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> How can someone tell me what I will find beautiful or intuitive? Let's be honest here. Yahoo doesn't really care what you think. Clearly if you are someone w

> How can someone tell me what I will find beautiful or intuitive? Let's be honest here. Yahoo doesn't really care what you think. Clearly if you are someone who gets worked up because a company calls a new product, "beautiful" or "intuitive" then you really aren't their desired demographic. Especially since you know. You are a Google employee and all. The fact is that Yahoo is simply trying to make this launch sound exciting. Like companies have been doing for hundreds of years. And the language they are using is far less hyperbolic than most. > The result is corporate speak. Might want to check a dictionary because I don't think you understand what that term means.

jrockway 14y ago
Let's be honest here. Yahoo doesn't really care what you think. I was under the impression that I was replying to an HN comment, not to Yahoo. I know they don't care what I think, nor do I expect them to care. I don't even think there's value in them caring what I think. The point of this particular HN thread was to analyze the language used in the article, and I added my thoughts to the thread for others to read. (I didn't even start the thread; someone else submitted the article and someone else pointed out the sentence in question.) Why are you following me around on HN and making everything into a personal attack, anyway? Disagree with the idea, not with the person. Might want to check a dictionary because I don't think you understand what that term means. If we're going by Wikipedia, it seems I meant to say "marketing speak", which is defined in the "Corporate jargon" article. I think the idea is clear: talk about what you did in objective terms, not whatever beautiful and dynamic words happen to be nearby while you're preparing a statement. (Wait, that was kind of fun. Maybe I'm wrong.)
- Terretta 14y ago
  Generally I'd agree with you. And generally I think these releases are PR. But the sentence in question "feels" more sincere than that to me: She said it's "important that the page be dynamic, that it feel very fresh, and that it be very intuitive, and that it really tries to embody beautiful design". In context, I don't think the first word, "dynamic", means AJAX, I think it means conveying energy or excitement. Putting the "Yaa-hoo!!!" back in Yahoo, if you will. The hero images change out. The weather, stocks and scores are up to date. On the iPad, you have an edge to edge (full bleed) hero image and thumbs you can scroll to. On the iPad, it does "feel" dynamic without being annoying. The next word, "fresh", is the opposite of what Yahoo's been for a decade. The Yahoo look until not long ago still hearkened back to its curated directory days. When visited from an iPad, her new design does feel up to date, without feeling like it came from Bootstrap Template Monster Ville. You can recognize at a glance that this is not MSN, AOL, et. al. (However, when visited on a desktop, I think it feels more like a shuffled iGoogle, so not so fresh.) There is a risk in "intuitive" in that it's crucial for the Yahoo audience which is a little older and more change averse. In this case, the word needs to mean approachable and immediately grokked by their majority. Grandpa needs to be able to find his scores and grandma her horoscope. I suspect this word used here signals why this page isn't singing and dancing with undiscoverable swipe style affordances. The "beautiful design" is the hardest to accept, if visiting from the desktop. On the iPad, I was struck how nice it looked. On the desktop, I think she might be bringing too much Google to her aesthetic. "Clean" is not equal to "beautiful", and I'm not even sure it's clean given the use of grey hairlines and shaded boxes to delineate content areas. A more "beautiful" design might, for example, convey the content area boundaries aesthetically, and have the grey hairlines and shading show up only when the gear (settings) and X (close) icons are needed. With a decade of Google behind her, she probably does consider this presentation more "beautiful" than any of the section home pages you reach from this page. Word by word, I think she used the best words she had on hand for what she was directing her redesign team to come up with. I like that she talked about how it "felt" rather than just metrics. If you spitball a bunch of terms you want your home page to convey, this isn't a bad list. Perhaps these particular words sound overused because, well, a home page like Yahoo's needs these words as priorities. I didn't read her comment as insincere or corporate speak or even marketing speak. I think it's honestly what she was going for.
  - Evbn 14y ago
    Yes, you have captured the essence of the consultant who wrote Marissa's speech. That is exactly what this thread is complaining about. The corporatespeak BS. "Dynamic" is 1990s codeword for "good", before "rock star" took over as the tech buzzword.
    - Terretta 14y ago
      > The corporatespeak BS. "Dynamic" is 1990s codeword for "good" Sometimes the best word for a thing is, well, the best word. dynamic (adj) 2a. marked by usually continuous and productive activity or change <a dynamic city>; 2b. energetic, forceful <a dynamic personality> She did not use the term as a code word for "good". The page is continuously updated with productive changing information. She used the most concise word for that available.

jrockway 14y ago

Let's be honest here. Yahoo doesn't really care what you think. I was under the impression that I was replying to an HN comment, not to Yahoo. I know they don't care what I think, nor do I expect them to care. I don't even think there's value in them caring what I think. The point of this particular HN thread was to analyze the language used in the article, and I added my thoughts to the thread for others to read. (I didn't even start the thread; someone else submitted the article and someone else pointed out the sentence in question.) Why are you following me around on HN and making everything into a personal attack, anyway? Disagree with the idea, not with the person. Might want to check a dictionary because I don't think you understand what that term means. If we're going by Wikipedia, it seems I meant to say "marketing speak", which is defined in the "Corporate jargon" article. I think the idea is clear: talk about what you did in objective terms, not whatever beautiful and dynamic words happen to be nearby while you're preparing a statement. (Wait, that was kind of fun. Maybe I'm wrong.)

Terretta 14y ago
Generally I'd agree with you. And generally I think these releases are PR. But the sentence in question "feels" more sincere than that to me: She said it's "important that the page be dynamic, that it feel very fresh, and that it be very intuitive, and that it really tries to embody beautiful design". In context, I don't think the first word, "dynamic", means AJAX, I think it means conveying energy or excitement. Putting the "Yaa-hoo!!!" back in Yahoo, if you will. The hero images change out. The weather, stocks and scores are up to date. On the iPad, you have an edge to edge (full bleed) hero image and thumbs you can scroll to. On the iPad, it does "feel" dynamic without being annoying. The next word, "fresh", is the opposite of what Yahoo's been for a decade. The Yahoo look until not long ago still hearkened back to its curated directory days. When visited from an iPad, her new design does feel up to date, without feeling like it came from Bootstrap Template Monster Ville. You can recognize at a glance that this is not MSN, AOL, et. al. (However, when visited on a desktop, I think it feels more like a shuffled iGoogle, so not so fresh.) There is a risk in "intuitive" in that it's crucial for the Yahoo audience which is a little older and more change averse. In this case, the word needs to mean approachable and immediately grokked by their majority. Grandpa needs to be able to find his scores and grandma her horoscope. I suspect this word used here signals why this page isn't singing and dancing with undiscoverable swipe style affordances. The "beautiful design" is the hardest to accept, if visiting from the desktop. On the iPad, I was struck how nice it looked. On the desktop, I think she might be bringing too much Google to her aesthetic. "Clean" is not equal to "beautiful", and I'm not even sure it's clean given the use of grey hairlines and shaded boxes to delineate content areas. A more "beautiful" design might, for example, convey the content area boundaries aesthetically, and have the grey hairlines and shading show up only when the gear (settings) and X (close) icons are needed. With a decade of Google behind her, she probably does consider this presentation more "beautiful" than any of the section home pages you reach from this page. Word by word, I think she used the best words she had on hand for what she was directing her redesign team to come up with. I like that she talked about how it "felt" rather than just metrics. If you spitball a bunch of terms you want your home page to convey, this isn't a bad list. Perhaps these particular words sound overused because, well, a home page like Yahoo's needs these words as priorities. I didn't read her comment as insincere or corporate speak or even marketing speak. I think it's honestly what she was going for.
- Evbn 14y ago
  Yes, you have captured the essence of the consultant who wrote Marissa's speech. That is exactly what this thread is complaining about. The corporatespeak BS. "Dynamic" is 1990s codeword for "good", before "rock star" took over as the tech buzzword.
  - Terretta 14y ago
    > The corporatespeak BS. "Dynamic" is 1990s codeword for "good" Sometimes the best word for a thing is, well, the best word. dynamic (adj) 2a. marked by usually continuous and productive activity or change <a dynamic city>; 2b. energetic, forceful <a dynamic personality> She did not use the term as a code word for "good". The page is continuously updated with productive changing information. She used the most concise word for that available.