AAVSO homepage is really bush-league :(

Affiliation
American Association of Variable Star Observers (AAVSO)
Wed, 03/02/2022 - 19:10

Its been many years now, that the front view of AAVSO is this kind of "juvenile-oriented" web page design. For a serious scientific research organization, it comes across as ridiculously "amateurish", and appears primarily oriented towards a very unsophisticated audience, rather than dedicated researchers.

The large fonts, giant, gaudy colored, flashing graphics and cartoons hardly fit to a non-profit scientific research organization! Sadly, the main webpage looks more like something my grade school keiki would browse around, almost like dreading a Roblox character will jump out at me with a sword waving, LOL.

PLUS, the excessive advertising all over the page just adds to its "trashy" impression :( According to the latest Treasurer's report, AAVSO finances are excellent, so why do we need to commercialize so heavily?

I had complained about this "new" webpage style years ago, but it has since gotten even worse. I find it is so annoying, that I only jump immediately to WebObs to enter my observations, then leave as fast as I can, LOL.

PLEASE, can we make our website consistent with a level and impression appropriate for serious science? MAHALO!

Dr. Mike Linnolt

 

Affiliation
American Association of Variable Star Observers (AAVSO)
AAVSO Webpage

Mike,

I appreciate you taking the time to share your thoughts on the AAVSO webpage with us. I will be certain to pass them on to the new Executive Director once we have one in place. I am sure he/she will have some of their own thoughts on how to represent the AAVSO on the landing page.

 

Kathy Spirer

Acting Executive Director

AAVSO

Affiliation
American Association of Variable Star Observers (AAVSO)
You are director now

Thank you for your response, Kathy. I would like to know your opinion on what format the landing page should have. Do you think it is ok as it is, or should it be modified to be like a more typical professional organization ?

I could suggest a general format similar to the NIH PubMed page, which I use a lot: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/advanced/ as an example of a "clean" and concise, appearing main page!

Mike

 

Affiliation
American Association of Variable Star Observers (AAVSO)
Not sure what 'bush league…

Not sure what 'bush league is' but I definitely agree. Looks like someone took a leaf out of Micro$oft's 'windows 8...' design manual and tried to get down with the kids (very well, keiki!) with all the clunky boxes and suchlike. Apparently we decided to code pages using a CMS (now it seems, two CMS's) rather than take our time and produce regular programming in a commonly-spoken manner. Instead there is a lot of heavy coding in a language that hardly anyone speaks, simply because a past coder knew it. He has of course now left and so the coding is up in the air.

And please, no more appeals for cash masquerading as something else.