Take a Good, Hard Look at Our Home Page. It May Be Your Last

Tomorrow (or maybe the next day — these things are completely subject to the whims of the digital gods) you will see a newly designed Tyee home page.

Our policy is to spruce up the place every decade, whether it needs it or not. And whew has our home page needed it.

The basic current Tyee home page design was crafted and launched in 2009. Back then it won a Canadian Online Publishing Award for “Best Overall Design.” It did look pretty slick for its time.

But here’s the thing about home pages for busy, evolving websites. They’re kind of like a garden. At first everything is all in its rows, and you remember why you planted this here and that there. Over time some parts die off and new species of content take root and flower. After enough years, your undulating green italic headlines are fighting for sunlight against six other type styles of various colours, and the whole jumble makes sense only to regular visitors to the garden.

That’s where we’ve ended up. With one overgrown garden of a home page (and, now, one exhausted metaphor).

So we began by listening closely to what you, our Tyee readers, tell us you most value in what we offer.

You often tell us you appreciate our straightforward, fact-driven journalism. You like that we give it to you straight.

Many of you have also said you’d like to know more about what we’re up to inside The Tyee, and how you might be more involved in helping with ideas, attending events, or lending other support.

So we redesigned our home page to reflect those aims. We’ve tried to make it less cluttered, easier to navigate and more revealing about what’s going on inside our offices, and heads. Every move we made was guided by our first principle here at The Tyee — put readers first.

We’re also slightly tweaking The Tyee’s article pages for better readability, but nothing like the overhaul we’ve given the home page.

That’s all we’ll say for now. But when the new home page goes live, we’ll publish a guide to all it has to offer visitors. In a poll that you’ll find on the home page, we’ll be asking how you feel about the new look and usability. Don’t hold back. Give it to us straight.

Meanwhile, take a good hard look at The Tyee’s home page today. You’re looking at history in the unmaking.