Cool Site Of The Day: NewsMap.jp

It’s not often I run across a site where I say to myself, "Yep. This is exactly how it should be designed and makes total sense. Awesome." This is one of those kind of sites:

This, ladies and gentlemen, is how a news web site should look. It is nothing short of a total win in design, form and function. Hotter stories have bigger text, lesser stories smaller, and all separated by colored blocks.

When you hover over a news article, you see this:

At the top right is a small box:

Yes, that is what you think it is – fullscreen mode. This makes for a very friendly and work-safe style of screen saver(-ish) display when away from your computer.

Where does NewsMap.jp get all its news from?

All the content is from Google, which you can see at the very bottom of the site. If you use Google News at all, this is essentially the same information – except it’s displayed a whole lot nicer.

On a final note, yes, dot-jp is a Japanese domain, and if you’re wondering if there’s a way you can help out per Japan’s recent natural disaster, ShelterBox is a good place to donate to as they have people directly in the thick of rescue and assistance operations right now.

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http://aaronfournier.50webs.com/ Aaron Fournier
I honestly prefer the more simple approach of Google News than newsmap. Seeing all those colors and blocks is a bit overwhelming.
jdeb
I agree, that seems more logical to me with the big fonts and color mapping. I think we are so used to seeing ads and pictures, when we see a site such as this, are first thought is yuk… but in reality it is logical.
http://www.lovingcharlotteblog.com Keith
Very cool, another idea I did not think of, and I read “TED” all the time and this is just like that!
http://www.lovingcharlotteblog.com Keith
Very cool, another idea I did not think of, and I read “TED” all the time and this is just like that!
David M
Good stuff….thanks Rich.
PK
This is great. I would only disagree that it’s a TOTAL win because some of the type is too small and hard to read, even in full screen. Other than that I agree it’s how news pages should be designed.
But any student of journalism will tell you that it is based on how newspapers are laid out–for those of us who use languages written from left to right. Studies have shown the eye naturally follows this progression, with some little variation; most important stories in larger print at top and to the left, with less important stories getting smaller fonts positioned to the right and toward the bottom. And the mouseovers are great, too, as studies have also shown that people often don’t read beyond the first paragraph since most of the important facts are there.
Google News is alright, I just don’t like scrolling way down to find to browse, say, sports. And for an old guy like me this is a damn site better that an RSS Reader. Thanks Rich.
DOS_equis
This looks like it was patterned off of the app called WinDirStat. I know WinDirStat is used for categorizing disk content but if you have ever used it and then looked at this news site they look alike, at least to me anyway. Thanks for posting this.
DOS_equis