The Internet reacts: YouTube's big thumbnail layout looks horrible

[Cal Jeffrey]

WTF?! According to buzz on Reddit and Twitter, YouTube began testing a new homepage design Tuesday morning. The consensus — it is giving everybody eye cancer.

It has been some time since we have seen such severe backlash against Google. The last big uproar in recent memory (not including the Project Dragonfly debacle) was when everyone was up-in-arms about Google's Duplex being too human-sounding. This time it is over a design change YouTube seems to be testing.

The outrage began shortly after YouTube developers implemented changes to some users' homepages at around 2 am this morning. The new layout is entirely different than before.

Gone are the categorial groupings like "Recommended" and "Recently Uploaded." Most noticeable though are the thumbnails — they are huge! Not only do they look terrible on the page, but also fewer fit on the screen requiring more scrolling.

It is not at all popular with those who were unlucky enough to be selected as test subjects. The response on Twitter was very — shall we say — vocal.

umm @YouTube what the hell did y’all do to the homepage? why would you make it so the recommendations aren’t in categories anymore & HUGE thumbnails this is so disorienting & unorganized

— bel (@anabelrios__) August 13, 2019

So if anyone wants a way around this dogshit update (Thanks you dickheads @YouTube ):https://t.co/nNQyd653rH

you lose dark mode, but its worth it. At least I feel like my monitor is about 3 feet away again

— Rishi (@Rishi_K_S) August 13, 2019

Reddit was equally disturbed with most Redditors calling it an unwanted forced update.

"Looks to be a forced update," said sethoffuture. "Makes sense since [YouTube has] been wanting to do away with the tabs showing your subscriptions on the home page. Now it's alllll algorithmicly [sic] recommended garbage with no way of knowing why any of it is being shown."

With such harsh blowback from the community, the layout will probably not be finalized, leaving us to wonder what inspired the change in the first place. Some think that the update was geared toward the trend of websites making themselves more mobile-friendly, but that's not a good enough excuse for most users.

"[I'm] getting tired of companies putting mobile designed layouts on PC websites, just because one thing worked on mobile doesn't mean it'll on PC," said Redditor billybobiswatching. "Big thumbnails are fine on mobile because of the smaller screen but on PC it's unnecessarily large for the average viewer."

The Redditor makes a good point. Whatever the case, I'm sure that the designers responsible for the change have gotten the message loud and clear.

Permalink to story.

https://www.techspot.com/news/81425-internet-reacts-youtube-big-thumbnail-layout-looks-horrible.html

 

[QuantumPhysics]

I’d be happy if they made it easier for me to see my analytics.

#1 the app should have a 3D Touch display for my revenue accumulated for the month up till that point.

#2. The MY CHANNEL button should always have ANALYTICS and VIDEO MANAGER next to it.

I do appreciate how they give you notifications when older videos that you’re not paying attention to hit certain milestones like 50,000 views or 100,000 views.

 

[psycros]

"[I'm] getting tired of companies putting mobile designed layouts on PC websites, just because one thing worked on mobile doesn't mean it'll on PC," said Redditor billybobiswatching. "Big thumbnails are fine on mobile because of the smaller screen but on PC it's unnecessarily large for the average viewer."

Wouldn't it be nice if this was the start of major pushback against the anti-user design we've had shoved in our faces for the last seven years? Google's user-hating, non-intuitive, ugly-as-s**t UIs are pure cancer and need to be purged - purged as in a lord inquisitor pounding the "exterminatus" button until his fist is bleeding. Even Microsoft has slavishly copied Android while adding their own extra-horrible twists. If everyone was going to copy a mobile UI then why not iOS which is at least usable and easy on the eyes?

 

[tomkaten]

Most YT redesigns managed to make stuff look worse, but this one's beyond ridiculous. Hope Google fires the ***** who thought this was a good idea.

 

[EClyde]

Only Gomer could stretch the word “Golly” to five syllables. But I did my best

 

[Godel]

"[I'm] getting tired of companies putting mobile designed layouts on PC websites, just because one thing worked on mobile doesn't mean it'll on PC," said Redditor billybobiswatching. "Big thumbnails are fine on mobile because of the smaller screen but on PC it's unnecessarily large for the average viewer."

Wouldn't it be nice if this was the start of major pushback against the anti-user design we've had shoved in our faces for the last seven years?

Yeah, like the phone companies took notice of consumer responses to the removal of 3.5mm audio jacks from cell phones. :-(

 

[PEnnn]

Those lame web designers at major tech companies need to show they're doing something between trips to the free ice cream buffet and the on-site gym / nap room.....

 

[Uncle Al]

What I really don't understand is why they don't put together a dozen or so layouts that the end user can customize to their own needs ..... certainly not that much effort to create and the end users will be a lot happier!

 

[Gypsygib]

Must be some new hire or someone got promoted into a new role. Whenever a person high up gets a new job they have to change the previous model so they look innovative and useful. Doesn't matter if the previous model was perfect fine or not. They need something to add to the resume.

 

[DelJo63]

"Big thumbnails are fine on mobile because of the smaller screen but on PC it's unnecessarily large for the average viewer."

NOPE -- that's contrary to mobile design too! Need larger TEXT to allow touch events, but graphics should have been adjusted to smaller, not even same size -- they're just too lazy. Many sites send the same graphic and alter the width-height and eat the mobile user's data plan -- sigh.

 

[Cal Jeffrey]

"Wouldn't it be nice if this was the start of major pushback against the anti-user design we've had shoved in our faces for the last seven years? Google's user-hating, non-intuitive, ugly-as-s**t UIs are pure cancer and need to be purged - purged as in a lord inquisitor pounding the "exterminatus" button until his fist is bleeding. Even Microsoft has slavishly copied Android while adding their own extra-horrible twists. If everyone was going to copy a mobile UI then why not iOS which is at least usable and easy on the eyes?

ROFL Warhammer much @psycros?

 

[Trillionsin]

It changed for me one day, and I couldnt help but to start looking around to see what I accidentally clicked on that "****ed up" my youtube homepage. XD

Would have been nice if they at least told us first... ****ers

 

[psycros]

ROFL Warhammer much @psycros?

War-hammer? What's that?

 

[Namtrooper]

Most YT redesigns managed to make stuff look worse, but this one's beyond ridiculous. Hope Google fires the ***** who thought this was a good idea.

Seems a bit harsh?