I have to say that one thing that has always bugged me about Jakob Nielsen’s web site is the complete lack of visual aesthetic. The impression that I get from his site is that good usability means ugly web design. Contrary to that impression, I believe that by applying standard visual design principles such as grouping content, making headlines that are easy to scan, and using white space to guide the user’s eye, usability can be significantly enhanced.
Fortunately, a group of professional web designers at Design by Fire thought the same thing, and tried to actually doing something about it. Who knows whether Jakob will see their work, but I thought they did a great job of taking a page from his site, and applying their trade.
Comparison: An article from useit.com (left) and the re-designed version (right).
November 4th, 2006 at 10:04 pm
[…] In 2004, design by fire started a little contest: Design eye for the usability guy or how to make useit nice. Via N. Derksen […]
November 28th, 2006 at 9:06 pm
Yes Jacob’s site needs a little alignment and some plain simple images won’t hurt!
I like the redesign of the site!