The Daily Sucker

Submitter comments: Why are so many evangelical web sites not only brutal on the browsers, and on
the eyes, but also designed by the preachers themselves? These sites crashed my browser a couple of times.

Vincent Flanders’ comments: I suspect people get confused by the concepts of “can” and “should.” Just because you can do something (create your own web site, add 1Mb worth of graphics, or use Flash navigation doesn’t mean you should.

Normally, I don’t use two web sites from the same organization, but there’s always a first time.

Basically, everything is wrong with both of the sites. On the Patricia Turner site, I’d like to point out the TITLE tag is “Home,” which isn’t going to help the search engines. My friend, GlobeGuy, will enjoy the smallish globe that’s toward the end of the home page.

The Miracles page is totally bizarre. Very strange animated GIFs.

The home page for Temple Compassion scared the living bejezus out of me. It’s just frightening.

Patricia Turner 
Temple Compassion

Submitter comments: This page’s suckiness is all about the buttons. This site is like a game of which buttons work, which ones don’t? As you surf through the site the buttons move around, now they work, wait… now they don’t. Some buttons are offered on some pages, then not on others - it is all quite a mystery…

A worthwhile non-profit that needs a web site that the public can use, not be abused by!

Vincent Flanders’ comments: It’s pretty impressive — in a negative way. I don’t think I’ve ever seen as many dead buttons on a site that

1. isn’t a mock up
2. under construction
3. is for a real organization

This is much worse than Mystery Meat Navigation (MMN). With the MMN I’ve seen, there are real links — once you find them. This site is using Dead Meat Navigation.

Northeast Nebraska RC&D

Submitter comments: This page is so freaking terrible. It plays one of three education-oriented country-music songs on start-up with no way of stopping them and that change depending on the day of the week (how clever!).

It’s ugly, has randomly placed animated GIFs and images for buttons. Back to the main page - in case my description is difficult to follow), the links across the top work randomly depending on what page you’re on. The Library page is also worth staring at in disbelief. For some reason it has a it-counter-laden splash page, for which someone actually took design credit and on which the TITLE tag actually reads, “This is my first web page.” I believe it.

If you click around the library page, you find all sorts of other, creative titles like, “This Links is the Index Page,” and “SECTION 1 Title 1 Title 2 Title 3.”

BTW, I just had to know who performed those songs on the home page. It’s Garre LaGrone, a motivational speaker and singer. I’m sure his music is copyrighted, and I doubt the school actually got permission to play it. I think I smell a law suit.

Vincent Flanders’ comments: I think it’s interesting that two of the home page’s major links just don’t work — Library and Calendar. The “Parents” link leads to a page that’s under construction. I got to the Library page from the Administration page. There’s a link at the bottom called “Back” and if you click it, you get a 404 error.

I also like the fact that the counter on the library page says 000001 — no matter how many times you visit.

Lopez High School

Submitter comments: One of the worst sites I have ever seen…The best example of why this page sucks is the “cheeky button” feature on the top right of the page. Give it a click and see what happens…

Vincent Flanders’ comments: Wow! Clicking on the “cheeky button” is a waste of time and might be insulting to certain people.

The color scheme is terrible, but what’s worse is the contrast between the text and background sucks. Here’s what AccessColor says:

1. Both color difference and color brightness do not meet the recommended standard for 13.41% of the total text.
2. Either color difference or color brightness does not meet the recommended standard for 73.18% of the total the text.

Your visitors need to be able to read your text.

Catalyst Retail Security Tags

Submitter comments: I really couldn’t believe the designers of The University of Alabama in Huntsville had the nerve to use this design after the same design was featured on WPTS with Brown University.

No research, obviously. To make matters worse, UAH tells you why this new design is so much better, while explaining how to use the navigation.

Vincent Flanders’ comments: I spent a long, long time trying to come up with an opening sentence for this review:

If I had cojones as big as the people who borrowed Brown’s horrible web site design, I’d…
If I had as much chutzpah as the people who borrowed Brown’s horrible web site design, I’d…

I don’t know what to say other than take a look at Brown University’s web site and then take a look at the University of Alabama in Huntsville.

Back in 2006, I said Brown University was the year’s 10th Worst Web Site. We certainly have a Top 10 entry for 2008. If you’re going to borrow a design, at least borrow something that wasn’t featured on Web Pages That Suck.

University of Alabama in Huntsville

Submitter comments: This is seriously bad.

Vincent Flanders’ comments: Well, that’s the 4 word version of my review.

We really don’t need the FlashSplash page. The “real” home page has, for some reason known but to God, sideways navigation. Fortunately, when you mouse over a link, the new menu isn’t sideways. When I clicked on the “Travel Flash” button, I was taken to a subpage that didn’t have a link to the home page.

On the Explore and Learn page, there are two links at the bottom-left of the page that are actually PDF files. Unmarked PDF files. For some strange reason, the home page link is on the right-hand side of the top logo. Oh, and we have contrast issues.

It’s very strange.

Land Between the Lakes