compliment

The flyouts were the main reason I chose msnbc over all the other site. it made it so easy to navigate and fins the stories I wanted. Don't you rember when you tried to do away with them several years ago only to bring them back later.

I would hardly call them annoying. Annoying is having to scroll down or click thru to each section to see what articles are there and if there is anything new.

I'm with you! Please MSNBC, give me the option for the classic view. I do not like the new look, nor do I need a fancy layout and gimmick's when I read the news. I will move to another news source with a simple news paper look where I can click and read without all the junk.

There's at least three of us asking for this. Moreover, some articles do not have a link to the vine... Afraid of our comments?

I don't like it at all. I agree with WraithGT, give me the option of the old form. I'm not blind. I thought somebody messed with my computer and changed the layout.

I feel like I'm reading a child's book. This new format requires more scrolling and clicking to read on, is irritating as hell. It defeats the purpose of one of my favorite Firefox add-ons. I actually find it harder to read because it's all TOO spaced out. I also want the old format back. Ever hear the expression "if it's not broken, don't fix it". The ads are bigger and AdBlocker doesn't seem to work. I'll be reading more CNN from now on.

I also agree. Another thing...too much redunduncy. Two banners across the top and then one down the side, all saying the same thing and taking up way too much space. Pretty much the same as the news on MSNBC. I have sent emails to no avail. If you watch MSNBC, the banners will take up so much space, you can barely see what they are really talking about.

But as you have all said, it's like reading a child's book...double-spacing, huge lettering and pictures, etc. And I'm a senior citizen with poor vision. Maybe I just don't like change. I was happy the way it was. Much easier to follow that CNN's site.

I forgot to mention that each section also has their own banner going down the right side. (I'm not sure if I'm using the term "banner" correctly, but I'm sure you get the point.) A lot of these banners were there before, however, are still such a waste of space.

I also prefer the previous presentation. This new format is difficult to read and wastes time. Being the corporate critic that I am I see this as nothing more than a ploy to insert even more ads to improve the revenue line.

Please give us an option for the 'Classic' view.

I find it very annoying. I start to read the article and I get pi$$ed off before I finish it. I don't want an ad in the middle of the article, I don't want to hit he little button to "read more" You get one paragraph read then it's time to hit the "read more" button or whatever it's called. I get pi$$ed and I don't "read more." I'm going to look into switching to a new online news site. I've been reading MSNBC for six years and if there's going to be a change then it's a change I decide to make and not one they decide to make for me. MSNBC, YOUR NEW SITE SUCKS!!!

I'm with WraigthGT: what if you did, in fact, give us a choice! When the site opens, simply have a bar to click New or Classic, kinda like Coke did ('course, we all know how that turned out). The page refreshes in the chosen design mode. Hey, everybody's happy...

I do not like the large text. I don't like having to scroll down to read the first part of the story, and then click to expand the text to complete the article. I definitely don't like the way the blogs are laid out. Way too much empty space and large print. At first I thought there was something wrong with my browser! I don't like CNN's new design, either. Both sites have way too much clutter. It's left me wondering where I can find just the news, without the gimmicks. NPR? Please add the "classic" view!

Don131 nope you are not alone as I dislike the fact that when I go to the vine I don't get a separate site which is easy to close and boom there I am back where I started with the next news story that I want to read looking back at me

Last time I saw font this large and spaced out, I was at the eye doctor's office. I can't even find the links to the things I used to read on a daily basis. In a world where everything is getting smaller--computers, phones, cars, homes, etc.,why on Earth would anyone think this was a good idea.

It's the visual equivalent of a tv commercial--just make it louder. Give us the classic view or I'll remove msnbc as my homepage.

Amen! This new design is unusable!

Why the change? It wasn't broke!

Sorry Ashley, I agree with MarcMcN. It's pretty but I don't want pretty. I want readable. PLEASE give us readable articles. The links to related material are OK but just make the article easy to read without distractions.

Ashley,

Sorry for the delayed reply, I've been away on vacation for a few days and have just returned.

Yes, your top menubar has been showing some strange behavior, given what you're saying here. On my system (Win7, IE8), the bar was initially (date of my first post) showing "full height" upon open, then collapsing as I scrolled down. I don't know if you've changed the code at all, but it seems now to be working as you describe in your reply. If you haven't changed code at all, I can't account for the difference, but there it is. Come to think of it, it may still be defaulting 'open' on some of the blog and editorial pages, but that may be a proper function on those - with such similar visuals, it's sometimes hard to tell.

The 'correct' function an improvement, but I would question whether this is really going to be obvious to a new user. The problem is that the upscroll 'expand' function is not given any visual cues and is not intuitive in and of itself - I'm a pretty advanced user and would say that I would not expect scrolling UP would do anything if I'm already at the top of a page. If I don't expect it to do anything, why would I try it? Less-savvy users may remain completely unaware of that option until they accidently 'overscroll' when returning to the top of a few articles - and even then, some of them may miss what may be obvious to us, but quite a subtlety to them. In short, this may be a great interface for the highly web-savvy, but you should run it past a number of less-savvy users before you commit. My own marketing guess is that your readership trends more towards the traditional, 'old-school' users, since the highly tech-savvy tend to prefer non-traditional news sources, however unwise that might be from our perspective.

Given your intentions for the function, perhaps a VERY obvious "Expand menu" button (lower-left corner, near where they'll start reading?) may be the only suggestion I can make. I think the upscroll is just going to be too subtle for most readers.

Even above and beyond that, the line-height ('leading' in my world) is the one characteristic in your new layout I'd vote 'most important to change', with getting rid of the "click for additional text" function a close second. In the former case, it not only minimizes scrolling, but makes for an easer eye-flow through the text. This is something we in print have developed tables and formulas for - leading and character size as a function of line length - to maximize readability. I completely understand that some of that breaks down in your variable-page-width world, but the basic theory applies, and some generalizations based on common screen resolutions can be made. The "click for additional text" simply disrupts the reading flow - If I have to scroll through an article to read it (which, given your comprehensive reporting, will always be a necessity), having to stop and click in the page to keep on reading is less friendly and supportive of the reading process than simply continuing to scroll down the page. I know my two statements here may seem a little contradictory, but they're both in service of enhancing the readability of the page: minimize scrolling where you can, and make it smooth and continuous where you can't.

I'm going to have to spend a little more time with your 'related' area before giving any real feedback, except to say that VERY carefull presentation will go a long way towards making them more usable to those who, say, are not intimately familiar with Facebook or Twitter. Much as I had to make generalizations or use stereotypes, design the page to be visually interesting and with the content as the center-focus, in ways that even your grandma would find obvious. A tough challenge, but given the realities of your market and the wide range of skill-levels you have to encompass, a necessary one.

And... I just noticed your second post - "this suggestion". Off to give it a try.

Okay, back from 'more text' land.

Ashley, since you're so graciously reading and responding to my little missives, let me make a relevant suggestion about this particular topic: Be VERY careful about interpreting research surveys in areas such as this. They're devilish. I understand that, in MSNBC's surveys, "most people" don't read the full article. If (like me) you're old enough to remember it, "most people" also hugely preferred the taste of "New Coke" over the traditional variety - right up until they changed the formula and the new stuff hit the shelves.

Surveys can mislead, and they can mislead hugely. People will SAY one thing in a survey, but then turn around and do exactly the opposite in real life. Or the survey may be subtly 'leading' in some regard, or it may be that the presentation of the survey somehow subtly selected for those who tend not to read entire articles. I suspect you already know all of this, but I mention it simply because you presented it to Jay## as part of the justification for paginated pages in your post to him.

Even in my own case, I very often start an MSNBC article to see if it really is of interest, then cast it aside in favor of finding something else if it proves to be something I don't want to read. So 'technically', I may not be 'reading the entire article' in many cases, but if there's an article that really does interest me, you betcha I'm reading it top-to-bottom.

So given that, I firmly hold that people prefer a smooth 'flowing' reading experience to an interrupted one, regardless of the media where the page is presented. I recall more than one e-book reader that failed in the marketplace because the 'next page' button simply wasn't in what the real market felt was a comfortable, natural spot on the device, despite, I'm sure, several usability focus groups. I think this is one area where you have to fall back upon the collected experience of text presentation through the centuries, rather than relying upon a marketing research survey that may be skewed in so many subtle ways.

Coming around gently to my point, I think having a preference setting would be a definite IMPROVEMENT, although a simple article-long page would be the best option, even at the cost of a slightly delayed load. And with the kind of skill your page coders so obviously have on-tap, I can see no reason they can't rig the page to continue loading ads 'below the fold' while the viewer is reading the first couple of paragraphs, which would load first. It's a far, FAR better reading experience to smoothly scroll down a single long page (one of the beauties of the web, compared to the printed page, if you ask me) than having to click on a "next page" or "more text" button now and again, interupting the train of thought.

I would also second Jay's suggestion that, if it must be done with a preference setting to clear a "we have a 'more text' button" default, that the preference setting not require creating an account.

I don't like all the link stuff at the bottom of my screen. It only makes the viewing area smaller and it is quite large and intrusive. Can I make it go away ? MSNBC has always been my first choice but with these irritations I may go to CNN or some other home page. I also don't care for the "more text button". Just write the story. If I don't want to read more I can click off of it. I prefer if all the ads could be down the side instead of in the middle of the text.

I agree completely, Those of us who actually read whole articles are annoyed by having to click to "read more." Also, the navigation is inconvenient. Despite the faults of the "classic" format, it was much easier to navigate. I hope you listen to the dissenters because if you don't we'll be going elsewhere for news.

Cusomer1 stated my view perfectly. It is what I wanted to write. The whole layout is very irritating.

Yep, found the same problem as Cat.

I *think* this is the same problem that I am having, and if not, it might be related:

I use Chrome, and when I tried to watch a couple Rachel Maddow Show clips yesterday, I was unable to scroll the list of clips down to get to the one I wanted. Also, I could not move forward or backward in the videos that would play. Clicking pause or the timer bar in the video paused the video and opened a new tab with the advertisement - not the behavior I wanted or expected. The new video playback system is a failure from my standpoint. I haven't yet tried to use Firefox or IE. I never had trouble with the previous videos, so I hope someone can address this.

You've opted poorly. I'd much rather click page 2 or page 3. It feels weird to phrase it this way, but the new design seems cheap. It devalues the story. It reads like a high school project.

Thank you J Brill.

Hey Ashley, I know not everyone has Firefox but maybe you could design your pages to scroll like they do with the FastestFox add-on. That seems quite fast to me and scrolling is easier and less distracting than moving the cursor to a specific spot and clicking.

Do it! ... please

Following up on my earlier post and your reply to Wonderbread here, the single largest reason that MSNBC is my online-'newspaper' of choice is that you DON'T truncate the articles into the traditional sound-bite summary so common to this media channel. There's nothing wrong or complicated about this formula: Write the sound-bite summary first, then continue in-depth with the rest of the article. Let your readers sort out how in-depth they really want to go.

In-depth, fully-developed reporting is the only thing you really have with which to differentiate yourself in the market. Summarizing and 'making the news more accessible' in this way is, like price reductions, always a race to the bottom. Eventually you're not giving enough news about a given topic to be worthy of the name.

I know that things like this are a siren song to CEOs, accounting departments, and shareholders. However, none of those people are what make a news channel great. It's the content. Nothing more, nothing less.

Thank you yomomma! When I come in from work I have about an hour to listen to/watch my video clips. Whose idea was it to remove my ability to view what I want to view - who totally removed the playlist option? More on videos - they tend to stop, freeze-up during a video. Solution often involves exiting videos and re-entering. Then trying to locate the clip I wanted to watch before video freezes again. I like to watch in full screen mode. Forget it. It freezes even quicker. And, what about viewing the video menu while in full screen? No, I have to sit down, reduce the video screen. Watching videos is getting to be more work that they are worth. I hope MSNBC addresses the issues that have been posted here - and moves to address them quickly!

yomommma, It has been over a week and there has been no change in video problems. If you are interested, some of us are seriously looking for a news site that will be better for the way we want to access news.

As we explore for new sites, we may come across something someone else wants to check out, so we are going to share, along with our pros and cons of what we are finding. Take a look - should be around page 13 - for The Godfather. MarcMcN posted an insightful comment and asked for other posters to share what new sites they are exploring.

That's my complaint. I have not seen one in depth article since the new format appeared. Everything seems to be cut to about as much news as what you get in a 30 news broadcast, which is next to nothing - just sound bytes. This is definitely dumbing down the news. There's more information on Newsvine that in the articles produced by MSNBC.

The video player is barely functional in Chrome and has a few serious issues. Looks like they haven't fixed it enough yet.

Joe, you should probably stick to Reuters.

Thank you for the personal answer. I am really trying to take in the changes, but I just can not read the stories in this layout. There is too much white space on the page, loose the double spacing and gaps, and please drop the "view more" tab at the bottom and display the complete story. I don't mind small unobtrusive ads, I know you have to pay the bills, but when they span the page and break my eye line when I'm reading it's annoying. I can't read in this format and end up closing the tab and doing something else. I think in your attempt to update your pages you are going to loose the majority of your readers. I'm going to be checking out other news sources this week and will check back when you people get this sorted out and readable again.

I totally understand how switching layouts can be disorienting at first. As a consumer, most choices we make are our own. We upgrade phones, TVs, cars, etc., making careful choices to best suit our personal needs.

So true but..........We get to decide if want to upgrade our phone, our TV, ect.... We get to choose what is right for us. When my TV burns out or my phone, car, ect. needs to be replaced someone doesn't come knocking on my door bringing me a new one they have chosen for me to have. I go to the store, car lot and pick out what I like. I drive a Toyota Tacoma 4x4 a Toyata Prius doesn't suit my needs. I chose the truck over the car even if the car salesman thinks I'd be better off with the Prius, it new, it's up with the times and it gets better gas mileage. New doesn't always mean better. Just because you worked for over a year on this doesn't mean it is better than the old style.

Several people here have requested a classic option. 'If it's not broken ...' Maybe it wasn't broken, though it was certainly outdated. The layouts predated Facebook, iPhones, even Windows Vista!

I have windows Vista, the old layout woked just fine. Outdated? So what! There is nothing wrong with the classics. Classic Rock, Classics TV programs, Classic Cars, Antique furniture, old homes. The list goes on. Same goes with style. I'm almost 46 yrs old I stick to the basic classic styles. I look young, but I don't think short shorts a skimpy tank top an is appropriate for me so I stick to a longer short a classic tank that my boobs aren't falling out.

And you plan to make more changes.....great I can hardly wait!:( Hopefully by then I will have found another new site to get my news.