Labas! My 2 cents:
Overall the team at http://www.newisnew.lt/lt have some very good ideas to share, however: If you are colorblind, the rainbow thing wont make any sense, and I strongly dislike the idea of burying smaller languages under a mouse. I think that Lithuanians (this re-design has been proposed by a Lithuanian firm) might be able to understand my dislike of that idea ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithuanian_press_ban). Also the W as a logo is EXTREMELY Euro-centric. In my opinion the puzzle globe, while it's busy, is a healthier representation of what the project is and represents. It's busy like a European coat-of-arms is busy: you won't understand it until you spend some time understanding the complexity of the symbols and their relationships to each other. The designers should post mock-ups of their work here if they are serious about making a change: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:2012_main_page_redesign_proposal On Wed, Aug 8, 2012 at 2:12 PM, Ziko van Dijk <[email protected]>wrote: > Perfectly sound remarks, Amir. > I would be a little bit more lenient about their grades. The problems > linked to this proposal are smaller than the achievements. > One could consider the "W" an abbreviation of "Wikimedia", or take > "WM". WM Commons, WM Source, WM News, WM Wikipedia. If in your > language it is a VM or something else, in "local" characters no > problem, use them. > The letter type could be a better one, indeed. > "History": It's amazing how little those terms are unified among the > Wikipedia language versions. A big renaming after 10 years of organic > growth would be great. > Kind regards > Ziko > > > 2012/8/8 Amir E. Aharoni <[email protected]>: > > 2012/8/8 Michel Vuijlsteke <[email protected]> > >> > >> Well, it's certainly a possible starting point for discussion: > >> http://www.wikipediaredefined.com/ > > > > TL;DR: > > * It's so-so for a mid-term design school project: It shows that they > > can draw mock-ups, but I doubt that they would get high grades for > > typography, logo design, and understanding the client's needs. > > * It's not so useful as design ideas for the actual Wikipedia, except > > some proposed reader-centric features. > > > > Now, the longer version. > > > > The beginning is just horrible: > > > > * They picked a font in which the capital I looks like a J. The fact > > that the capital J there is longer doesn't help at all. It's not an > > original typographic solution. It's just weird, ugly and hard to read. > > It may be useful somewhere, but not here. > > * They want to redesign the Wikipedia logo, but they start from the > > one that was retired two years ago. So yes, the ideas are the same, > > but they should still do their homework properly. > > * They want to kill all the scripts except Latin from the logo. On the > > main page they want to make the big languages even bigger on the main > > page and to make small languages even smaller. Imperialism FTW. > > * They create logos for sister projects from their English names and > > once more disregard the notion that there are other languages in the > > world. And that it's rarely a good idea to design logos from letters > > without a good reason to begin with. > > > > Somewhat better ideas begin in the middle. What they call "history" is > > completely different from what editors call "history". They should > > have called it "reading list" or "what I read" or something. It > > requires an account, which is not so relevant to most people in the > > current setup. That said, their idea of history can be useful. If > > nothing else, it's a good reminder that MediaWiki's technical > > innovations are mostly aimed at the editors (1%) and not the readers > > (99%). The "Quote" button that they propose is not a bad idea either. > > > > Then they get to editing. Basically, they don't propose anything very > > different from what the Visual Editor is going to be. In fact, the > > current testing version of the Visual Editor is already quite close to > > that. And they use "history" again, with a different meaning, > > disregarding the very basic design principle that different things > > should have different names. (Come to think of it, using "history" the > > way we use it today is not a great idea either. It's easy to confuse > > it with the subject of History. In the Hebrew Wikipedia the "View > > history" tab is called "Previous versions", which makes a lot more > > sense.) > > > > Towards the end they discuss the "portal of Wikipedia", by which they > > actually mean the Main Page of the English Wikipedia, and disregard > > yet again that there are other languages. > > > > So OK, it brings up a few areas where we can improve, but the solution > > as they propose it is not viable. I'm not sure that they meant it to > > be. > > > > -- > > Amir Elisha Aharoni · אָמִיר אֱלִישָׁע אַהֲרוֹנִי > > http://aharoni.wordpress.com > > “We're living in pieces, > > I want to live in peace.” – T. Moore > > > > _______________________________________________ > > Wikimedia-l mailing list > > [email protected] > > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l > > > > -- > > ----------------------------------------------------------- > Vereniging Wikimedia Nederland > dr. Ziko van Dijk, voorzitter > http://wmnederland.nl/ > > Wikimedia Nederland > Postbus 167 > 3500 AD Utrecht > ----------------------------------------------------------- > > _______________________________________________ > Wikimedia-l mailing list > [email protected] > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l > -- *Victor Grigas* Storyteller Wikimedia Foundation [email protected] +1 (415) 839-6885 x 6773 149 New Montgomery Street 6th floor San Francisco, CA 94105 https://donate.wikimedia.org/ _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
