Eating Macromedia.com Dogfood
Okay, today I noticed that Macromedia has redesigned their site and are putting into production what they call a “beta” version. That’s all well and good, I guess.
Actually, I’m more than a little inclined to wonder about their intention and wonder if redesigning their site was a good idea at all. According to their statement, the redesign is intended to “give you a better web experience.” However, I can definitely say that my user experience has been significantly downgraded.
Consider that:
- The home page does not validate, although the source declares XHMTL Transitional
- Safari and a host of other fine modern browsers are not offically supported
- Due the the overuse of animation, the load time appears significantly longer, even on high speed connections
- The products page is a fundamental abomination of readability
- Desdev has been mysteriously renamed Devnet
- Most of the navigational metaphors are not obvious or could be done better using traditional web page techniques
Clearly, they’re trying to tout their site as a “rich internet application.” That’s okay if they want to eat their own dog food. But to put it out on everybody else before it’s ready may be crossing a line of etiquette, and certainly won’t attract any converts.
I can’t help but feel that this was a marketing decision gone horribly awry. But as a grunt developer myself, I know all too well that that’s the way the biz works.
