Excite.com is far from exciting

A long time ago, when email was just a baby and when internet was nothing but a bunch of wires, Excite.com was born. That’s right, the event took place some time ago when people used to write letters instead of emails. At that time my mother used to made research on paper and from books. Now, she is lost without the World Wide Web.

Excite is just the term left from the early days of the internet. It is the only thing left from the early promoter of the customized web profiles. That’s right! The once big and important portal Excite.com is now a simple web page with less traffic each day. I wonder why?

Cons
As you can see the site has still many sections. But those are good for nothing if the information is not displayed in a positive way. Regarding the way of showing the information, it is quite hilarious. I mean, we know that the content is gathered from around 100 different sources, but after you gather the information, you try to give an uniform look to all content. Not here … there are different graphic elements from different sites using … different styles. A total mess.

There is no user interface logic in here. Also, the points of interest are not prioritized or emphasized. Even the news, that are vital for a portal, are placed in the bottom side of the portal. It is chaos.
The layout is fluid and because of the bad implementation it looks awful.

Pros
The only good thing in this portal, that doesn’t have great importance, because it is destroyed by the overall look is the logo. The logo after these years is still great. I like it a lot. And also there are several decent icons in the top side. But the rest is a mess.

Conclusion
This is sad because the portal is owned by IAC which also has Ask or CitySearch. With traffic around 1.5 mil / month and dropping, this site is the perfect reflection of bad management. Regarding the user interface, design and user experience, this site is zero.

User Interface ☆☆☆☆☆
User Experience ☆☆☆☆☆
Design ★☆☆☆☆
——————–
Graphic ½☆☆☆☆

Andy Gongea is a passionate UI/UX designer with a great appetite for technology and trends. Currently he owns, a future wife, a loan that comes with a monthly fee and some strange ideas about user interface and user interaction. Cheers! Follow Andy on Twitter: @andygongea

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