5 ms·
I don't usually like to comment on design when people post early stage products, because I understand that usually development is focused on core features and,
by superfrank 6y ago
I don't usually like to comment on design when people post early stage products, because I understand that usually development is focused on core features and, as time goes on, the design will change.
That being said, I feel like the homepage was overwhelming to the point where my immediate reaction was to back out of using the product, so I feel that it's worth commenting on in this case. I'm not trying to nit pick, but if other people had similar reactions, it could affect user acquisition.
There's lots of big bold text and not a lot of use of negative space, so it's really hard to know what to focus on. I feel like a little more vertical space between posts and maybe making the URL smaller or moving it below the post title (or both) could really make the homepage a little less overwhelming with only a few minor changes.
- iagovar 6y agoI felt the same.
- emmelaich 6y agoInteresting! I thought the opposite; could do with less whitespace and smaller fonts.
- holler 6y agoHey thank you for the feedback and for checking it out! May I ask if you were on desktop or mobile? Definitely could adjust the font sizes and since I've been working mostly on my laptop, I realize I might not be optimizing for other screen sizes. > I feel like a little more vertical space between posts and maybe making the URL smaller or moving it below the post title (or both) could really make the homepage a little less overwhelming with only a few minor changes. I will experiment with this further. The vertical space should be easy, the urls are part of the text of the title, so maybe either shrink them slightly or a more muted blue? Thanks for the feedback!
- superfrank 6y ago> May I ask if you were on desktop or mobile? I was on desktop. > maybe either shrink them slightly or a more muted blue? Yeah, I think either or those (or both) could work. Looking at it again, a lot of the issue I'm seeing is that the URL and the title are equally prominent and fighting for my attention. I'd take the one you think is less important (probably the URL, imo) and visually make it clear that it's less important, similar to what you did with the user and time it was posted.
- holler 6y agook gotcha, I'm marking that down as a UI enhancement, thank you for your feedback!
- torgoguys 6y agoThe bold, black text is too much IMO, but I appreciate sites that are high on content, low on unnecessary white space. In fact, I would suggest/prefer experimenting with an interface where: 1) every entry has the exact same amount of vertical space (two lines total), which includes the topic title, link to content, date, and username. Include username and date on the same lines as the other content (not their own line) and truncate long titles to make it work. 2) the links to external content are just the domain name (like HN--you don't currently include enough extra characters for it to be useful to see those extra characters) This gives the interface more consistency which might help clean up the "messiness" of the look and be more inviting in that way, rather than in a way that cuts down on information density. (Make it a power tool, not a toy.) And as referenced above, playing around with weight and color for all that bolded black would might be helpful. Overall, I dig the concept!
- holler 6y agoThank you for the feedback I really appreciate it! I like the idea of (1), it would make it more uniform which could increase readability. For (2) I did truncate it but can see how for many sites it just shows the domain. I didn't want to end up with really long urls being shown either, so maybe extending the truncation a bit could be useful? Thanks again!
- allenu 6y agoI'd like to echo this statement. I found the text was a bit too bold and there wasn't enough whitespace to let the page breathe. I couldn't really get my bearings on what I was looking at. A little bit more tweaking of the design will do wonders to communicate what the "intention" of the page is. Sites like reddit can get away with a cluttered interface because they've been around for a while, have loads of content, and loads of users, so people put up with it, but for a new site, you have to sell them immediately.
- holler 6y agoHey thank you for the feedback! I've received a fair amount of comments on the spacing/font size of the posts list & plan to tweak it. Appreciate the feedback & taking the time to check it out, take care.
- lifeformed 6y agoI feel like for this kind of product, it's all about the design, and not so much the tech. The design should be given first class priority, in my opinion.
- holler 6y agoI agree, the design is a crucial part of it! I was originally inspired by Slack, and later Discord, having used irc growing up etc. Thanks for your feedback!