Digital Mountain Top

Just been looking at plusgood.co.uk. The site's navigation is inspired by those lovely sitemaps we all spend hours over.

It's nice idea, fun to use but f**k me is it frustrating to use should you actually want any specific information.

It could be improved by making the "map" which appears to be only a visual representation, clickable or by indeed providing one those "boring" traditional sitemaps. But then, if you have to use one of those to make your nav work, your site's nav is flawed.

There is an accessible version which is nice to see. The problem with this is it's less usable than the flash version, as it doesn't have any buttons taking you to the main areas of interest.

Call me old fashioned, call me boring, but you know what? I need a site, to above all give me the information I need, quickly. Unless it's a site where you hit Bush round the head with a shoe or such like.

I can see what they are trying to do and indeed people are talking about their site - which is going to appeal to an audience looking for someone to create viral websites. In that sense a round of applause is called for. The trouble is I couldn't even find out where plusgood were based - yeah I know - it's doesn't matter in the digital global world. The fact is, I'm a country bunkin' and if I was a digital marketeer, choosing my digital agency, one of the first things I would ask "Are you local?" or at least "where are you from?" I'd be a bit suspicious if I couldn't find out fairly quickly. Basically, I got impatient when trying to find specific info.

On the other hand, I really don't like using Jakob Nielsen's site www.useit.com because it is so god damn ugly. It's like eating gourmet food in a burger bar. Not that I think that all of Jakob Nielsen's ideas are of gourmet standard but that's another day's discussion.

To sum it up, I'm the type of person who will go "oooh nice shiny designer chair" and will then walk past to sit on the comfortable, practical, battered old sofa. I think there are lots of us sofa lovers out there. Good website design is about striking a balance between "ohhh shiny" and practical, in manor that's appropriate for the audience.