practice my squinting, Mike?
I’m using MS IE Explorer.
On the responses to the individual comment threads you’ve added a right hand column with “recently at XGW”. This squeezes the individual comments into narrow paragraphs in the left hand column with the right hand generally being empty space. This is a little less pleasant to read than the old way with the comments spanning the width of the screen.
I like the redesign a lot. It looks great to me.
I would make the link color just a couple of shades darker–it’s a little too light for old eyes to see. Also, I’d stretch the entire main column a bit so that your Google ad will fit without running over on the right. Or pick a smaller Google ad banner. Or get rid of it, because you’re not going to get many clicks when it’s on the bottom of the page.
Otherwise, lovely!
I like the softer, cleaner look of the new logo, but I’m not sure what it’s suppose to symbolize.
* A person with their arms raised in red fury?
* A top view of a red person giving a brown person a hug?
* A view down a screaming mouth with a brown tonsil?
* A blood-shot brown eye rolling back in disgust? 🙂
I like it overall. I’d echo Michael’s comment about making the link darker.
The logo makes me think of someone throwing up his/her arms in exaggerated dismay : “good grief, what HAVE they done now?!” – which, given what we’re ‘watching’, is by no means inappropriate.
Looks fine on Firefox in Windows 2k.
When I first saw the new logo, it made me think of someone opening their arms in a welcoming fashion, as if all are welcome to the table. Once you asked for comments and I started straining to put more meaning behind it, I started to see it as an eye, watching the exgay issues I guess. So, put it together and you have: to all who want to participate in civil debate, you are welcome to come and help us keep a watchful eye on the exgay issues of the day. FWIW, I like it.
I agree with others that the link font needs to be slightly darker. It is especially hard to read on some LCD monitors. I have adjusted my brightness some which helped, but a darker link would helpful. I think the content area needs to be a full 800×600 (which would take care of the Google Ads problem). I believe 1024 x 768 resolution dominates now but certainly accommodating anything less than 800×600 is impractical. That should help a bit to answer the other comments about a space crunch.
In general, I like the new look. It has more contrast but is still clean and to the point. With a few tweaks, you should be good to go.
PS: Mike, if you count on Google Ads revenue to help pay for the site (which is perfectly reasonable), you might consult their layout suggestion for the best revenue spots. They aren’t always where you might expect them. I have no problem with it being in the middle as before but having it not fit the width of the site was (is) annoying.
David
Re: the logo.
It for some reason reminds me of logos I’ve seen within some evangelical context (which I can’t quite recall).
It made me think of hands raised in praise. (And then, for some reason, it reminded me of an egg on a plate. Who knows?)
However, considering everyone else’s comments, I think I may have been alone in both of those. I’m sure some psychologist could have a field day with we’ve all seen in it.
In any case, it’s simple and elegant and I kinda like it.
It looks great! However, I find the post text colour too light — I kinda have to adjust my screen to make it easier to read, and I still find myself squinting a bit.
I like the new layout much more than the old one. The symbol at the top looks like someone being robbed. Stick ’em up!
This new logo is becoming somewhat of a Rorschach test 🙂
David
I see a pony! Or possibly my father.