10 Top Social News Sites Ranked by Design
by Emitstop on Nov.16, 2008, under Graphic Design, Social Media
Digg, Reddit, Mixx, Slashdot, and so on. They are all great social news and media websites, but how do they rank in terms of how easy they are on the eyes? Here I will rank all the top social news and media websites based solely on their layout. I’d like to rank all of these sites on overall usability as well, but I’m not a dedicated member on all of them and feel it wouldn’t be fair for sites I’m less acquainted with. Well lets get this started, the sites are ranked from ugliest to sexiest.
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Fark |
Fark.com, created by Drew Curtis in 1999, is a popular social news website receiving over 2,500 submissions a day and over 5 million unique visitors per month. It is also really, really ugly.
It’s almost difficult to find many redeeming qualities about Fark. The logo itself isn’t too bad, it could use an upgrade, though. The website itself has a nice layout, it’s easy and simple to sort through all the different categories and pages.
From the colors to the way the news items are listed, the site was poorly designed. It’s a nice site, but not in terms of looks. The cheap gradient under the tabs feels wrong. I don’t like the lack of icons and graphics. A lot is done using ‘/’s and ‘( )’s in place of icons, graphics, and other means.
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Reddit, was started by Steve Huffman and Alexis Ohanian in 2005. It has an extremely loyal userbase, very well-known for their witty comments and posts. The website itself became an open source project earlier this year, and all of the code and libraries are freely available. It’s also a little ugly.
Reddit has a great logo, and the Reddit Alien is a very recognizable symbol around the internet. However, despite all of this Reddit, in terms of aesthetics, is poorly designed. One thing that really jumps out is the lack of color, the site feels boring.
This lack of color, make the comment page especially, a bit difficult to navigate. It becomes a bit harder to at a glance see how many points a comment has, and viewing comment threads can get a little bit confusing.
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Slashdot |
Slashdot was started in 1997 by Rob “CmdrTaco” Malda, and is owned by SourceForge, Inc. While all the content on the site is user-submitted, editors choose which appears on the site. There is also a Slashdot Japan, which is localized for Japan.
The site is well laid out, and simple to navigate. It’s easy to read, and the site overall looks decent.
However, the site’s banner, especially the font used in the main logo, isn’t all that great. And the entire site has a bulky, feel to it. Some elements of the design just feel weird, like for instance the odd looking red edges on news story title boxes.
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Propeller |
Propeller (formerly Netscape.com) is operated by AOL-Netscape, and was started in 2006. All content is user-submitted, and stories receive ratings on a scale of 1-10, rather than individual votes.
The site is simple, clear and has a well-made, and recognizable logo. The rest of the site’s colors and theme is very well established.
But, I feel everything is too boxy, and doesn’t flow. The logo is made up of circles and curves, which would make you think that the rest of the site should follow that theme, except that just doesn’t happen. There are no curves to be found.
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Tip’d |
Tip’d was started in 2008 by some guy named Andy. The Community Director is Muhammad Saleem, who is a well-known for his status on Digg.com, as the #2 digg user of all time with nearly 2000 Front page submissions.
Tip’d is a social news website specifically targeting financial and business news and media. And the entire site feels this way. It feels like finance and business, it feels formal.
However, just because it’s a business and finance site, doesn’t mean it needs to be boring. In the banner especially, i feel like they could have done a better job.
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Yahoo! Buzz |
Yahoo! Buzz was started in February 2008, believe it or not, by Yahoo. All content is user submitted, however the front page is under editorial control. Meaning that editors at yahoo.com can choose what gets to the front page of buzz.
The website itself looks good, and most of the site feels great, well laid out, and easy to use and navigate.
However, it feels inconsistent. Certain bits of the site don’t look good, some smaller images are pixelly. And some things have borders, some of the borders are different sizes than eachother, and the site feels all around inconsistent.
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Design Float |
Design Float was started by Andrew Egenes, as a solution to the problems with digg’s design category. Since design is such a broad category, why does Digg only have one category for design?
Design float is very well designed, which one would expect from a website made specifically for designers. The site keeps it consistent, and has an all around theme surrounding water, which goes along with the name.
I wouldn’t go as far to say the site is absolutely beautiful. It is stylish and easy to navigate, but it is actually quite simple, and doesn’t demonstrate a ton of skill. It feels very “safe”.
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Digg |
Digg, started by Kevin Rose in December 2004, is one of the most prominent social news websites out there. All content is user submitted, and all the content that appears on the front page is chosen by users.
The site is laid out extremely well, and you can tell that lots of work has been put into it over the course of it’s lifetime.
There are, however a few things I don’t like about Digg’s design. The header colors seem a bit dark compared to the rest of the site, and at times it feels too simple. It could use a gradient or two.
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StumbleUpon |
StumbleUpon was founded by Garrett Camp, Geoff Smith, Justin LaFrance, and Eric Boyd, and was bought by eBay in 2007. It has a toolbar which allows you to like things, and not like things from the actual page. It is also recommendation engine, based off of what you like and do not like.
StumbleUpon’s layout is absolutely fantastic. Everything from the tabs to the listed items looks great. The few annoyances on the site are few and far between.
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Mixx |
Mixx was created in 2007 by Recommended Reading, Inc. It’s a social news site similar to Digg. It has been claimed as a sort of refuge for the diggers that were banned in the recent mass bannings over at Digg.com.
Mixx looks great, it was designed extremely well. Everything is where everything should be. The categories at the top are easy to find and use. The content on the front page is sorted and easily distinguished.
The overall design looks good, from the icons to the tabs. The use of gradients is just enough, they don’t overuse them. And the comment pages look just as sexy. The sites logo is great and makes sense to the name.
Mixx is a model website in terms of design.
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November 16th, 2008 on 3:59 am
Great list! Too bad “DesignBump” isn’t on the list (yet). Although their community isn’t as big as DesignFloat or anything else, they still manage to get great design articles on their front page.
November 17th, 2008 on 5:15 am
ahhh you forgot about us! we’ll take #11 or #1
November 17th, 2008 on 7:06 am
[...] social news and media websites, but how do they rank in terms of how easy they are on the eyes?read more | digg [...]
November 17th, 2008 on 8:33 am
I actually discover 2 new sites to try for.
November 17th, 2008 on 8:36 am
[...] טופ 10: אתרי חדשות ווב 2.0 [...]
November 17th, 2008 on 8:51 am
What about….
http://www.zabox.net
and
http://www.graphic-design-links.com
Fark and Reddit are ugly as hell
November 17th, 2008 on 8:54 am
Glad to see Mixx made the #1 slot — it is a challenging thing to design a visually pleasing aesthetic while keeping the massive amount of content top-of-mind. Sites heavy on user-generated content are amazing in their dynamic power, but prove to test the power of strong designs.
November 17th, 2008 on 9:13 am
What about Newsvine? If you’re just going by aesthetic style, they’d do well I’d think.
November 17th, 2008 on 9:41 am
Hi
I am working on a site new social news site called http://crowdnews.eu.
I think the main problem with many social news sites is the voting system.
When only top voted stories get on the front page it has
to be a subject that many can relate to,
which result in stories with a low information content.
Crowdnews solves this by using sharing instead of voting.
Every have a personal news page on which they can subscribe to other users and when those users share stories they will appear on the personal news page.
Join me on CrowdNews
November 17th, 2008 on 10:13 am
I’m sorry but saying that Digg isn’t well designed because it’s “too simple” and “it needs some gradients” is simply not having a clue about what good design is really all about.
Anyway the post was quite informative. Keep up the work.
November 17th, 2008 on 10:20 am
designfloat is a shi**y website, barely any content and users.
November 17th, 2008 on 11:16 am
Reddit should be further up than number nine. It may not have as much eye candy as the others but it doesn’t look bad and it looks very clean. It is very usable. More so than the other site’s. No space is wasted. Login and commenting are much more intuitive than the others. You don’t have to click on sub categories. It delivers them all to you. This results in less clicks and more content. It is designed in a way that helps you focus on content, the most important feature of reddit.
November 17th, 2008 on 11:24 am
Generally, good observations. The reddit front page is easy to read, though the comments take a bit of effort to navigate.
I don’t find Stumbleupon very easy to navigate at all. I find myself having to click on links, I wouldnt expect to click on, to get to my own profile page and trying to find others in the same locality with similar interests is a bit hit and miss.
November 17th, 2008 on 11:37 am
This article is really subjective. Who cares if Digg “needs” a gradient or two? That’s your opinion.
Mixx isn’t that great. It’s your typical “clean web 2.0″ design. It lacks hierarchy, uses too much white space, and is very generic. Also, the fantastic gradient at the top is the 37signals gradient flipped vertically. lame.
And finally, why rank things by their visual design anyway? I don’t read a website because I like the color palette, I read it for the content.
November 17th, 2008 on 11:47 am
I wouldn’t say Digg should get less points due to their being no gradients used. It’s flat. It’s a style. It works. Not every website needs gradients.
November 17th, 2008 on 12:33 pm
I used to be a homeless rodeo clown but now I am a world class magician !
November 17th, 2008 on 1:23 pm
Great list! I agree Mixx is not only the prettiest, it is also the most helpful and let’s me drill down to what I want rather than forcing me to run with the total masses!
November 17th, 2008 on 1:24 pm
Never heard of Mixx before…
November 17th, 2008 on 3:34 pm
I am feeling bored http://wwww.totalpad.com is not in the list. May be it will get inclusion in the next list/ article.
November 17th, 2008 on 7:34 pm
great list.
we think we have done a reasonably good job on http://www.kwoff.com also
two things our users like is that both ‘incoming’ and ‘popular’ items are on the one page and also the summary via hover on the title.
November 18th, 2008 on 12:21 am
I’ll vote Digg for #1, although nclud did a great job on Mixx.
November 18th, 2008 on 2:19 am
great designs
November 18th, 2008 on 8:29 pm
Ass is but an ass, though laden with gold
November 19th, 2008 on 12:42 am
I would like to add http://www.earnersclub.net/ Maybe you can place it on #3 and Digg on #4?
November 19th, 2008 on 2:00 am
Mixx design is awesome
November 20th, 2008 on 7:48 am
Reason why is great to be a gay
Porn movies are designed with your mind in mind. Its joke
November 20th, 2008 on 5:45 pm
as far as looks go, winner is current.com
November 21st, 2008 on 8:11 am
[...] November An article originally posted on emitgraphics.com [...]
November 21st, 2008 on 8:04 pm
TV commercials now show you how detergents take out bloodstains, a pretty violent image there. I think if you’ve got a T-shirt with a bloodstain all over it, maybe laundry isn’t your biggest problem. (Jerry Seinfeld)
November 23rd, 2008 on 5:40 am
Thanks for the article - just social bookmarked you at http://www.tutable.com
November 23rd, 2008 on 6:43 pm
Hello. I am going to check it, since I saw a comment in another site regarding \”Social News Sites Ranked by Design - Emit Graphics\”. Someone related to top 10 candy. Thanks anyway.
November 24th, 2008 on 12:31 pm
In my opinion, the Digg-menu is easier to use than the Mixx-menu. Nice article!
November 24th, 2008 on 5:40 pm
Nice list, although I think I’d put Digg above Stumble
November 24th, 2008 on 5:43 pm
[...] 10 top social news sites based on design [...]
November 26th, 2008 on 10:33 pm
[...] Top 10 social news sites ranked by design [...]