- Edited
malmon
The old design, particularly the one linked to in this thread, is just more intuitive to use for anyone that has ever used a forum before. The new design also does several things I don't like.
After stripping out some of the annoyances, you're left with this view:
Image no longer available
Here are the issues that I see.
- The top bar is at least 33% more thick than it needs to be. Perhaps even 50% moreso.
- Gap between top bar and content, which is most likely due to me blocking elements willy nilly, but is too big regardless. 25% reduction
- Gaps between topics could be reduced by 20% without making them feel crowded, same for the left bar with the forum categories
- Who's online section seems designed to only have a few users visible on screen at once without a fuckhuge monitor
- Shittons of wasted space that could be presenting topic summaries in the main view
Not pictured:
- Reply and follow buttons should be below the timeline view
- Timeline view should be bigger
- Wasted horizontal space
- "Follow" should have more options than it does.
Follow options:
- Blocked. Ignored + hide this thread from me
- Ignored. Never get notifications for this thread.
- Normal/Not Following. Only get notifications if tagged.
- Summary/Following. Get notified (with a UI element) of new replies (see below pic)
- Detailed/Following. Get notifications for every reply.
Image no longer available
Summary notifications should only show # of new replies (unless some of them tag you).
I could add more but I'm meandering at this point.

