Loading ...Read Write Web is one of my Web industry blog recommendations, and I’ve been a subscriber (therefore receiving everything they publish) for over a year now. Some of the posts can be a little lengthy, but it’s obvious that publishing well researched and considered posts is integral to Richard MacManus differentiation strategy (even though RWW was established prior to most other Web tech blogs).
1. The old ReadWriteWeb
The site recently went through a re-design by the team over at Ideacodes, of whom I’ve been a fan since I first took an interest in the industry. I also subscribe to some of their feeds (Max & Emily run a whole host of Web tech resources).
The re-design has taken the site from an old school blog layout (full posts on the front page and a strong linear, left-aligned stream for the editorial content), over to the appearance of a bigger media portal (post excerpts and tidbits on the front-page leading to a busy above the fold landing area, and a much more modular layout). This is a trend which the guys over at GigaOm have also followed with their recent re-design. TechCrunch seems to be the only Web industry blog which still uses the old style - but I’ll leave this for another post.
There’s one part of the re-design which I think could be tweaked, and that’s the logo. I don’t think it matches the rest of the site, it’s a little difficult to read, and it I think it needs a sharper edge to it:
2. The Re-design
But instead of just suggesting a change, I thought I’d throw out a screenshot of an alternative logo. This is what I came up with:
3. Alternative logo
What do you think? Is this an interesting alternative logo for the guys at RWW, or should they send me a cease & desist letter for defacing their site?
I like the way you iconified the ying-yang symbol. But I like the text they have. So maybe something in-between. Their text and your icon. That would look best, in my opinion. But that’s just me…
Doh, I seem to have mixed up the images. Or maybe their in the wrong order in your post. Whatever it is, it confused me. But, looking at their site it would seem I got it backwards. I like the ying-yang symbol that has the box around it and I like the text that has the nicer font and the slash in-between the words. So whichever is which, I like that combo. The boxed icon and the nicer text. Sorry for the mix-up.
Not a problem, James! Don’t think I explained this one very well;
Image 1. is RWW before the re-design (that’s the font you like, right?).
Image 2. is RWW after the re-design (this is the work of the guys at Ideacodes, and it sounds like you prefer the icon on this one).
Image 3. is RWW after my minor changes to the logo font.