Saturday, June 6, 2009

Ineffective Websites

The Curious Dreamer: (http://www.thecuriousdreamer.com/dreamdictionary/)
I found this site hard to use. I was looking for some insight into a weird dream I had and this site came up in my google search. There are two dictionaries, the main one and the "alternative symbol index". I clicked on the alternative index at first and my results were just a series of synonyms for the words I was looking for. I went back to the main page and saw the links for the main dictionary. I tried my search again and was once again given a list of synonyms, but these were links to additional pages. Clicking on the link finally gave me some information about my dream.

Sing365.com: (http://www.sing365.com/music/lyric.nsf/Beth-Hart-Lyrics/D0D39309737BB27B48256A93002F8324)
I am listing this one because the first time I tried to access it, all that came up was a green screen with the artist's name at the top (no ads, no lyrics, nothing). It is working now, but everything is squished onto the left side of the page, leaving a bright green (empty) column that takes up the right third of the screen. The text is tiny and surrounded by large ads (many of which move or flash). I skipped over the artist's bio at first because it is right under an embedded video playing a movie trailer. It is easy to believe the bio text is describing what is playing in the video.

The Hummingbird Website: (http://www.hummingbirdworld.com/h/)
Although I was able to find some useful information on here, it can be confusing to navigate. The main navigational links are in the center-right of the page, but there are two additional links in the column along the left of the page. Scroll down about half-way and find some more navigational links about first aid for injured birds. I just feel like this site could be streamlined a bit to make it more user-friendly.

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