"I'm pretty sure life comes easier to you when you are Vusi Mahlasela"

In sticking with theme of what happened on my birthday, I wanted to share some of the music that I picked up from i-tunes. I was able to get a hold of some music from South African singer-songwriter, Vusi Mahlasela. I checked out his website, and was pretty disappointed by the results. The homepage is compact and does not require scrolling, that is a plus. The photo of Vusi with guitar in hand is a nice touch, and does a bit of the "show, not tell" that I referred to in my DMB review. However, the links of the web site are small, white, and at the bottom of the page, making it near impossible to see them. I quite literally didn't even see the ones all the way to the left until after about sixty seconds. I did not like that the writing on the homepage was small and urged you to go to youtube to check him out before you even explored his own site. I would revise that. Beyond the homepage, the site is great, with correct proximity, colorful pics, effective font contrast, clear links present on every page. However, the homepage's inability to draw and keep an audience from even getting to know his site and more importantly, his music. (If you do nothing else for the rest of the day, please click that link.)

In my search for solid tunes, I find a solid web site

My 21st birthday was recently and in addition to bringing about some cotton-mouth, it also yielded some i-tunes gift cards. I used amazon in order to discover and organize the music that I wanted to purchase.

Overall, the layout of the homepage is a pretty good one. The search bar is the first thing that grabs your eye, which is the goal for a web site like this. The search box is divided into several different categories to make searching easier. The search bar is also present on every page of the site.

There are an awfully large amount of advertisements on the site but, in general, they keep a solid proximity distance away from each other, and when you consider that the point of this web site is to sell things, you realize that things could indeed look a lot worse. A plus of the site is that it suggests things that you may like based upon your searches. When the advertisements are geared towards things that you enjoy, they are less overwhelming and bothersome. I did not appreciate the fact that if you were not familiar with amazon, it may take you a while to realize that is a shopping web site. Granted, the search box may be a big hint, but The words "Shopping" and "View Cart" are very small on the left and right of the page in comparison to the web advertisements.

Holy Cluttered Webspace Batman!

I suppose this was inevitably going to come out eventually, so I'd rather get it over with. My square indulgence in this world is what we'll call an "appreciation" for the cape and cowl of Batman. I wouldn't say I'm a nerd about it, but the fact that I check http://www.batman-on-film.com/batmovienews.html once every couple of weeks may in fact undermine my claim. Let's just say I like to stay informed. On to business....

I've never been a fan of this homepage. There a graphics and advertisements that cover a lot of the surface area of the site. In order to get too the current movie news, you have to scroll down a ways which is a pain, considering that is the purpose of the web page. The links to other interesting stories on the site are found at the top of the page, that is a plus. However, these links are small, found in one big clumpy list, and the gray font does not contrast well with the black background. These three factors combined force a reader to skim and find it difficult to find a specific article on the site. Links to other pages on the site are tiny and seem to hide in the left column of the web page. Compared to the ads and graphics they are practically invisible.

Following the most recent story, a huge advertisement is present before you ever see other stories, this would discourage me from reading on in the site, as I would assume that all important information would be found before the advertisement. A pain of a website, but the reporting is solid.

In looking at Pennsylvania’s Department of transportation website, the homepage seemed like one big traffic jam. I never thought that a website would make me wish that I were actually in line in the actual DMV but, this in clarity of this homepage certainly came close. There is no spacing on this homepage and the proximity of pieces and links are very cluttered and make my mind overwhelmed before I even read the offered links. The difference between “Online Services” and “Information Centers” are unclear and overall I feel as though the web page and links could be phrased more concisely in order to clear up the crowded homepage. One plus of the page however, is that there is no need to scroll on the page.

The sight on how to create a website is pretty basic, but overall pretty effective. The text contrast of the piece makes the text readable. While the font could be larger I think it is hard to find a text color that would not contrast heavily to such a blaringly loud yellow hue. There are links at the top and side of the page that can help you access answers to your specific questions. The fact that the links are always present on the side even as you scroll is definitely a plus. Perhaps the website could be spaced out better, as all of the site’s content can be found one page. I would most certainly put separate content on separate web pages, but the links allow for quick access anyway. In conclusion, I’ve certainly seen better and worse sites, and overall I think the site fills its purpose. (Which is found at the top of the page and should be larger, text variation is an issue, as they want to prevent the words and topics from being muddled together and/or skimmed.)

The WXPN site is pretty well constructed; there are well aligned and symmetrical links at the top of the page which make navigating the website much easier (with sub categories available once you scroll over the general categories). The homepage is busy one, perhaps a bit too busy, but with that said, each headline is within its own box and as a result do not run into each other. There are some changes that could be made to make the homepage more concise as there is a lot of scrolling to do to see the entire page, but overall the web page seems solid and could certainly be more chaotic than it is.

The science fiction site seems to have a bit too much contrast going on, as the space background combines with yellow, red, and green text, and a plethora of pictures to create a monster that one could only wish was actually fiction. It’s quite simply too much for the eyes to handle. One could find it difficult to focus on anything on the page. The green links on the side are very small and seem to be hiding amongst the spaceships and storm troopers. Just not a great layout; you have to actually concentrate pretty hard to ascertain what is going on with the website. Live long and prosper.