November 03, 2003 | View Comments (15) | Category: Design
Summary: Why the Napster website is not cool.
I love minimalist design. I love the powerful message that it can evoke to an audience. However, if done improperly it can be a complete failure. Case in point the new Napster 2.0 homepage. It is awesome that they kept it simple. However, they kept the site so simple there is no information on it. Granted the majority of the people may know what Napter is, but there are bound to be questions about the new service. How easy is it to find this information on the minimal site? I don't know because I still can't find it.
It really is sad to see an "innovative" Internet company, fail so miserably in creating an effective website. It seems like the information provided on the site is geared more towards the media then towards the actual people who will use the service. How much does it cost? Can I burn cds? Can I use it on any portable music player? I mean minimalist design revolves around the content and unfortunately the content is severly lacking on Napster. Bad form.
Simplicity can hurt a site. Too simple and it doesn't become effective. Too hard and it is not usable. Too minimal and it is not useful. It is a fine balance to make and I would expect larger companies or at least the companies that design the pages to understand that by now.
Trackback URL: http://9rules.com/cgi-bin/mt/mt-tb.cgi/42
When I went there I figured the site hadn't launched yet and this was just a "coming soon" page. Which it was before the service launched, and it was fine then. But now that it has launched, you'd think they would give you a little info. Or some screenshots. Or maybe say why you should use it over any other service, besides the fact that it's "napster". I downloaded it, and it is crap in my opinion. The interface looks more like the old napster, which was fine when you were downloading illegal songs and knew you were just taking random stuff off of people's hard drives. But compared to the iTMS it's a joke. The iTMS is more like a high-end CD store with nice graphics, great interface, featured artist pages with big photos and videos and stuff... Napster just lists the songs like they always did. Ugly.
Derek (http://www.twotallsocks.com/)
"when you were downloading illegal songs and knew you were just taking random stuff off of people's hard drives"
Ah, the good old days...
JC (http://thelionsweb.com/weblog)
It seems like Apple sucks all the good interface designers into their company. I am really interested to hear Napster's web strategy. I can see in the meeting somebody just telling the intern to slap a page up with the Napster logo and watch them sell music like hotcakes.
I mean the page is so simple, why not at least do it in CSS. At least looking at the source code it is decently formatted for easy readability. The only good thing it has going for it though.
Scrivs (http://www.9rules.com/whitespace/)
I've downloaded and tried the new Napster service, and it's really not that great. I was rather disappointed. I expected more from the Napster brand and Roxio, it's new parent company.
Ryan Parman (http://www.skyzyx.com)
I think the site is neither minimalist nor simple. It is just an ugly eyesore. Let's be careful how we use these words. Okay, maybe I don't want to go so far as providing a definition of minimalist and simple, but let's just say "I know it when I see it".
How about this:
http://sarawaters.com/
This is minimalism. Beautiful site. Seems these days you really have to scour the web to find a beautifully done minimalist site. I've said before that I regard many of the sites on textbased.com as not being truly minimalist. I'd argue for more discernment in describing a site as minimalist.
Although, in a way, Sara Water's site could also be described as a cliche of the minimalist site. It's hard to win with me! But for now, I really like her site.
Joel Biroco (http://biroco.com/journal.htm)
Joel: You are impossible to please man :) JC is hard enough to get anything by and now I gotta deal with you? :P
Scrivs (http://www.9rules.com/whitespace/)
Ha ha.
True enough, I am certainly hard to please. The curse of perfectionism. I can work for several months on a site design, think every day that I love the design, only to get up one morning and think "nah, that's crap" and start again. This is not a very useful approach to gainful employment let me assure you!
Joel Biroco (http://biroco.com/journal.htm)
Perhaps a better description of the Napster site would be "unfinished" "blank" "empty" "temporary" "under construction" or just plain "crap". :)
Derek (http://www.twotallsocks.com/)
My vote's on the last one there, Derek.
Besides, it's not scottish... ergo...
JC (http://thelionsweb.com/weblog)
I couldn't get past the splash page because, apparently, the designers don't want users to view their site using Konqueror. So I fired up VMware, lauched Win2k and started IE. The site then forced me to install InstallShield. "Okay," I say to myself. "No problem." I install it and reload. The site then gripes about me not having Windows Media Player 7 and kicks me back out to the splash page with the cat logo.
I can kinda understand the desire to limit your page views to your target market, but sheesh! Can't I get a peek at the homepage without jumping through a bunch of hoops?
Louis (http://www.clotman.com)
And you're a coward who insults people without leaving an address to come round and visit. Big deal. Live with it.
Joel Biroco (http://biroco.com/journal.htm)
Hi, I'm Joel's mother. I love minimalist things too. That's why we made sure to give little Joel a very minimal IQ.... I think we did a good job, huh..?
JoelsMother
Hey, I wasn't trying to upset the whole family Joel :)
Scrivs (http://www.9rules.com/whitespace/)
Keep track of comments to all entries with the Comments Feed
©2003-06 9rules, Inc. | Thoughts Feed | Notes Feed
Amazon Stores: Powertools | Jewelry | Books | Health | Landscaping | Kitchen | Movies
#1
eh, did you expect anything to be good about it?
and innovative belongs in quotes, as you've put it.
The original napster was innovative. this is just another itunes music service clone, but with stricter DRM
as for the site, though... sheesh. they don't mention anything about the variety of music or what it costs... just a download link and a press release bragging about how recognizable the name is.
JC (http://www.thelionsweb.com/weblog)