

Unsolicited Redesigns (Khoi Vinh responds to NYTimes redesign) - prawn
http://www.subtraction.com/2011/07/28/unsolicited-redesigns

======
donohoe
When Andy's link was first posted here it struck a nerve with many people,
especially myself (<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2806257>).

The big problem that myself and many others have with Andy is that he is a
professional. He is known in web standards and design circles. He builds web
sites.

The big point here: He has been on the other side of the design process (I
presume) explaining to people why things were built the way they were.

In Andy's "redux" he seems to forget this. Blatantly. Thats not to say he
isn't right on some obvious things (the Times left-navigation on the Homepage)
but for almost everything else he was pretty damn disparaging and ignorant of
the process that churns out the end result. To a shocking level IMHO.

What Khoi is saying here is a very level-headed and polite response to Andys
redesign. (BTW Andy himself says it wasn't so much a redesign, more like " _I
examined pressing issues for digital news_ ").

If it had been a graduate who did the "redux" I would have smiled and said, "
_Come back in a few years working in the real world and you'll see things
differently_ ". So I was a little shocked that this came from someone like
Andy.

 _Background Info:_ Khoi joined the Times in late 2005 or so. At that time the
redesign for the NYT was well underway so he was not responsible for the look-
and-feel that emerged. For the most part he has been trying to improve on the
legacy he inherited - the Sectionfront and Article layouts, the Navigation
bars on the Homepage - not Khoi's idea and he fought to change that (take a
look at the Opinion section for example <http://www.nytimes.com/opinion> for
one single sample of his stewardship).

~~~
jamesteow
Working on a startup is nothing like working client side at a place like the
NYT. With the former, one can be agile and code up some easy edits in a few
days, and push it out without weeks of deliberation. It's easy to pick out the
navigation and say, "look, let's cut some of this out or hide it in secondary
navigation." Good luck with that with corporations as big as the NYT. Chances
are, each link is represented by a group that will be LIVID if you dare remove
them from the exposed navigation.

Removing big ads from the homepage is nice for a pitch (actually to be honest,
it is a very common strategy to emotionally lure people into a pretty but
imperfect design to rework later) but would never get approved internally.
You'd have to have a pretty convincing argument that losing a huge source of
revenue would be counterbalanced by a large increase in viewership, and I
don't think that's an argument he could win (in this specific instance).

~~~
donohoe
This is very true - sadly.

The top nav of the NYTimes is a political minefield ("HOME PAGE, TODAY'S
PAPER, VIDEO, MOST POPULAR, TIMES TOPICS". Part of the problem is that links
to some of these pages exist nowhere else (or relatively few other obvious
parts). Its a big big web site and over time some organization was lost as new
pages crept in.

BUT... Do you know what happens if you remove it? Nothing. No meaningful
impact on traffic. Yet there it still ives.

The Left Navigation bar on the Homepage is a recognized problem internally.
However you need to weight:

\- Same argument as above, some links to these pages don't really exist
anywhere else (Skimmer, Times Wire, Multimedia, Times Machine). You need to
solve that problem first.

\- Various departments would make a stink if they did not have the glorious
link from the Homepage.

\- If you remove it, you're probably talking about a solution that would take
up more horizontal space and push the content down even further.

Those are the two immediate ones that I recall. I don't see this being
addressed specifically anytime soon - it was hard enough to clear space for
the Facebook module.

------
nikcub
What I find ironic is that when Pump was posted, the alternate to WSGI -
everybody jumped on the author and trashed everything about it.

Meanwhile some designer suggests that the New York Times trash their entire
business and turn it into an ugly looking blog (with padding!) and it gets 500
upvotes.

At least the Pump/WSGI proposal was genuine interest and enthusiasm and not
condescending.

This is a total repeat of the American Airlines redesign thread [1], which
everybody should be familiar with. Some things are the way they are for good
reason, and the reasons are usually very good when you are referring to a
successful product or a billion-dollar company.

[1] <http://www.dustincurtis.com/dear_dustin_curtis.html>

~~~
andrewljohnson
It's ironic, but predictable.

A site full of hackers is good at picking apart a naive technical idea... not
so much a naive design idea.

The bigger irony is if you had these discussions on news.ydesigninator.com,
the designers would have no opinion at all on the code, because they would
realize that they know nothing. But with visual arts, it's easy for us
programmers to bike-shed and act like we know something.

~~~
bglbrg
naive is the perfect term. Rutledge's ideas about what news should be are
quite naive, in fact. Of course good journalists should adhere to strict
ethical standards, but all that stuff about how popularity should have no
basis, and that "editorial" is a bogeyman? Sounds like he has little context
for what news has been in our democracy, and/or just an idealistic worldview.
There has never been a crisp line, and it's dangerous to imagine there could
be.

I think the best designers get this "real world" aspect of news. Hopefully
same goes for you programmers.

------
pbreit
The redesigner did make some breathtaking pronouncements:

"The New York Times presents a rather typical example of terribly-designed
news"

"popularity has nothing to do with news"

"today's paper: irrelevant"

"the Times’ search results page is an excellent example of usable news design"

~~~
tonydev
I try to keep up with Khoi Vihn and Subtraction because I believe he always
provides a balanced insight into respectable/high-design principals and the
practicality of applying them to mammoth operations like the NYT and such.

In fact, his tone of decency and respect, despite the the off-the-cuff
pronouncements made by Andy Rutledge is exactly the voice I've come to expect
from Khoi. Which is awesome.

Also, this reminds me a lot of the Delta Airlines redesign fiasco brought on
by another designer
(<http://www.dustincurtis.com/dear_american_airlines.html>). It's really easy
to sit back and critique the obvious flaws in design from within the ivory
tower of photoshop, where you can arbitrarily remove advertisements and ignore
the loads of user studies that entire teams have spent significant portions of
their careers.

This is the kind of stuff that gives designers the MO of being 'decorators'
who don't 'respect constraints' - operational or technical. As a designer
myself, it's sad to see this behavior showing up again and again.

~~~
davedx
"The ivory tower of photoshop". Great quote!

------
Darkmusic
It's sad that people still regard Andy as an "Industry leading expert". Andy
voids his own agency's process with this this blog post. He does very little
research, makes some bold statments, spends a few hours in photoshop and
produces what? A poorly thought out, soap box "solution" with a pretty face.
He gives no real thought to advertising, social component (comments,
popularity and social media) or the politics involved with news.

The industry should do it's self a favor, hand Andy a muzzle and continue on
to bigger and better things. He's scum.

------
Barnabas
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think the redesign he refers to but does not
link to is this: <http://andyrutledge.com/news-redux.php>

~~~
prawn
I believe that is the one.

------
dmbass
_...the argument that the redesign’s author makes is not quite so persuasive,
mostly because it makes some rash assumptions, misses some critical realities
and, perhaps worse of all, takes a somewhat inflammatory approach in
criticizing the many people who work on the original site._

This guy sounds like the redesigner really hurt his feelings.

Why not share the design constraints that the redesigner failed to consider?
Wouldn't that be more productive than complaining about link baiting and
criticism?

~~~
tonydev
It's fairly plain to see that the "redesign" completely disregards any
presence of advertisement. I'd say that would be a constraint failed to be
considered.

~~~
ralphsaunders
That simply isn't true.

> Since news is accessed only via subscription, most of the ads can be
> eliminated from the pages. Story pages could still have one or two
> tastefully-presented ads, but preservation of the content is what will keep
> readers happy, engaged, and willing to continue paying their
> subscriptions…just like in olden times.

[http://andyrutledge.com/images09/newsSite/nyt-redux-
article....](http://andyrutledge.com/images09/newsSite/nyt-redux-article.html)

~~~
mrkurt
"Considering" a constraint using magic fairy dust and an imaginary world where
people pay for news content isn't really addressing it, unfortunately. It's
like saying "since people can levitate, we can ditch their shoes. They can
wear minimal shoes for times when they might want to land, but unencumbered
feet will keep people happy".

------
MichaelApproved
_But as they do so, I also hope they remember it helps no one — least of all
the author of the redesign — to assume the worst about the original source and
the people who work hard to maintain and improve it, even though those efforts
may seem imperfect from the outside._

Redesigns, solicited or not, are very helpful to me. I don't care what
internal politics the original product designer is grappling with. It's
refreshing to see what outside observers come up with, politics and other
restrictions be damned.

I'd hate to work for someone who was so critical of critical thought.

~~~
mbreese
I thought it was very clear... Redesigns are good, but don't assume that as an
outside designer that you have all of the relevant data.

I don't recall Khoi making a statement about the redesign itself, just the
tone of the explanation of it. I got the impression that the choices made had
valid reasoning behind them that may not be obvious to someone outside of the
times. It had nothing to do with internal politics, but the realities of
running a very large site. Design is great. Practical design is better.

~~~
MichaelApproved
_Design is great. Practical design is better._

That's really true but nonetheless, its helpful to see another design point of
view. If the nytimes disagreed with the tone that was taken then state that
but don't dismiss the whole article.

He could've adressed the design concerns and also mention his shpeal about the
tone that was taken.

------
thoughtsludge
Just for perspective, Rutledge harped on Frank Chimero a few months back for
getting his book funded on Kickstarter. He was making other brash,
insensitive, and short-sighted claims that Chimero was hurting the industry
and selling-out.

I'm starting to think he's a bit of a modern design muckraker, pursuing
pageviews by stirring the pot. I suspect that Khoi picked up on it, which is
why he smartly did not pass on a link and feed the flames.

------
mbreese
I'm pretty sure this comment from the Pump/WSGI stuff is equally appropriate
here: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2817995>

It basically comes down to: if you think something is bad, try to understand
why it was designed that way I'm the first place. You may not know all of the
data or edge cases.

------
blueskittle
Having worked for a major metro newspaper's website, I'm fully aware of the
challenges faced by Khoi and others. The homepage is the Mt. Everest of
challenges within these organizations.There are so many considerations and
limitations, which are compounded by the fact that so many people within the
organization have a vested interest in the homepage design. It's impossible
for people such as Khoi to push a design through without compromising at every
step along the way. The end result is unrecognizable from where you started
(or had originally envisioned). Such is life at a large news organization. We
are powerless. And so we dream.

~~~
joshrice
"But if I'm not on the front page, _above the fold_ , no one will (read my
articles | (see|buy) ads)!"

It's a constant battle between the ad department and the content makers, and
then between the content makers themselves.

------
kstrauser
I'm not a designer and come into this not knowing who Khoi Vinh is. However,
his site's footer - _Visual design, layout and Cascading Style Sheets may not
be reused without permission._ \- just reeks of self-importance. I'm really
not allowed to make a high-contrast fixed-width three-column layout with
header and footer without Vinh's authorization?

I realize this might be like coming to a software discussion and not knowing
who Steve Jobs is. For all I know, maybe Vinh invented and patented three-
column layouts and everyone's laughing at my ignorance.

~~~
eropple
I think you missed the point. _A different_ high-contrast fixed-width three-
column layout? Totally cool. Just don't take his CSS to do it.

(Yes, this is commonplace; his little footer blurb will probably do nothing to
stop somebody who wants to, but I can't blame him for it.)

------
resnamen
I admire Vinh's reserve. Engineering is full of compromises, and few things
are more irritating than the guy that walks into the shop and spouts out at
the mouth, utterly ignorant of the historical context surrounding the
compromises that have been made.

Fresh pairs of eyes are helpful, but there are definitely more constructive
ways to offer solutions than operating under the default assumption that
everybody else are idiots.

------
hendrik-xdest
This is mostly the same reaction I had when I read the redesign article. Andy
blatantly chose to define what is news to drive his design. For example he
defined that the most read articles list is not news. Like, the front page of
Hacker News is not news because it is a list of elements that have been
ordered by how many people read, comment or upvote them and not by the news
value specified by grown journalists.

------
emp_
This was the first thing I considered doing for a living when I got more into
the internet back in 98~ (unsolicited redesigns), but I knew I would get into
so much trouble and even legal implications. Nowadays if a site has king
content and terrible ui/ux I'll just Stylish it down or stick to the feed and
move on, if they can't bother to improve the experience the next one will.

------
ChrisBanner
Vinh's response is really true of any collaborative creative environment, from
the arts to engineering. To evaluate or re-design outside of the context of
the original project (it's requirements, business goals, stakeholders, etc.)
can only yield an irrelevant conclusion.

------
napierzaza
The world also needs more poster re-designs for Kubrick movies. Here's my
ideas for 2001, remember that scene at the beginning on a space station? That
would make a good poster. What about Clockwork Orange? They could use the
Ludivigo exterior in a poster too. I mean, why did they not originally do
that?

------
hax2dyou
Khoi Vinh has no control over the content of the website. He has to listen to
many bosses.

He should have been honest and come out and said that. Instead, he chose to be
a jerk.

Guess what Khoi, we do this for fun, so no it's not a waste of time. You
clearly do not do your job well, nor do you enjoy it.

~~~
funkah
Wow. It's hard to believe people come out of this thinking Khoi is the "jerk"
here. And that he doesn't do his job well. It's sad that you think that.

------
uladzislau
Ouch. So ideas are not bad but the language hurts someone's ego. Guess Andy
Rutledge won't get any recognition because of "the wrong approach".

------
jblow
Unimpressed by this response. This is the same kind of thing said by everyone
who makes bad products.

~~~
jamesteow
He's actually a pretty stellar designer.

------
WeAreKnights
Based on the timing, I believe he's talking about the redesign exercise Andy
Rutledge did @ <http://andyrutledge.com/news-redux.php>

Khoi Vinh is being a poor sport here. Criticism is an important part of the
design world. In school we're taught to use criticism as another resource and
learn from it. The design team at the New York Times could have learned a lot
from this 'unsolicited' exercise. Instead, they chose to be offended.

~~~
statictype
Did we read the same article? Vinh was very respectful to the alternative
design.

That article you linked to contains a lot of unneeded and useless criticism of
the Times that was only peripherally related to any actual design aspects of
the site. When he goes off about ads, he's no longer talking about site
redesign and is instead advocating that they change their business model.

He's certainly free to throw his $0.02 in along with the rest of the peanut
gallery about how he thinks the newspaper industry should run their business -
but it tarnishes what was supposed to be an interesting look at a web site
redesign.

~~~
ralphsaunders
If you read the first four paragraphs of Andy's article you'll realise the
piece looks at digital news as a product, so it must address the business
model as well as the design.

~~~
statictype
Well, that was kind of my point. It's completely valid for Andy to propose a
new site design, whatever others may think of it. It's difficult to take him
seriously when opining on the paper's business model, especially when he's
being so harsh about it and hasn't really worked in the industry.

