Announcing the Metafilter design contest.

November 21, 2004 11:27 PM

I'm hereby announcing the MetaFilter design contest. Post any questions here.
posted by mathowie (staff) to MetaFilter-Related at 11:27 PM (52 comments total)

The offical color of MetaTalk's background is "metatalk puke"

How appropriate.

heh
posted by Steve_at_Linnwood at 11:39 PM on November 21, 2004

Not a question, but a suggestion: how about a lifetime pro membership to Metafilter (assuming you do go that route) for the winner and maybe a 1 year one and a 6 mos one to runners up? I got nothing against Flickr but was a bit surprised at it being part of the prizes when more than likely the winner is pretty much guaranteed to be spending at least some time on MeFi and there's no guarantee they have any use whatsoever for Flickr.
posted by dobbs at 11:40 PM on November 21, 2004

Yeah, good point dobbs. I guess free lifetime for all three top slots.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 11:43 PM on November 21, 2004

#333333 is "metatalk puke"? Someone should notify the W3C and/or Pantone!
posted by neckro23 at 11:57 PM on November 21, 2004

Ah, the old girl gets a new look. It will only sting for a second, right?
posted by rabidsquirrel at 1:10 AM on November 22, 2004

not the gumdrop buttons!!!!!!
posted by superposition at 1:14 AM on November 22, 2004 [1 favorite]

the MetaFilter design contest

aka: how to get your choice of dozens of sweet designs for only $300 ;)

(not that tons of folks wouldn't do it for free - I would if I could design for shit)
posted by scarabic at 1:18 AM on November 22, 2004

I'd love to see the worst of the submissions when they begin rolling in. Anonymously of course so as not to hurt anyones feelings. Or whatever.
posted by geekyguy at 1:18 AM on November 22, 2004

It hurts me more than it hurts you. Remember the first time you saw a NY Times with a color photo on the front page?

Here's a kinda legit question:
So for awhile it was recommended to use long, thing lines in GIF images (like the ones at the top of the header) because the GIF algorithm was really efficient at compressing horizontal bands of similar color. Is that why you used that motif? Will the winning entry sport similar byte-saving tricks? How concerned are you, in general, with image compression/bandwidth? As it stands, MeFi home isn't all that much bigger than LoFi.
posted by ChasFile at 1:24 AM on November 22, 2004

Change scares me.
posted by RavinDave at 1:59 AM on November 22, 2004

Change scares me.

RavinDave, I'm glad I'm not the only one. I totally understand that the current design hasn't grown to meet the demands of the site.

But the possibility of no more blue? No more gray? No more green? I'm going to have nightmares tonight.
posted by sbutler at 2:36 AM on November 22, 2004

I, too, am woefully inequipped to handle a change of his magnitude. I say the new design should incorporate Mefi blue in some manner. If it doesn't, I probably won't do anything except silently rage against whomever designs the new layout.
posted by The God Complex at 2:38 AM on November 22, 2004

Oh, please oh please let the 'use old skool color schemes' be an option. That we don't have to pay for.

*huddles in the corner, shivering*
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 2:39 AM on November 22, 2004

And by silently I mean nakedly. Remember this warning.

ps - don't delete the image tag yet.
posted by The God Complex at 2:39 AM on November 22, 2004

pps - i meant to type 'unequipped', really. clearly the fear coursing through my veins has intesified my poor typing skills.
posted by The God Complex at 2:41 AM on November 22, 2004

Intensified.

That's it. I'm going to sleep. Clearly you've thrown me off my game.
posted by The God Complex at 2:42 AM on November 22, 2004

Will there still be an option for a "white"? I love my white, with its chosen-by-me serif fonts, and as-wide-as-the-window posts and its doesn't-look-like-I'm-not-working-whiteness. I'd be very sad to lose it. And no, lofi isn't it.
posted by bonaldi at 4:41 AM on November 22, 2004

I'd like to see a winner that's W3C Validated.
posted by Pretty_Generic at 4:49 AM on November 22, 2004

I'm already nostalgic for the old design
posted by matteo at 5:02 AM on November 22, 2004

Matt: a la Monkeyfilter, could your ongoing MeFi rewrite include a provision for user-defined stylesheets?
posted by Gyan at 6:04 AM on November 22, 2004

Design restriction: Must incorporate #D4AAA in some manner or mode.

Matt, are you going to be the only judge, or will there be a celebrity panel?
posted by gleuschk at 6:15 AM on November 22, 2004

I am with RavinDave. MetaFilter currently sports one of the best designed sites around. It is simple, yet elegant. Everything is easy to find (except that there is no link to AskMe on the front page) and easy to use. Moreover, the interface is intuitive so that even a first-timer can figure out the site and find stuff almost instantly. Perhaps a little jazzing-up will be fun, but hopefully the design will remain simple, elegant and intuitive.
posted by caddis at 7:15 AM on November 22, 2004

Multiple entries? I say if someone puts the extra work into another entry, it should entered as well.
posted by angry modem at 7:20 AM on November 22, 2004

Uhoh!
posted by travis vocino at 7:30 AM on November 22, 2004

Bring it on, I say. I like the current design, but (positive) change is always good.

I'll definitely be submitting a meager entry of my own when I get the chance.
posted by kryptondog at 7:33 AM on November 22, 2004

Hey wait, where's the new *filter site?

(To be on-topic: I'm with RavinDave & caddis. I hope whatever design wins will be similarly minimal and elegant.)
posted by kenko at 7:35 AM on November 22, 2004

I just hope whomever wins chooses to keep the colors for historical purposes. The text of former entries will live on, and in those old entries the nomenclature has been decided. People refer to MetaFilter as "The Blue" and MetaTalk as "The Gray," etc. If a future MetaTalk becomes orange, then things can become confusing.
posted by terrapin at 7:52 AM on November 22, 2004

Matt - did you consider sorting out a barebones version of the MetaClan, marking it up as XHTML and submitting it as a sort of Zen Garden?

(Although then there may be several winners, and therefore several iPods, and therefore several more hours at the rockface for you to pay it all off.)
posted by NinjaPirate at 7:53 AM on November 22, 2004

wouldn't that be
MetaTalk — “The Puke”?
posted by NinjaPirate at 7:55 AM on November 22, 2004

How about a mod to the design rules that each of the front pages need to incorporate the current colors (not necessarily the exact current colors but blue, gray, green) so we can still refer to the blue, gray, and green. Just a little color around the logo, or the logo itself in the appropriate color would do the trick.
posted by TimeFactor at 8:01 AM on November 22, 2004

Or, post preview (d'oh), exactly what terrapin said already.
posted by TimeFactor at 8:02 AM on November 22, 2004

MetaFilter currently sports one of the best designed sites around. It is simple, yet elegant. Everything is easy to find (except that there is no link to AskMe on the front page) and easy to use

But that's the point of this. Ask MetaFilter needs to be added, as well as a way for five more sites someday. And what happens when I add a list of "your saved favorite threads" and links to "comments you've made recently" and "comments made on your threads." Where do you stuff that in the interface?
posted by mathowie (staff) at 8:03 AM on November 22, 2004

we can use midis, blinking text, and those little floating angels, right? ; >
posted by amberglow at 8:06 AM on November 22, 2004

... and hopping bunnnies with pancakes on their heads, of course.
posted by terrapin at 8:17 AM on November 22, 2004

Would it be possible to keep all of the old content on the old layout or would that defeat the purpose of the redesign?

I'm sending the contest out to some fellow Multimedia grads.
posted by ODiV at 8:26 AM on November 22, 2004

Would it be possible to keep all of the old content on the old layout or would that defeat the purpose of the redesign?

I guess someone could technically design a "classic" style set.
posted by terrapin at 8:53 AM on November 22, 2004

I've grown to love the blue. I'm not particularly attached to the gray or green, but the blue is big. White backgrounds are good too, but I hope we'll see some blue in the winning entries.
posted by rdub at 9:25 AM on November 22, 2004

Matt, you planning to take MeFi commercial? Make a living at it?
posted by five fresh fish at 9:50 AM on November 22, 2004

So can we just submit a PSD of the design? Or a heavily cutup HTML? Does it have to be as close to the final product (in terms of coding) as possible?
posted by geoff. at 12:17 PM on November 22, 2004

I ? gleuschk!
posted by deborah at 1:15 PM on November 22, 2004

Dammit...that's supposed to be a heart!
posted by deborah at 1:16 PM on November 22, 2004

Can I suggest a substitution prize? Instead of the iPod, how about user number 2?
posted by Civil_Disobedient at 2:50 PM on November 22, 2004

A mockup image is fine, as I said on the page (HTMLized version was optional).

Multiple entries are fine too.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 7:14 PM on November 22, 2004

Considering this has already fallen off Metatalk, I'd suggest putting it on the Sidebar
posted by Stan Chin at 8:47 PM on November 22, 2004

Yeah, I'll pimp it on the header, and probably on the front page of metafilter as the deadline draws near.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 10:26 PM on November 22, 2004

hey Matt, per NinjaPirate's suggestion, standardizing the code a bit and releasing it a la the Zen Garden would make it easier to code the top few entries as choices on a style sheet switcher. The old designs could be a choice as well.
posted by whatnot at 9:11 AM on November 23, 2004

Yeah, a second revision feature I'd like to add are user generated stylesheets, with a gallery of contributed ones.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 1:24 PM on November 23, 2004

are all of the styles embedded? I don't see any links to external style sheets.
posted by whatnot at 3:08 PM on November 23, 2004

Whatever; just please, dear Lard, no horizontal scrolling.
posted by yhbc at 8:19 PM on November 23, 2004

Hey! I made that, you bastard!
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 4:05 PM on November 24, 2004

Which is why I baited you here.

Y.H.B.T.

(not to be confused with my own handle, of course!)
posted by yhbc at 7:02 PM on November 24, 2004

oh. i thought there might be more discussion here.

i worried about this yesterday for a while, and jotted down some ideas and an example of how they might come out. it's not really good enough for an entry (i'm a humble programmer - when i worked on "this kind of thing" i had a designer chappy who took stuff like this and make it look amazing), but i thought there might be some comments on this thread that i could join.

since there aren't, i'll just leave this here and hope someone notices. it's probably all obvious anyway.
posted by andrew cooke at 12:11 PM on November 30, 2004