Case Study #2: Wired Magazine

A news site is the candidate for our second case study. The Google home page (our first candidate) was an easier analysis by the sheer nature of its singular function. Obviously, Wired News is more intricate, as are most news sites. For example, the New York Times is vast and complex (relating directly to its expansive news coverage, as compared to Wired’s focus on tech-oriented news) and would result in a much more intricate analysis. For our purposes, Wired is a good place to start. The Wired News site has also been recently redesigned, giving us the rare opportunity to do an evaluation while our subject is still piping hot.

• 1. IdentityIt is still a rarity to see a site, particularly a news site, without it’s identifying logo at the top of the page. There is no exception with Wired. One unusual feature about the logo position: they move it to accomodate the Sponsor Units. This is both an unobtrusive method of ad placement and a clever use of real estate.
• Web design notes: White space is always useful to provide distinction among dissimilar Units. The uninitiated might have a bit of confusion with the Identity and Sponsor Cases being intertwined. For instance, the updated Wired home page displays a Sprint ad. A user might think Sprint is the actual site they’re visiting or that Wired is a Sprint subsidiary. It is not utterly critical to the experience, but such confusion should always be avoided.
• 2. ImpactThe folks at Wired have created a hierarchy of news Units that correspond to the level of importance they’ve placed on these stories: lead at the top, then three sub-levels of news Units. How do we know that? It’s not only the spatial arrangement of these items, but their headlines and images. As you move down the page, the headlines decrease in size, allowing you to scan and categorize the news units: feature or lead stories, secondary features, tabbed items (latest blog posts), etc. You’ve got four levels of news units, and it’s yours to decide how far you’d like to browse through them. Negotiating this page from top to bottom becomes a pleasant exercise in scannability.
• One of the nice features further down the page is the “prologue” for the tabbed items. Though the headlines are helpful clues to a story a prologue supplements the more obscure headlines.
• Web design notes: Though the large headlines for the lead stories jump from the Web page, is it necessary to dedicate such space to them? The largest ones are 2.8em. It would be understandable if this were an accessibilty issue, but a smaller size would suffice. No text decoration is needed for the headlines – a user will know that simple standalone phrases will likely be a link – a mouseover will take care of any amibiguity.
• The Georgia serif font is a familiar remnant from print days and are just as readable in this context. Many news sites have begun to use serif fonts in their redesigns.
• 3. Navigation The first Navigation Case is cleverly and distinctly placed. It dissects the Impact Case with a bold contrasting color, giving a nod to the lead stories while still making it easily located by the user. The top level categories give credence to the implied user task and gives transparency to the site’s information architecture.
• The second Navigation Case at the bottom of the page, could also be considered a Courtesy Case, simply by its locale and redundancy of some of the links in the first Navigation Case. But there are some very helpful links connected to common user tasks on the site. These might be considered secondary, to the first Navigation Case, but giving them top-level navigation (rather than within a dropdown menu) flags them as important items.
• 4. SearchWired adds a helpful dropdown that enables the user to search via section. This gives the user a level of omniscience regarding the site contents. Helping to filter the contents also gives the user control and eliminates the feeling that you’re just stumbling into a big pile of irrelevant search results.
• 5. FeatureThe Feature Case is a “Visit Our Sister Sites” promotion of sites within the Conde Nast conglomerate. It doesn’t really serve the user as much as it serves the business and, therefore, identifies it as a Feature.
• 6. SupplementalThese discrete Units entitle the reader to a peek at upcoming news or current interesting events as a supplement to the Impact Case. Because of their standalone placement, they are given emphasis with the other competing page elements. The subtle but eye-catching border also helps.
• 7. SponsorOnly one area has been dedicated to a Sponsor Case, integrated with the Identity Case. It appears custom-made to fit in with the logo, allowing the design of the site to reign over a what could have been blaring banner ad. The Web user if often sacrificed for commerce (as we know so well in daily life), but this is a subtle integration that still has an effect and draws attention.
• 8. AdminThere are two Admin Cases on this page. The first is the ubiquitous copyright, user agreement and privacy policy. A site that doesn’t have this info easily seen is, of course, likely to not be covering those bases. But those that do give the user pause about any type of plagiaristic intent or other nefarious intentions.
• The second is located to the right, below the Supplement. Or is this Admin a Feature Case? This was a tough call because the subscription links (already offered in two other areas of the page) are business-driven, but there are Admin elements also offered, such as RSS Feeds and FAQ’s. So we’ll leave it as so. If the Quick Links hadn’t been there, we’d call this a Feature Case.

1 Comment(s)

Comments RSS | TrackBack Identifier URI

Leave a comment