Never heard of thesixtyone.com? I'm not surprised. It was a fairly small scale operation; an online radio for indie music, it used to look like this: old.thesixtyone.com. You would stumble through this Discovery Zone (DZ for short) of indie music and almost immediately find something you liked. Or at least that's how it worked for me.
Even if I get bored with all this I can go play arcade games!
The old design was sleek and made it deceptively simple to find new music. The quest system was awesome, and I liked that they used the Fallout guy for this, though that's mostly just my inner geek having fun. Having all the navigation permanently at the top of the screen made perfect, undeniable, genius sense. The music plays no matter what? Genius. There were a few navigation issues on the old site, but nothing that genuinely pissed me off or made me confused, just something that required a few extra clicks -- but clicks that made sense. Why no specifics? Because I can barely remember any dramatic issues, and remember my learning curve for the site to be about ten minutes. For the entire site.
The removal of genre from the site is most baffling. If the goal of this redesign is to mimic browsing an indie record store -- somewhat likely, given the sudden focus on band images and so forth, then why in the hell would the designers remove any mention of genres, or ability to only focus on one genre? I don't like listening to dance music in my spare time, looking at my computer. I will almost inevitably skip it, no matter how good it is. I liked, for example, the blues and r&b sections on the site -- they no longer exist. People know what they like, if they gravitate toward something it's easier to have them find more. Why would you remove the familiarity of a genre? Pandora starts with something you're familiar with, a song or a band you like, and takes it from there. The glut of information on the internet needs a familiar filter, or people will inevitably be overwhelmed. The new redesign took away my sense of controlling what I listened to within the wider realm of discovery. The genres sections allowed me to pick something I felt like listening to and have a selection of music right there that would not jolt between bombastic dance jam, quiet singer-songwriter moment, followed by punk rock wails. And now that's all thesixtyone seems to want to do to me.
Lastly, the sense of community the old site offered mimicked Facebook, an opportunity for social networking based around the artists, but also those who follow them. This new site lacks that, and in fact seems intent on alienating those users who used to enjoy the site's simplicity. I'm curious who in the site's community was pushing for this redesign? It's like if Michael Bay decided to make a romantic comedy -- his old explosion loving fans disappointed by the end result, but the new audience doesn't appreciate it either.
Give us back lists and organization, not images and randomness. Otherwise you lost a very enthusiastic old supporter -- and I think after this redesign hype the lack of good UI will bite thesixtyone on the ass, traffic-wise. Why Facebook over Myspace? Facebook is easier to navigate, less flashy, and focused on the interface rather than the imagery. This was a highly risky gamble the site made with the redesign. I'm hopeful that when the dust settles, changes can be made to make the site both pretty and functional. But if not both, please focus on function.
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