Wikipedia turns 20 years old and is planning a website redesign.

[Damdatfam]

 

Summary

 Wikipedia is turning 20 (January 15th), and as a part of the celebration, they have announced that they are planning to redesign its website. This is due to the fact that “while Wikipedia’s content has grown rapidly, our interface has not kept pace.” They are planning to introduce a reconfigured logo, collapsible side bar as well as introducing a maximum line width based on a grid system, and more.

 

Quotes

Quote

 Wikipedia has remained a critical and widely-used resource for knowledge across the world for the past two decades.  Over this time, the site has expanded significantly to contain unparalleled amounts of reliable and thorough information, including 53 million articles across over 300 languages.

Quote

The desktop design is particularly important to new users who have come to the internet for the first time over the last decade.  To these users, much of the wide range of functionality on the site can feel overwhelming and difficult to understand.  In order to welcome them to our projects and entice them to come back, we need to provide not only excellent content and an experience that is engaging and easy to use, but also an experience that is on-par with their perceptions of a modern, trustworthy, and welcoming site.

My thoughts

Wikipedia is finally getting a new website redesign, yay!

 

Sources

 https://wikimediafoundation.org/wikipedia20/

https://diff.wikimedia.org/2020/09/23/wikipedia-is-getting-a-new-look-for-the-first-time-in-10-years-heres-why/

 

[flibberdipper]

Well how the hell am I supposed to use Wikipedia on my dial-up connection now?

[suicidalfranco]

4 hours ago, WikiForce said:

for the redesign, i have only one thing to say, don't fix it if it ain't broken.

Also, current design is really good and very intuitive.

No, no, it doesn't use a shit ton of bw to load and people can easily download the entire content of Wikipedia and make offline encyclopaedia out of it with just a raspberry pi.

Time to bloat the shit out of it and fill it with pointless animation

/s

[captain_to_fire]

I remember back in the day during the times when almost all phones are Nokias (especially the N series), you can download a Wikipedia app and use it offline...just saying

[Spindel]

In the past I have donated money to keep Wikipedia running on a couple of occasions. 

 

Then suddenly I started to get daily spam form them about donation money to keep them afloat right after I had made an donation. 

 

Now I think their organisation can FU, I will never donate to them again because I got so pissed by that behavior.

[NeuesTestament]

I just hope the redesign doesn't end up like so many redesign these days. Really bloated up and painfully slow even with a fast internet connection and PC.

[Mihle]

Make it easier to switch between languages on the mobile site please, that is one thing that is needed.

[wamred]

Well dang, that’s not what I expected from them. I don’t know how I feel about a website redesign, I mean I guess it’s time but this one is so iconic. 

[Doobeedoo]

Hmm hopefully for the better, maybe a modern way to switch between links and better tables. Native dark mode too.

[soldier_ph]

Wikipedia FTW 

[GreatnessRD]

20 years?! Man, time flies like a motherfucka. Hope the redesign doesn't mess with the integrity of the site. Congrats to them.

[Vishera]

On 1/28/2021 at 4:29 AM, Damdatfam said:

they have announced that they are planning to redesign its website. This is due to the fact that “while Wikipedia’s content has grown rapidly, our interface has not kept pace.” They are planning to introduce a reconfigured logo, collapsible side bar as well as introducing a maximum line width based on a grid system, and more.

That's bad news,RIP Wikipedia.

Don't fix what is not broken,nobody asked for it.

The need to make things look pretty/modernize tends to destroys fully functional software,

And the most famous victims are Microsoft's Windows 8/10 and AMD's Radeon Relive/Crimson/Adrenaline Drivers.

We all loved Windows 7 and Catalyst Control Center,but their replacements are awful.

At least NVIDIA still use the good UI they have since the 90s,

There is no need for fancy graphics at the expense of functionality.

[LAwLz]

There are some links to concept art of the new design. It's like 90% the same which in my mind is a good thing. It's only minor changes here and there for what I can see. 

Stuff like "view in other language" is now a drop down selector instead of a static list on the left, and the search box now showing results in real time. 

Hope the page remains as snappy as it is today. If it stays as performant as it is right now then I think these changes will just be minor improvements. 

[colonel_mortis]

Looking at the mockups that they have, these changes look good to me. Long lines are (based on published research as well as my personal experience) harder to read, so I'm glad to see that they will be limiting the width. The rest of the tweaks are pretty minor, but generally look like positive changes to me which will clean up the interface a bit.

[Mling]

I want a slider that lets me travel back in time through article edits.

[Totallycasual]

On 1/28/2021 at 3:43 PM, WikiForce said:

don't fix it if it ain't broken

This exactly, i'm tired of change for the sake of change.  I'm using a bunch of Chrome extensions just to keep things how i like them and use the old versions of things lol

[n0stalghia]

Checked out the redesign in the arcticles. It's actually just addition of like 10 QoL features while the design stays the same. Collapsible side bar, language menu being moved to a drop-down thing at the top as an effect of this, and same drop-down menu for the table of contents so it's also accessible from anywhere in the article.

 

Everyone who is "reeeeee change" here didn't bother actually checking it out. 

[kuddlesworth9419]

I would rather they didn't re-design the website. If it's not broken don't fix it.