New look for Answers.com.

Yesterday the folks at Answers.com unveiled a new look and feel for the reference site. It seems to be a sort of meshing of the reference world that is Answers.com with the community Q&A aspect that is WikiAnswers. Well, they are ‘sister sites’ after all.

There are now three tabs to browse on the homepage, along with some featured questions and… yours truly, no.stupid.answers, featured right below. The homepage keeps the fun trivia spotlight of the old design in the first tab while highlighting the Question of the Day in the second tab. The third tab is all about community, where this blog’s Contributor Corner and What’s New columns are highlighted.

Answers.com homepage

And that’s just the homepage… The topic pages have a new look and feel, too. Type in a topic, like say, blog, and you’ll see a fresh-looking page with a left-side navigation to quickly select which type of reference source you want to view.

So, it’s time for your comments. You know that feeling when you’ve gotten a makeover and some of your friends are gushing and squealing in utter delight and some of your friends are kinda like, “Oh wow… so in how long will those bangs grow out?”

Go on and leave a comment – how do you feel about the new layout? The new homepage hightlights? The new navigation for topic pages? The new Britney Spears album?

45 thoughts on “New look for Answers.com.”

  1. I encouraged all my friends to download answers.com because it has always been so handy and simple to use for reference. Now, you go and change it and my friends will hate me now.

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  3. I was shocked when I opened up my (old) favorite website, Answers.com at work the other day. This is not the easy to use, friendly, professional site that I advised all my coworkers to use as a reference when working. This is ugly, it’s too big, and it just doesn’t seem as pro. Plus I miss the Today in History/Today’s Birthday

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  5. Pingback: Homepage feedbackers have been heard! | no.stupid.answers

  7. I do not like the change at all. The answer is better integration not combination. The two sites are two very different concepts and should not be comingled in this way. Please stop this experiment I am begging you.

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  8. By the way, don’t listen to the jack antlers who tell you, “people that dislike the change are more likely to report their feelings than people who view it favorably.”

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  9. I miss the old layout. What happened to the word of the day and this day in history posts. They were very helpful distractions. I feel like my favorite restaurant not only traded in their linen tablecloths for paper, but exchaged the silverware for plastic.

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  10. The change isnt nice at all, it no longer looks professional, its font is huge as if referring to the blind – THE BLIND COULD’NT SEE ANYWAYS – I wish it would go back to its older version, it was much better, i dont want to stick up to google.com or yahoo.com or merriam-webster.com or wikipedia.com

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  13. I too agree with David and heavyMGS and everyone else who’s said it: the new layout is so huge that it screws up the first few lines of the entries, and I can’t even see some of the links at the top because of it. Why so huge??

    I felt pretty confident in the simple look for simple lookups. It worked for Google! I’ll probably favour wikipedia as a result. Shame, as I loved the concept of alt-clicking on a word/term in a document, but the new website doesn’t seem to be doing these selling points any favours.

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  15. HATE IT! Ever heard of the saying if it’s not broke, don’t fix it! Well like the way of the dinosaurs and the fur industry…..Good bye!!!!! Thanks Valarie!

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  16. Ditto with David – “Sorry, but I’m not feeling the new look”…….and heavyMGS – “The new site is huge, bulky and uncomfortable and it is hard to tell where you are”.

    When you change it back….then I’ll be back. But, like heavyMGS said, “I doubt you will change back to the old look as most websites who change it up don’t listen to complaints”…..

    too bad…..I’ll miss you.

    In the meantime, I’ll be following Valerie’s advice….Thanks Valerie!!!

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  17. Hey, all you guys can go to iGoogle and can create a page and put all the same things on it that the original Answers had on it. Word of the Day, Today in History, Today’s Birthday, Dictionary, yes and even Wikipedia. I made up my own page on there & it is very easy to use.

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  21. I like the old looking, and I think a wedsite for public to review and learn should have the “sending e-mail to friend” function. Thanks!

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  23. I like the new look, but I think you guys should keep the “today in history” and “famous birthdays” on the homepage. I always like going to Answers.com just to see these things. Thanks!

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  24. Today in History and Today’s Birthdays were excellent features, they should be brought back.

    The new site is huge, bulky and uncomfortable and it is hard to tell where you are at exactly.

    The look and feel on the old Answers.com was much better. The new look, with the greens and blues, along with the huge looking layout are really hard on the eyes.

    The old Answers was easy on the eyes and easy to navigate. The new Answers is just not as clean and streamlined.

    I doubt you will change back to the old look as most websites who change it up don’t listen to complaints and just wait it out for people to get used to the new look, but I think you should seriously reconsider going back to the old format or at least giving people the option to go back to the old look and style.

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  25. Sorry, but I’m not feeling the new look. I use you guys over Google, Yahoo!, Dictionary.com, Wikipedia (yes, I know you pull from Wikipedia) and the rest because you combine hard facts with user contributed content. The new format makes this more of a community blog than a reference site. I don’t see why you couldn’t have left the “ask” portion on its own. Oh well, guess it’s off to Wikipedia. Bring back the old format before you lose all of your loyal research nuts.

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  26. Why in the world did you ever decide to delete the drop down menu that allowed you to click on “Images?”
    This feature was the quickest way to look for and get very specific information (not to mention the pictures/photos were invaluable).
    Bring it back please!

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  27. The old one looked better, felt better, maneouvered better. Bring it back. Besides…there was nothing wrong with it in the first place, so why the change? As for Britney, I am not sure she qualifies for having one state an opinion about her.

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  28. I like the idea of merging the two sites. But it’s a bit confusing the way it switches between WikiAnswers and Answers, and they both look the same.

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  29. I prefer the old answers page. I looked forward to the birthdays and day in history. There’s no real personality to the current page just plain vanilla boring!

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  30. I used the Classic answers screen, it was more low key than the newer front pages and much better for use at work.

    Please bring back the simple page.

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  31. I think I’m going to redo my Google page to reflect the old Answers home page and use that for reference. It’s better than this is now.

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  32. is there a way for one to choose to have the old page back? this page is so big it hurts my eyes. I like the history, etc. At least give one the option of keeping the new or going back to the old.

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  33. I liked the old Answers.com better too, wish the new one still had the drop down menu to do web/image seaches. It helped when you wanted to learn more than was on the page.

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  34. Yes, I agree with Kelli. Why do people “fix” things that aren’t broken. There’s nothing wrong with the old format, in fact, I hate this new look.
    Bring the old one BACK!!!

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  36. I agree with Liam.

    The first thing I do in the morning is sit down to answers.com with my breakfast. I love “today in history” and the “word of the day”. Liam is right….you start “exploring”.

    Now, I need to find something else to start my day.

    Why do people “fix” things that aren’t broken?

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  37. Can you bring back “today in history” and “today’s birthdays” please?

    The whole point of answers.com, surely, is to encourage looking for information. The “today in history” allowed users to click on a highlighted element and begin “exploring”.

    Without it, there is no impetus to go searching for answers! Please bring these two features back.

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  38. Agree with Mark. “Today in History” and “Today’s Birthday’s” were the best part about the old format.

    Also, would be cool to see the polished look come back to the Ask/Answer bar.

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  41. This looks pretty cool. What I would love is a tab like that on each definition page. This way every time you search for a term you can also see all the related questions and their wiki-answers. …and I think I agree, the design is lacking abit, but the content is great.

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  42. The RSS for the blog is awesome, but I’ll be honest, the new look is a little plain. It does look much more like wikianswers though, so I see where you’re going with this!

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  43. One more thing… I think the WikiAnswers category list is kind of boring. How about jazzing it up with some photos, images, anything??

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  44. I love getting a glimpse into the community straight from the Answers.com homepage. Answers.com reference and WikiAnswers community are two sides of the same coin and that multifaceted approach to knowledge is really neat.

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Your comments are welcome!