[Jason Snell]

We will change the design based on feedback, when we think that feedback will serve the majority of our readers. (Note what I said there -- the majority of readers. We aren't going to be able to please everybody, and this design is also not going to be driven by a vote of forum members in a message thread. That said, we understand that you guys are all really closely attached to the site and therefore are going to notice stuff others won't. And we are listening to what you have to say. Then we'll decide what to change and what not to change.)
Will we just revert back to the old design? In a word, no.

[MarcL]

Wow, Jason. WOW. I wasn't going to comment on all of this, though I agree that the redesign has totally failed, but that kind of snarky response is unbelievable.
Almost everybody dislikes the design. We understand that it must have been a lot of work and took a lot of time for a lot of people on your end, but we're all not slamming the redesign just for kicks or out of some stubborn aversion to change! People have been very explicit about the problems they are experiencing, most of which are problems of usablity.
You want people to come to your site, and therefore it should have a design conducive to that. When it isn't and it starts to turn off users, your response is basically, "don't let the door hit you on the way out?" Sure, that's fine for some part-time hobby blog, but it certainly isn't for you.
Most of us won't revisit sites that are overly complicated or visually unappealing. I, for example, wouldn't have continued to visit the old MacCentral if I wasn't able to block that infuriating pop-up (which would re-engage with each reload). There are different degrees of tolerance, but surely when the VAST majority of users revolt, you have a serious problem.
Rather than get your back up and post some childish playground retort, why not go back into your boardroom with the rest of the staff and hash out a way to take all of this feedback and turn it into something positive and useful to what are effectively your customers. All of us -- and your advertisers -- will thank you.
I'd also respectfully request that you let this post remain instead of knocking it from the queue. Part of being a grownup is taking your knocks like a grownup.

[jmincey]

In a post above you chastise Jason Snell (a MacWorld forum moderator) for his bad attitude. This is a most curious reaction. What attitude do you speak of? Is it his specific requests for user feedback on the new site design? Or is it his post above which provides examples of the user-requested changes to be implemented soon? Or is it when he speaks of wishing to honor the previous MacCentral community enough not to just pull the plug on the old forums straightaway? Or is it when he sends good wishes to a former subscriber when he (the subscriber) speaks of dropping his subscription? Please enlighten me on this.
It seems to me that it was TxTom with the attitude. He (and many others here) are unwilling to give this new design a fair test drive. Many people had their minds made up after only a single DAY -- and others are coming back in succeeding days only to vent. When MacWorld demonstrates that some of the feedback is exerting an influence, the thanks it gets is the door slammed in its face.
Look, I don't generally care for this new design either -- for a number of reasons which I won't detail here. But I want to "try it on for size" (which is to say I want to give it a fair evaluation), and this takes more than a day or two (or even a week or two). Have we not all tried on a new pair of shoes which at first feels very uncomfortable -- only later to find that we like them very much? Why can't we give the same benefit of the doubt to MacWorld? (I guess it just feels so satisfying to get on our moral high horse and impetuously stalk out.)
We all seem to be forgetting that the company which we now criticize is the very one responsible for the much revered original MacCentral design to begin with. Is it too much to ask to reserve judgment for one month to see how the fine-tuning takes place and whether we come to like the new design after all? We can still check out other Mac-related sites even as we continue to monitor this site now and then. What's the harm in that?

[bradleys]

I totally agree.....I cant for the life of me think of what was difficult about navigating the Maccentral site as it was. It was clean, easy on the eyes (this one scorches your eyeballs) and just had an overall more friendly look and feel. This new version has all the personality of a beige PC running Windows NT.
I think the thing I miss most is the threaded message heading list below each article. Having to go to another page to see the replys sux big time and is just another factor contributing to the personality free zone that this new site seems to have transformed into!
And wheres my profile gone???.....Poof*.....and there it goes!!! I read Maccentral almost every day (and have done for the last 4 years) and dont recall being told this was going to happen. I suppose at least Macdoomed/Voltar/Mendar/PaperShredder et al's profiles has been blasted too, which cant be a bad thing....but I cant see even that being a future issue, because if my opinion doesnt change over the next week or so I cant see myself coming back other than just a passing browse at the headlines.

[Jason Snell]

In reply to:

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Almost everybody dislikes the design.

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More specifically, almost everyone who has bothered to post a note in our messages boards has complained about it.

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we're all not slamming the redesign just for kicks or out of some stubborn aversion to change!

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No, not all of you are.

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People have been very explicit about the problems they are experiencing, most of which are problems of usablity.

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All of which we're taking careful note of.

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When it isn't and it starts to turn off users, your response is basically, "don't let the door hit you on the way out?"

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No, when one user decides to be abusive and then immediately declare he's leaving the forums and cancelling their magazine subscription immediately, all I can do is throw up my hands and say, "goodbye."

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Rather than get your back up and post some childish playground retort,

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You might want to read one of the other dozen replies I've posted throughout these forums without consigning me to the playground so quickly.

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why not go back into your boardroom with the rest of the staff and hash out a way to take all of this feedback and turn it into something positive and useful to what are effectively your customers.

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Pretty much what I've been saying in almost every post I have made here. So I'll say it again: We are all watching these threads. We are compiling lists of feature requests. And we will then figure out what we can address, and how, and when. (For example, MacCentral users will note that there are now timestamps and many, many more headlines on the MacCentral home page. That's work done by our staff over the weekend, and it's due in part to reader feedback received on these forums.)

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I'd also respectfully request that you let this post remain instead of knocking it from the queue. Part of being a grownup is taking your knocks like a grownup.

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That's a pretty serious accusation to make, MarcL. Care to give me an example of a post that's been deleted because we disagreed with it? I haven't deleted a single post on these forums in months, and when I do delete a post it has to do with abusive behavior toward other users, not dissent against us. I've left whole threads about how great MacAddict is in these forums.
And if any member of my staff has deleted a post merely because they disagreed with it, someone let me know -- because nobody else should be doing it, either. It's just not cool. So, basically, I agree with you -- but I am somewhat offended by your suggestion that we've been deleting dissenting opinions. As the top of your own post suggested, we've allowed plenty of negative feedback about our design to be posted here.

[jmincey]

I would really like to hear from people who are FIRST-time users of the new MacWorld site and who haven't even SEEN the old MacCentral format. Granted new users don't have the perspective of the long-time users, but there are advantages and disadvantages to this. New users carry no baggage and can evaluate the site straightaway -- up or down on its merits.

[Jason Snell]

bradleys,
Your user info is still there on the original MC forum site. This is the Macworld.com forum area, which is a different user database that's been online for several years now.... Nothing got nuked, but the data's not here, it's over there.

[Jason Snell]

It's funny -- I've gotten positive feedback from Macworld web site readers, generally. MacCentral readers are more negative, and the complaints seem to fall into two camps: one is just about the simplicity of getting the headlines on the news page, which we're looking at. The other is about the forums: no visible threads on news stories, moving the news stories to the MW.com forum structure, not transferring accounts from the MC forums over to the MW.com forum database.
MacCentral readers definitely have strong opinions, and have had for years. I recall several years ago that MacCentral rolled out an entirely new redesign, only to withdraw it after several days due to the firestorm of criticism.
We're not going to do that this time, but we are listening to the criticism and will try to do everything we can to address it. (One of the reasons we won't be going back to the old design is, frankly, we are not a gigantic organization and maintaining two totally separate site designs for Macworld and MacCentral just wasn't working for us. But we've tried to keep the MC name (notice the MC logo atop all the news pages!) and we will do what we can to address the needs of MC readers.

[MarcL]

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That's a pretty serious accusation to make, MarcL. Care to give me an example of a post that's been deleted because we disagreed with it?

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It wasn't an accusation at all; just a request. As for what you deem "abusive," threatening to cancel one's subscription and leave the forums is hardly what should be termed abusive.

[Jason Snell]

You and I will just have to differ about the tenor of TxTom's final two posts.... I think he did it to make a scene.
In any event, criticism stays posted. Witness TxTom's final two posts... /forums/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

[jmincey]

In reply to:

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...that kind of snarky response is unbelievable....
Rather than get your back up and post some childish playground retort....
Part of being a grownup is taking your knocks like a grownup.

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You are on record as saying you are simply making a request of MacWorld. Uh huh. Apparently, then, you feel these particular comments are a necessary part of your "request."
Let's get real. If you had truly felt the MacWorld staff is tolerant of opposing views and had no policy for deleting such posts, you would not have made these snide remarks. So let me suggest to YOU that part of being a grown-up is coming clean and fessing up to one's true attitudes.
As for the question of abuse, I agree it lies not in the mere decision to cease one's MacWorld subscription. But that doesn't mean there was no abuse. The abuse, as I see it, lies in TxTom's manipulations of his repeated demands and then -- after being assured that a number of his demands were indeed being adopted -- he shows his thanks by taking his ball and going home (in a huff). This behavior shows bad faith in my opinion. It is indeed as if his mind were already made up, and that anything less than getting his way 100 percent would not be good enough. (This is why I refer to his complaints as "demands" rather than mere requests. They are demands because they carried an enforcement strategy.)
If you take issue, then consider that TxTom created two separate one-line posts. He could easily have edited his original post to include the second line, but that would not make for as much drama, you see. So make no mistake: What we saw from this user was the verbal equivalent of stalking out. Is this your idea of good faith?
To add insult to injury, when above Jason resists the temptation to respond in kind and when instead he only sends good wishes to Tom, he STILL gets criticized. Now you tell me -- what else could Jason do? What would you have had him do? With some people, you just can't win.
Again I repeat: Why must we be so hasty to pass judgment on this new design? I appreciate we all (myself included) have an initial reaction to this dramatic change, but why is it such a burden for us to give the new design a little time -- two weeks or a month? If after that time we continue to dislike it, then we will have more credibility (for having actually bothered to test the site rather than to react out of reflex) and by that time we will also have seen how much further fine-tuning had been done to correct and improve the site. Is this too much to ask?

[ALG]

What really stinks is that the user of MacCentral seem to think that they are the only readers of MacWorld. While I have read one or two posters from both sides MacCentral and MacWorld that have voiced some legitimate concerns on changes they think might help the site out, what I have read most are the comments of a bunch of spoiled little kids who sound like if you do not conform to my desires I will take my ball and go home.
While Jason has tried to be accomadating to this attitude I find all of this negativatity I find all of you to be very inconsiderate of those here who are looking to read the news and comments of intelligent adults and instead are forced to peruse through hours of drivel repeated over and over by a mere handful of spoiled children throwing a temper tantrum because someone else has exerted their authority and they are no longer the big bully on the block.
I am also sure that there are many responsible readers and posters from MacCentral who will be an asset to this Forum and will far out weigh the neighsayers, I look forward to getting to know them and benefitting from their advice and experience. However I for one hope those of you who are not willing to embrace any type of change and work to make it something to be proud of would go on and foolow up on your threats and mossy off into the sunset. I assure you while you think you are a majority when you are gone the world will continue to exist and MacWorld will become strong and will be here when you are tring to dictate to some other entity.
From my point of view it is not just those of you from MacCentral who's comfortable world has been upset. Those of us who are loyal readers of MacWorld have been upset not so much by the changes but rather by the appearance of a few of you from MacCentral who think your opinion is all that matters.
If this merging was looked at as though it were a war it is not MacCentral who conquered MacWorld but rather MacWorld who is in command. However in being gracious and accomadating Jason and his staff have allowed you to have your say and instead of trying to make the whole sitituation more bearable for you and your followers you still try to bluster and act as if you are in control and want us at MacWorld to bow to the repressive demands of the conquered.
I think a little respect for those who have been reading this forum and support it is in order.
Thank you,

[jmincey]

On balance, well said -- and I say this as a user with over 1300 posts on the MacCentral forums.

[d00d]

Overall, I like it. A lot. Here are some thoughts I had:
First, I'd like to see more use of CSS. More specifically, I'd like to see a series of "skins" for both the forums and MacCentral itself. Some different options could include smaller fonts to compact the overall site, and some different color schemes. On style sheet could even emulate something close to the original MacCentral (call it "Classic" or something). I think it might even be possible to have users pick a series of settings and have a PHP script generate the correct CSS code for each users preferences (that might be a bit involved for an immediate fix, but I think that could be a long term goal).
For MacC users, I think a link to the original forums is a good idea. I believe I read that was already being set into place, so that may be a dead issue at this point. /forums/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif
I'm glad you added back the multi-day history (and added the times back). I think "visited" colors would be nice to add back.
As for the migration from MacCentral's forums to MacWorld's, I am neither here nor there. Sometimes I felt like seeing the posts below the article was nice, other times, I didn't. Generally a comment count is actually to make me look, so I don't feel strongly about it. I always found post counts to be more of a vanity thing than anything functional.
In the forums, I'm going to suggest that you alter the CSS sheet to make links visible once again. They are indistinguishable from normal text and I now feel the need to make my links read "click here" to make sure others follow that I'm linking. I've gone to the lengths of altering the style sheet manually and setting Safari to use that instead. I'd also like to see new post indicators stand out more. To that end, I've altered my style sheet to make "new" class elements have a red color.
I hope my comments are helpful and prompt a more constructive discussion. /forums/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/cool.gif