Portals Never Went Away

Internet Portals never went away like they were supposed to. A year or two ago I heard that their days were numbered, basically because they try to be all things to all people. They like to have a gif "button" for every link, and usually end up using a 2 point illegible font to cram in all the info they want you to see "above the fold", meaning the point where you�d have to scroll down to see more of the page. All those silly graphics for each button and tab slice weigh portals down so much that they�re slow loading even from the fastest servers over broadband. And they�re usually quite visually confusing too, using a tiny font to pack as much info as possible into the upper part of your browser that they suppose you can see without having to scroll down. In a previous post I much maligned CNN.com on these grounds.

But I took a closer look at CNN.com after I posted that. It�s not as bad as I thought. I looked at a few other portals too. It seems instead of abandoning the approach altogether like they were supposed to, the purveyors of portals instead half learned their lesson and modified their approach. It seems these days they�ve rightly abandoned the folly of using a gif button for every link. They still like to use lots of "notebook tabs" and consequently all the little tab slice images that are the way this is implemented, but instead of gif "buttons" for every link, most of the links are plain, simple html. I applaud abandoning all these useless graphics, because it makes portals load in your browser so much faster than they used to.

However, I can still criticize portals for being visually confusing. If it�s not a news site like CNN, where I want to read all that little writin� to find out what�s going on in the world, I flat ignore all that crap and try to find a search box on the page, usually the ctrl-f way. Especially if I�ve come to the site looking for a specific piece of information and when I get there I find it's one of those damn confusing portals!

It�s ironic I guess. People like the portal idea I suppose, because they have sooo much they want to tell you and so much they want you to see. So they use a tiny font so they can pack as much into the page as possible without making the browser�s scroll bars come on. The irony is that the resulting information overload so turns me off that I look at exactly none of it. If I can�t find a search engine on the site quickly, I just as quickly become frustrated and lose patience with the site. Then it�s back to Google to see if I can find what I�m looking for in a clearer, more straightforward way somewhere else.

I hate portals. Call me opinionated if you must.





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