Facebook facelift

http://www.behance.net/Gallery/Facebook-Facelift-Home-Profiles-_amp-Publisher/314489

by prabodh • 17 years ago

27 14 17 years ago

unalone2• 17 years ago

Too light. Not enough contrast/information density. I like some of the things, like the photo display, but this makes Facebook look generic and cluttered and "trendy". The best thing about Facebook's design is it so thoroughly denies trends.

EDIT: Also, the lack of pointless gradients.

kyro• 17 years ago

It's just that one gradient in the background.

I agree with your overall sentiment, though. You know, often times, I find sites designed like that really uncomfortable to use. I can't explain why. Everything is too nice, and too slick. Maybe it's like taking a friend's ferrari out for a spin and being afraid to get it scratched - not sure.

unalone2• 17 years ago

The way one of my teachers described it a few years ago is that we get uncomfortable around beauty without purpose. Beauty feels good, but only when there's a logic to its being there. Often it's better to be plain than to attempt overt beauty, because it feels more honest. And that's how Facebook feels to me. It's an honest design.

izaidi• 17 years ago

I agree. A lot of designers excel at making things that are nice to look at but not especially nice to use. I've always thought of this as a sort of "heaviness" -- the design has so much inertia that you're reluctant to manipulate it. This Facebook makeover, with its non-standard fonts and metallic sheen, feels really heavy.

akamaka• 17 years ago

They haven't added any fundamental innovations that Facebook hasn't already implemented.

This is an example of the worst kind of design, where the designer has gone through a self-absorbed process of moving around and resizing elements that Facebook created through years of experience with real users.

texec• 17 years ago

Can absolutely confirm that. For me it looks like something that is designed by Microsoft (mainly because of the fonts).

There are too wide spaces between text and metadata, too lwo contrasts between light shades of grey and a disrupted context for some elements (see My Profile and Search).

#fail

potatolicious3• 17 years ago

To add to your point, these guys have no idea what the average computer user is running. Hint: it's not a pro-grade 30" widescreen LCD.

Where I work we run a website targeted to everyone - mom, pop, grandpa, college dude, etc. Suffice to say, our minimum resolution and colour depth requirements are really low. Experience has proven this to be far wiser than Web 2.0-ing everything and assuming people have screen real estate.

The design here won't work on low resolution displays. The news feed would - but that's only because their design wastes a truckload of space down the middle. Their photo viewer, and calendar will break on any low-resolution screen.

Can it be fixed? Sure, but I have a feeling the more you "fix" their design, the closer you're going to get to where Facebook already is today ;)

timdorr• 17 years ago

Not only that, it's completely done away with the branding that Facebook has built over time. That goes beyond just the logo. There is hardly any blue in this design, which is their signature design element. The design they have itself is a brand. Even as they've changed designs over time, it's maintained a similar design language. Completely eschewing that for the sake of "newness" is borderline retarded.

Also, it's bland and ugly as fucking sin.

nsfx• 17 years ago

It's funny we all share a similar view on ycombinator.com (the 'facelift' is nothing special), yet everyone on the source page is orgasming over it.

== critical thinkers vs. autofellating designers

potatolicious3• 17 years ago

To be honest, claiming that the HN community are critical thinkers and designers are autofellating... is pretty autofellating.

I would like a more rational, more realistic explanation of why we seem to universally hate it, while designers seem to love it.

prabodh• 17 years ago

Wonder how different perspectives designers and hackers have...But it is not definitely a great design and it gonna look worse on a small screen...

snprbob86• 17 years ago

I quite like what they are doing with http://lite.facebook.com

Facebook facelift

Related Stories