AMAZON TESTING "SLICK NEW SITE DESIGN"TNW has a report on an apparently new, "vastly improved version of [Amazon's] massively popular shopping website" to be launched in "the near future" and which has been designed to appeal to tablet owners.
They say that "only a small number of users have been granted access to the new design" but that some of them have been describing their surprise via Twitter. Here's a sample Twitter thread about the new redesign and the reactions of those who have access to it. The reaction is very positive.
As TNW says,
' Gone are the blue menus and buttons, making way for a slicker white and grey interface that reduces clutter and makes navigation a lot easier. From the screenshots that were shared with us (thanks Derek), Amazon has stopped its navigation menu from loading on page load, now displaying it when the user mouses-over the “Shop By Department” button. '
Also, there seems to a large focus on tablet-friendly products, such as "Instant Video, MP3 Store, Cloud Player, Kindle, Cloud Drive, AppStore for Android, Game and Software Downloads and Audiobooks..."
Conjecture which follows that, in the article, is what we've been reading for the last month in several articles that report industry rumors.
As for the look of the store, I don't pay enough attention because in comparing their examples of the new look vs the current one, it looks similar except that I still do have the blue tool bars and separators (which make it a bit easier for me to see categories than the new-style vanilla-looking gray/black-white version of the toolbar might).
At any rate, take a look. It's almost September, and most estimates for the first type of tablet is 'by October' although some of the shipping of parts reported the last week seem to indicate a delay, but maybe that's because they want to produce more. Who knows?
Kindle 3's (UK: Kindle 3's) K3 Special ($114) K3-3G Special ($139) DX Graphite
Check often: Temporarily-free late-listed non-classics or recently published ones
Guide to finding Free Kindle books and Sources. Top 100 free bestsellers. Liked-books under $1
UK-Only: recently published non-classics, bestsellers, or £5 Max ones
Also, UK customers should see the UK store's Top 100 free bestsellers.
Below are ways to Share this post if you'd like others to see it.
-- The Send to Kindle button works well only on Firefox currently.
Send to Kindle(Older posts have older Kindle model info. For latest models, see CURRENT KINDLES page. )
If interested, you can also follow my add'l blog-related news at Facebook and Twitter
Questions & feedback are welcome in the Comment areas (tho' spam is deleted). Thanks!
most wanted
Mighty Bright
You can access your books, periodicals, or the full Web* with Amazon's light 6" 
![[Valid RSS]](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_sqAN4x-eh8SuW_ojZIhT7JHp4x2ej3k9XsXnBbJFoujV7Jpk1ea0Yk9lerHGi0aII3Ar1qchAyrSeembqTc_DjqrZFml7YR4Hj=s0-d "Validate my RSS feed")
The wait is killing me! Thanks for the post, I missed all the Twitter talk on this.
ReplyDeleteFinally! I've hated how cluttered Amazon's pages are from the first time I saw them. I can only hope that Amazon also makes finding user information easier to find. I 'belong' to some Amazon groups that I'm not even sure how to reach. Visiting Amazon is like entering the vast government warehouse at the end of The Raiders of the Lost Ark. Things enter that get lost and never come out.
ReplyDeleteAmazon also needs to make major improvements in the book detail pages, making them easier for author/publishers to change. I've got a Tolkien chronology that, through most of the year needs to target Tolkien fans, But around Christmas, it'd be great to have an alternative page that targets the friends of Tolkien fans. And it'd be wonderful to be able to switch between several book descriptions in a flash to see which draws the most sales.
--Michael W. Perry, author of Untangling Tolkien
" I 'belong' to some Amazon groups that I'm not even sure how to reach. "
ReplyDeleteStrangely, they were very easy to find but Amazon removed all options to do so some time ago.
Used to be there was a link to communities on every page, and one to your favourites on your profile page, plus a search option to search for communities on every community page.
Those are all gone, for whatever reason.
" I've hated how cluttered Amazon's pages are from the first time I saw them"
It's got worse over time as more and more product categories and stuff have been added to the existing design which was never really meant to host them all.
They've been using the current basic design (with minor changes like adding "recently viewed" and recommendations and some ajax content) since about 1996.
That's a very long time.
Anonymous,
ReplyDeleteDo you mean Amazon discussion groups? I have a shortcut to the Kindle Forum and BELOW it there are links to other Amazon discussion forums.
http://bit.ly/kindlecommunity
I had not realized, until you pointed it out, that the Discussion areas are on toolbars mainly in the Kindlestore area ... I don't see them under regular printed books.
But in the Kindlestore area still, there is a "Discussions" link in the top toolbar.
I hope the new redesign IS a bit simpler (I should talk).