In the first picture I saw border navigation panels and a main center content area. Why is that "too many columns"? 1998 was a good year, web pages contained mo

In the first picture I saw border navigation panels and a main center content area. Why is that "too many columns"? 1998 was a good year, web pages contained more information, not just text boxes super sized freakishly, low content, just large massive items on screens which have shrunk vertically the past several years which is far more of a conundrum to me. Making use of columns seems to make more sense now than it did in 1998. If anything, the Japanese are ahead of the curve. If screen sizes start growing vertically again then I could see your point.