The 10 Worst Web Sites to Navigate in 2006

Note: The worst form of bad navigation is Mystery Meat Navigation and 2006 saw some incredibly bad examples.

Don't forget to read The 10 Worst Web Sites of 2006.

As a now-defunct article once stated:

Mystery meat navigation (also abbreviated MMN) is a term coined and popularized by author and usability analyst Vincent Flanders to describe user interfaces (especially in web sites) in which it is inordinately difficult for users to discern the destinations of navigational hyperlinks—or, in severe cases, even to determine where the hyperlinks are. The typical form of MMN is represented by menus composed of unrevealing icons that are replaced with explicative text only when the mouse cursor hovers over them.

Flanders adopted the epithet mystery meat because, like the unidentifiable processed meat products historically served in many American public school cafeterias, MMN is unfathomable to the casual observer. Before conceiving the term mystery meat navigation, Flanders temporarily described the phenomenon as Saturnic navigation, a phrase named for the Saturn Corporation, whose web site formerly served as a high-profile example of this web usability problem.

Here are the worst web sites to navigate in 2006:

#10 Diners Club

(They've fixed it. See Below.)

Diners Club (New window)

Strange old school MMN circa 1997. Here's a big company using <gasp> animated GIF images. You have to wonder about the four doors. You would think they would match the navigation buttons at the top. Nope. The bottom-right door is about "News and Resources" while there is no corresponding door to the "Corporate Solutions" button.

They've fixed it.

Well, the good news is they've fixed the page in question. The bad news (for them) is the web has archive.org so that you can't really hide your past mistakes. I've also got two video versions -- at WebPagesThatSuck TV, and YouTube (below).

 

#9 Shulman Fleming

 

Shulman Fleming (New window)

A grand exercise in Flashturbation, this one features MMN and a pixilated picture of their graphics designer on the home page! I especially like the effect one finds when moving the mouse through the white box in the "Services" section. The baby image makes no sense.

 

#8 Mathew Mahon

 

Mathew Mahon (New window)

Upside down and sideways text. It didn't take me long to not read that. I hope it wasn't important. I found a phone number and cell phone in a few places where, thankfully, they read left to right, in English, and right side up. However, the rest of the site gave me no reason to want to call him. I don't even know what his specialties are, although later I found it to be portraits. At least I think so. The charming movie version is below.

 

#7 Campbell Mithun

 

Campbell Mithun (New window)

When I read the e-mail, my first reaction was, "Crud. They do web design and I can't use them." Nevertheless, I moused over each and every pill and nothing said web design.

OK, if they offer web design services, Google doesn't know about it — which may be all the proof you need that as far as Search Engine Optimization goes, Flash sucks. If I can't find it and if Google can't find it, then it certainly is proof to me that they don't offer web design services.

 

#6 M E D I U M

 

M E D I U M (New window)

What is it with architectural firms? It seems every other one is using MMN on their site. There's also very little contrast between text/links and the background. To paraphrase a great quote, "If programmers built software like web designers build architectural web sites, Bill Gates would have ended up a lawyer in his daddy's firm."

 

#5 sjb

 

sjb (New window)

I spent a long time trying to grasp how the navigation was designed to work. Further, even once I saw how it worked, I still found it frustrating to use.

Pushing the envelope for navigation design is one thing, but this approach is so literally counter-intuitive it's uncomfortable even when you understand it. You're asking the user to interact with one button-type area of the screen while looking at another area to see the response. Eye/hand coordination aside, it didn't even strike me as particularly interesting.

 

#4 ushida findlay architects

 

ushida findlay architects (New window)

I didn't even know what these folks did for a living until I belatedly looked at the TITLE tag. I should have known. What's the deal with architects? They seem to love the stupidity that's MMN. The #6 spot in this list is and architectural firm ( M E D I U M) and another architectural firm I've used is Torchia. My question is simple. In the buildings they design do you have to guess where the rooms are located?

 

#3 Gaia Group

 

Gaia Group (New window)

Last century — the summer of 1996, to be exact — I remember a co-worker saying, "Come here, Vincent. I've found the most awful, degrading, dehumanizing web site on the Internet." I went over and looked at the site and said, "You're right, but only for today. It always gets worse."

Originally, I thought this site may very well have the worst MMN on the web. But since this site came in at only #3, it's obvious we've got at least two sites which are worse.

I think of myself as logical and I think most people are logical, but who in the name of all that's holy signed off on this web site?

 

#2 Crumpler Bags

 

Crumpler Bags (New window)

Just go there. You'll understand. Or you can click on the movie below.

This is a higher-quality version of the video.

I didn't provide commentary for this or any other site because I believed all these examples were all self-explanatory. However, I received a dissenting e-mail on July 9, 2007, and I'd thought I'd include it and some of the many e-mails I received which explain why this site's navigation sucks:

Commentary on Crumpler Bags (New window opens here

 

#1 Optimal World

Overall Winner — Optimal World -- They've changed it!

Well, I just happened to have the movie version. Doesn't the worst site of 2006 deserve to be captured for posterity?

The Wayback Machine also has some of the pages.

It's self-explanatory and it's a double-win. Optimal World wins worst MMN and it was #1 on The 10 Worst Web Design Techniques Featured on Web Pages That Suck in 2006.