The Daily Sucker

Submitter comments: The amount of MMN on this page is amazing - not to mention the fact that they are using 36 links to point to approximately five different pages total (which they already have links for right at the top), and didn’t even bother to organize the links into any coherent order. I think one link is repeated about nine times, and another is used only once. Have fun finding it!

Just keep an eye on your CPU performance if you do (at least in Firefox).

Plus, I personally found that mouseover effect on the actual readable links at the top of the page to be obnoxious.

Vincent Flanders’ comments: After looking at this site it should be obvious why Mystery Meat Navigation is so obnoxious and why it should never be used.

The Connext Project

Submitter comments: Vincent, I don’t know how I keep stumbling across a bunch of sites that really suck — but I just did it again, when looking for the address of a restaurant where a live remote from the radio station we wake up to here in St. Louis is scheduled to be tomorrow morning (or this morning by the time you read this).

It’s for a restaurant called Reynolds Roadhouse, and their site sucks due to the following no-nos:

1) They’ve got out-of-date information on their homepage from almost five months ago (yes, the same morning radio crew mentioned there is scheduled to be there tomorrow morning, too).

2) The very same text on their homepage is on some other pages, too.
Again, the same crap that’s way the heck out of date.

3) Poor contrast.

4) I was looking all over for the address of this joint so that I could look it up on Mapquest (I’m thinking about going over there tomorrow morning), but their address is nowhere to be found.

Vincent Flanders’ comments: There’s a simple reason why you keep stumbling across sucky web sites — you’re surfing the web.

I don’t remember seeing a restaurant web site without an address. That’s a new, bad concept. On the other hand, I did find a phone number so I guess you could call for the address, but that defeats the purpose of having a website. It’s possible their menu had the address except that I don’t like to download Microsoft Word documents. Oh. Why are they forcing you to download an MS Word document?

The biggest problem is lack of contrast. As AccessColor points out:

Both color difference and color brightness do not meet the recommended standard for 17.97% of the total text.

Either color difference or color brightness does not meet the recommended standard for 75.78% of the total text.

Reynolds Roadhouse

Submitter comments: I especially like the violent blood red, scrolling conveyor built and animated Product Categories text.

Vincent Flanders’ comments: The biggest, most obvious, and fastest improvement they could make to the site is to get rid of the background color. You could improve the site’s appearance by 200%.

Cost Compass

Submitter comments: Hi, Here’s a secure winner for your “Worst Web Site of 2008″ contest. BTW, the “GAT” is the Counter-cybercrime department of the Italian law enforcement corp “Guardia di Finanza” (Finance Guard). See Wikipedia for more details.

Vincent Flanders’ comments: We have the obligatory, but unnecessary,Flash Splash page and if you click the Flash web link, you get one of the most horrible Flash introductions I’ve seen. Clicking on the building takes you to the “real” home page.

You’ve got to hand it to the Italians. The music on the “real” home page is much nicer than what you hear on American police sites. Still, it’s a bit over the top.

GAT

Submitter comments: How to anti -market yourself (drive business away), should be used in marketing classes everywhere!

Vincent Flanders’ comments: Well, it’s entirely possible this is just a placeholder page and we’re soon going to see a CSS Zen Garden masterpiece. Right. And I’m going to be the next dancing machine at Chippendale’s.

Don the Poolman

Submitter comments: Can you handle this?

Vincent Flanders’ comments: Yes.

OK. I suppose I need to say a little more than just “Yes.” It’s a classic example of Mistake #5 from Biggest Mistakes in Web Design 1995-2015 — “Have you ever seen another web site? Really? Doesn’t look like it.“ I call this type of design the “I haven’t taken my antipsychotics in a while school of web design.”

The designer should read Does My Web Site Suck? Checklist 1 (and Checklist 2).

Alpha Signs

I’ve often said that if you have a web site and aren’t reading Seth Godin’s blog, you don’t really belong on the web. Seriously. The man is brilliant, brilliant, brilliant. The only thing that keeps him from ascending to the heaven’s is that stupid, unmarked home page bar across the top of his blog. On the other hand, I mentioned that he really should find a way to use the picture of his head and he came up with a, naturally, brilliant concept.

In today’s post, Mr. Godin sums up why you should care about bad web design.

Every time you visit a new website, enter a new airport, visit a new store, examine a new book… the question you ask first off is, “what’s this like?”

At a strange airport, if it’s ‘like’ your airport, you know just what to do. It’s easy. If it’s totally different, you have to stop, regroup, and start to understand what’s involved.

… Visit a website with a brown on brown color scheme, a stock photo of a nautilus, some flashing graphics, a bunch of widgets and a typeface that’s not quite right, and you’ve already decided how you feel. Entirely based on the fact that this site is like those sites, and you didn’t like those sites.

He gets it. You got it? Get reading his blog.