<p>My vote is that it's a bit less appealing to the eyes. Thumbs down.</p>
<p>Basically, what Chucktown said ^^^.</p>
<p>As an HCI engineer (that’s what my job title sort of says B-)) I would say that the new layout should be improved by differentiating a bit between the screen areas. There’s too much emphasis on making it a modern interface - which it did - but modern is not necessarily easier to use. </p>
<p>The header bar is done well. I would not change much.
The footer bar is done very well. maaaaybe darken up the font a wee bit.
The left bar needs some work esp. the first entry (forum home, recent posts etc). Just used to the old way I guess.
Horizontal separators are nice, I wish we had some between the left menu bar and the messages.
The list of forums and threads is well done. </p>
<p>The message area… A bit too much space but overall well done. What happened to our tag lines?
The flag/like/helpful/facebook is a bit too prominent, perhaps put it bottom right? It focuses the eyes too much especially on short messages like RedEyeJedi’s above. </p>
<p>The Home -> Forum link is kind of redundant at the bottom, the other buttons are well done and placed well.</p>
<p>The editor works well, the smiley button is a bit hard to spot - perhaps move it to the same line as ‘Reply’ outside the text box?</p>
<p>Inserting a smiley did not seem to want to work - always adds at the end of the text, not the current location at least in my browser window (Firefox)</p>
<p>Edit already posted message - icon needs a bit of help as the gear wheel is more associated with settings and stuff, maybe a pencil/pad type icon to indicate the only action available? Is there a delete option still?</p>
<p>In the message list it would be nice to put the date and TIME of the last message in a thread right under the thread title, not who posted in it. Seems to be a bit more readable when you scan topics so you can see topics and date/time.</p>
<p>That’s all. Overall a bit hard on the eyes because of the white space but well done, a few tweaks would help. Thumbs mostly up. </p>
<p>I’ll wait a week or two until passing judgment. By then I’ll be more used to it and they will have made small tweaks and improvements.</p>
<p>I will say that the new mobile site is barely functional, though.</p>
<p>If I had to nitpick, I would say there is too much white space between sections, especially on the main forum page… aside from that, I think it looks pretty good.</p>
<p>we’ll all usually start out with unfavorable reviews of the update, but we’ll eventually get used to this layout anyway!</p>
<p>Yeah, it’s the white space. All the features are fine with me, but the posts, and even more so the main page, lacks some visual organization.</p>
<p>I miss the flag that showed i had posted in the thread in the past. i found it useful to be able to go back and keep an eye on those threads. Apart from that, I think I can get used to it soon enough.</p>
<p>I know it’s new and we need to get used to it but there is too much white space and lots of wasted space. It was much more efficient before. But this way allows for more advertising which is what it’s about anyway.</p>
<p>And like above, knowing where new posts are so far does not work. I have to check dates on the threads I’m interested in.</p>
<p>Loss of the userName dropdown (PM/email/user posts lookup) is,
imho, a significant adverse hit to usability.</p>
<p>And the new blue font used for thread titles has less contrast than
the old shade, making reading harder.</p>
<p>The new email notification is, imho, useless. No aggregation,
and no content – just a single email saying that someone posted.
One for each post. 
</p>
<p>And I find the wasted vertical space to be tragic. Huge loss
in information density. Compare with the old layout:
<a href=“http://web.archive.org/web/20140105214743/http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/”>http://web.archive.org/web/20140105214743/http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/</a></p>
<p>Hate it. Lots of wasted space.</p>
<p>Sites usually do things like this in in order to free up space for ads.</p>
<p>The only improvement I have seen is the addition of the “like” and “helpful” buttons for posts. Like that. The rest, no.</p>
<p>The default font is smaller. This might have been a good thing if it allowed getting more post text on one screen without needing to scroll, but the excessive blank space (some of which is caused by large avatar pictures on short posts) negates that. As it is, the smaller default font just makes it harder to read for some people.</p>
<p>Like the “like, flag, and helpful” button plus the profile pics - however, I agree with way too much white space inside the forums and I can’t easily look at the forum and see when the last post was made to see if I want to go back in. </p>
<p>What is the purpose of the stars next to the thread names? Shouldn’t they be filled in if the thread is new, or one that I’ve posted to? Finding it very hard to find where I have posted, or what’s new since my last visit. Change for the sake of change is NOT good.</p>
<p>I believe you click the star and it will bookmark the thread and notify you when there is a new post up in the new notification center. Or maybe it just gives you a quick bookmark up there. I am not 100% sure.</p>
<p>Some posts have to be approved and others just appear. WTH?</p>
<p>I’ll post another and see if gets approved. I think CC shot themselves in the foot with this release. I can see a visitor drop-off since it is more difficult to use and posts have to be moderated prior to being posted. The moderators are going to be overwhelmed. </p>
<p>I’ll post another and see if gets approved. I think CC shot themselves in the foot with this release. I can see a visitor drop-off since it is more difficult to use and posts have to be moderated prior to being posted. The moderators are going to be overwhelmed. </p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Yeah, the pending moderation thing is annoying. </p>