Hey, good looking!
by Sue Bailey
eBay have given us a sneaky preview of the new design for their home page. It’s a lovely clean design, with sexy curved corners not dissimilar to the ones I made for a certain Shop 
And at long last, Shops are being conspicuously featured:
We’re pleased to see that eBay for Charity has a prominent spot. As well as doing great work for good causes, this part of the site does bring in both punters and publicity that eBay would otherwise most likely miss: it absolutely deserves a headline spot.
Also new are a space to talk about site safety issues - long overdue this, it’s nice to see eBay finally being more upfront about the need for members to protect themselves while using the site - and ‘Look At This’, which “will highlight an area of the site that we feel helps make eBay the fun and interesting place it is”. The example they give shows Cabbage Patch dolls, “due for a revival”. I’m not convinced about Cabbage Patch dolls any more this time than I was the first time around, but it’ll be interesting to see what other items Richmond use to fill this spot.
Altogether it’s a much more coherent look, a great change from its messy and illogical predecessor.
For a nostalgic look at eBay home pages past, the Way Back Machine has dozens going back to 1999. This one was there when I first visited the site: what a dull start compared with today’s!
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Interesting after my last post that pulse seems to have lost it’s spot on the eBay home page. Still no great loss - it’s great for sellers, it’s of no use to buyers which is what the home page should be all about!
I’m glad Pulse has gone. Not only is it no use to buyers, it’s full of crappy ebooks bumped up by the idiots that sell them. They shouldn’t be given the oxygen of publicity.
[...] I notice that the redesigned front page has abandoned these kind of ads, though they are still around in eBay’s banners - there might be one on the bottom of this very page right now. [...]
[...] The page is particularly badly laid out, in fact it just looks a mess with new sections squeezed in. It’s a shame they didn’t get the guys that designed the new eBay.co.uk home page to lay out the new feedback view. Useful links to About Me, Trading Assistant, reviews and guides and ID History being hidden on a drop down menu. Strangely they’ve added a “View Item” link, but haven’t bothered to make the item title or number clickable. The page is also much longer as each feedback now takes two lines instead of one. Finally some of the fonts on the page have been reduced in size, and the detailed seller rating box dwarfs the size of the recent feedback ratings. [...]
[...] Meanwhile on .co.uk, the return of the Shops tab to the homepage, alongside Motors and Express, has been promised for the end of this month. Though this was originally included in the UK’s new home page, it subsequently vanished in mysterious circumstances. We look forward to its safe return. [...]
[...] Last Christmas eBay.co.uk made a radical decision. Rather then revert to the old home page when the Christmas season was over they unveiled a completely new home page. The eBay.co.uk home page has set the standard for other eBay sites around the world who have replicated the look and feel but eBay.com has been one of the last sites to follow suit. [...]