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Why is their logo so degraded [1]? [1] https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/G/01/boost/landing/img/FormLogo._CB314969857_.jpg https://images-na.ssl-i

• phonon 10y ago
  Because it's a jpeg and not a png. Jpeg will show artifacts (smudging and mosquito noise) in high contrast areas and flat fields of color. PNG is lossless, and well suited to compress repeating color values mixed with high frequency signals.
  • apetresc 10y ago
    While true, this is still well below the upper bound of quality JPG is capable of.
    • phonon 10y ago
      OK, "for a given data budget". The image in question is compressed 13:1 PNG would match that size and be lossless.
      • phonon 10y ago
        Here is a similar version and size of the jpeg logo, that I created from a clean source. It is about 40% smaller (in bits) than the jpeg. http://i.imgur.com/DlJ2uFX.png http://i.imgur.com/DlJ2uFX.png
        • apetresc 10y ago
          Again, I'm not disagreeing that PNG is better. I'm saying that, even if you insist on JPG, you can still do much better than what Amazon's got going on 90% of their splash pages.
          • phonon 10y ago
            Well, here's my jpeg attempt (PS, Save for Web), at the same file size that Amazon used. http://i.imgur.com/lmHd51x.jpg http://i.imgur.com/lmHd51x.jpg Yeah, they could do better :-)
  • acdha 10y ago
    There are also wide quality variations across implementations. Kornel Lesiński has made some nice contributions to mozjpeg which improved quality significantly for images with sharp edges compared to the standard libjpeg: https://kornel.ski/deringing/ https://kornel.ski/deringing/
• apetresc 10y ago
  Amazon has got this weird thing with low-quality JPGs, and especially text-as-images for all their announcements. Every time they announce a new Kindle or something, the front page becomes a giant image of a "letter from Bezos" with artifacts the size of grapes. It's constantly surprising to me how sophisticated and careful they are on every single other aspect of their business, except for this one.
  • ChicagoBoy11 10y ago
    Is there any chance that it could be intentional? Everyone knows Amazon's product page, for instance, is some of the most optimized real estate on the internet, I don't know any designer who looks at it and doesn't immediately want to start saying everything that is wrong with it. Could they, in this case, also be optimizing for something that we aren't considering?
    • tkxxx7 10y ago
      Perhaps to signal affordability.
  • __derek__ 10y ago
    Seriously. The testimonial block-quotes are images with meaningless alt text (e.g., "Testimonial 1"). They're clearly doing plenty of things right, but the inattention to detail and disregard for accessibility get my goat.
• orky56 10y ago
  Outside of the artifacts from being a jpg vs svg/png, it has a very tacky gradient that becomes worse with poor contrast (light blue on white).