[Wikimedia-l] Apparently, Wikipedia is ugly

[Michel Vuijlsteke]

On 15 July 2012 02:40, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:

> On 15 July 2012 00:52, Michel Vuijlsteke <wikipedia at zog.org> wrote:
> > Maybe if we used some of our millions to pay for a good designer?
> >
>
> Won't work. Aside from the wikipedia forever mess that shows how
> things can go wrong the En main page is firmly under the control of
> the en.wikipedia community and it will change it when it is ready and
> not before. Try the ang.wikipedia.org instead.
>

Ah, erm... *interesting* choice of design choices on ang.wikipedia.org. :)

Of course, design by committee (and a fortiori by community) doesn't really
work. Would it not be possible for at least a style guide to be agreed
upon? A couple of good fonts to be licensed? A showcase wiki to be set up?

Another annoying aspect of the lack of good graphic design / typography, I
think, is that the presentation side of things is being taken care of by
third parties (I like http://sophiestication.com/articles/ipad.html,
http://www.wikiwebapp.com/ was in the news this week) -- and that they''re
not at all interested in the editing/adding content side of Wikipedia.

Michel