We’re taking a different approach to this review. William and I thought we’d discuss this particular design a bit.

William:
“Theme Name: GigaOm - Hotness Edition”, the code aptly declares. This design really caught my eye with its pure, smooth simplicity.

Mike Rundle has created his own unique style, and this design is no exception. Ryan sent us an email, telling us that Mike has managed to “showcase his breathtaking ability to use Trebuchet, in every single design he has ever come up with,” while Colin Devroe, “WordPress Jedi,” did a great job hacking out the coding. The design sticks to a simple color scheme and the minimalist use of colors and layout make Om’s Blog easy on the eyes and mind. The clever use of soft gradients makes the site pleasing to the eyes. The navigation at the top of the page makes it easy to find your way around the site.

The design really helps to emphasize the other major strong point of the design: organization. Om voiced his frustration over his previous designs, evidenced by his frequent redesigns. The new design really stands out in its presentation of the content. The different sections of the page are clearly differentiated. Ads are unobtrusive and flow with the page; this design shows that ads shouldn’t have to be an eyesore, sometimes appearing randomly. Most of all, if I had no clue what Om’s blog was about, I could learn what the blog was about and who Om is in a few seconds.

The issues I found with the design are minor. The site could do with some image replacement. Without images, the navigation and header effectively disappear. Also, some small validation issues could be easily solved, and I wonder why BusinessLogs didn’t bother fixing the small errors. Nevertheless, the markup is incredibly clean and easy to navigate, and there are no glaring issues. The site finally has a clean, suave, and professional look worthy of its content.

Khaled:
Upon seeing the new GigaOm site, I knew immediately that this was another Mike Rundle special. The man’s got a very distinct style. It’s the mixture of colours and the typography that give the design that Rundle feel. It’s the flat background gradients that tie everything together. What annoys me the most about the guy is that he actually makes it look simple to achieve this level of quality. It’s not. You raise a pretty good point William, in that the site does come across as much better organised.

One thing that’s another Rundle staple, although I can’t understand why, is that he didn’t style the NEXT PAGE button at the bottom of the page. He’s done the same for the 9rules blog as well, must be a usability thing? Dunno, still sticks out like a sore thumb.

William:
Some readers of Om’s blog commented that they like the old design better because of various reasons. One said that the ads stood out like a sore thumb. My experience is that there is near nothing you can do to make ads look nice. And from what I remember, the old design had the ads appearing at seemingly random places. I’d say the redesign is a clear improvement.

Khaled
Addressing a comment made on the site about the new design, honestly I remember the old site being a complete mess of links and no cohesion. The fact of the matter is the site design is made so as to remain unobtrusive and highlight the content, which is what people are there for. In that respect the site design is a success.