Gratings 2008 – Worst Redesign
This is the second category from Gratings 2008 – 1st Annual Graphic Rating Awards. The Worst Redesign category is dedicated to all bad redesigns in 2008. This year there are not many contestants and hopefully this category will stay short on nominees for the following years.
Inquisitr.com
The first major failure in the redesign area is Inquisitr, an online site for all kinds of news. The owner of the site is Duncan Riley, former Techcrunch employee. I have to say that half a year ago, at launch, Inquisitr was quite a good looking site. That was until the new design was applied. In this one you will find the importance of Adsense advertisments and also what are the drawbacks of pour implemented typography, spacing and a grid layout.
HP logo
One of the most bizarre decisions regarding a legendary logo – HP. Redesigning HP is like seeing “Lord of the Rings” in 320×240 resolution on a 30″ plasma. And keep in mind that Lord of the Rings is “the” movie for me. Switching from a simple and stylish logo to a trendy and glossy one is a big mistake. But, this is HP’s problem and our second nominee.
ConceptShare
I can’t figure this one either. You have a site, you have a good service, you even have a good number of visitors and you decide to copy the Apple.com style? The ConceptShare redesign decision was based on what? Anyway, due to this redesign we have our 3rd contestant.
Which is the worst redesign of 2008?
Judge and Vote!
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!6 Responses to “Gratings 2008 – Worst Redesign”
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I would vote for the new Intuit logo. They replaced a fairly terrible logo with an even worse one.
That is a new terrible logo, I agree. But this year we will have just these nominees and next year we will have a proposal section as well.
I’m definitely a bit confused as to why ConceptShare is on this list. Those guys have been making an incredibly popular and useful product for years and over time they’ve added more “fresh air” to their designs as their feature set grew. I often see how clean sites are compared to Apple based on use of white space and large visuals. But I don’t think that’s enough to consider a highly usable and well trafficked site a poor redesign contender. I think the criteria you’re using should be included with your commentary so that you’ll actually get constructive engagement from your readership. Or consider taking a positive view towards redesigns so that you can highlight what works instead of being negative.
Frederik, I’m not speaking about the product. I’m talking about their website. The ConceptShare product is quite useful and was one of my favorite a year ago. I even wanted to make something similar, so I don’t have reasons for hate or anything else related to the product.
Regarding the site, it is not the fact that has a clean look. There are multiple elements similar to Apple.com (the one that was online a year ago). Too bad that Archive.org is not working the way it should. And also I don’t have a screenshot.
Regarding my so called negative view, you should read the reviews and see what is the general feeling.
Cheers!
@Frederick. I just looked at the Conceptshare site next to the Apple site and it does look, er, “heavily inspired”!! You can imagine the thinking that took place at Conceptshare HQ… “We make a product for designers, designers love their Macs, let’s copy the Mac website ‘cos then designers will love us too”.
Conceptshare is a good product (as are ProofHQ, Cozimo and others in this space). It just seems to me that for a company claiming to support designers they should not so blatantly copy someone else’s work.
@vbk. You are right about the Intuit logo – eek!
@Andy. A proposal section would be a great idea.
You are right Jared.
Next year there will be more categories and also a proposal section.