Front Page News
Yahoo unveiled a redesigned Yahoo.com front page on Tuesday, billing it as the Web portal’s most significant redesign ever. Taking a cue from Google’s iGoogle, the new page is gives users a way to personalize Yahoo.com so they can check in with other sites, such as Facebook or Gmail using a brand-new “My Favorites” section. Yahoo has built Web widgets that link to more than 65 other sites. These can all be added with a simple point and click, but users can add their own Web sites too and edit the layout of the front page.
The redesigned front page is leaner and more contemporary looking, featuring less advertising than its predecessor. For example, Yahoo has scrapped its “Marketplace” section, which featured links to advertising. Users in the U.S. should start seeing links to the new homepage when they visit Yahoo.com, starting Tuesday (If you’re not offered the page, you can check it out by visiting this page) and it will roll-out in the U.K., France, and India over the next week.
A new version of Yahoo.com for mobile users is set to launch next week. Spain and Mexico are slated to get updated sometime next month. The new design has already been beta tested by tens of thousands of users, and the new design should be available worldwide by early next year, said Tapan Bhat, Yahoo’s senior vice president of integrated consumer experiences. “What we are doing over here is making users at the heart and the core of Yahoo.”
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Wads of Widgets
Yahoo has created more than 65 widgets for its “Apps Gallery.” These widgets give users a quick way to add sites like Gmail, AOL, Facebook, or USA Today to the front of their Yahoo page.
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What You See Is What You’ll Get
By hovering your cursor over the Yahoo’s new “App” widgets you can get a preview of your page.
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Add Your Own Web Page
Even though Yahoo has created just 65 Apps of its own, it’s easy to add your own Web page. You just enter the URL and whatever name you want to use.
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App Dev Platform Opening Soon
The preview you get with Apps that you add yourself is not as good as it is with the Apps that Yahoo has already built. Yahoo says it plans to open up the App development platform, though, so that site owners can build their own full-featured Apps.
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Drag, Drop, Personalize
You can drag and drop App widgets to reorder your “My Favorites” column on the front page.
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Status Symbol
Yahoo’s new page also lets you share your status updates with friends. This feature integrates with other social networks such as Facebook and MySpace, Yahoo says.
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Cleaner, Leaner, Less Cluttered
Here’s a shot of Yahoo’s old front page. Overall the new page has a less cluttered feel with fewer ads (the Marketplace section has been scrapped altogether).
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