When the university launched its rebranding last year, I was quite pleased: a glossy brochure explaining the kind of image the university wants to project to the public, a new logo, new momentum for change on superficial and deeper levels.
Now it’s all ruined. Take a look for yourself (click to enlarge):
Yes, this is the new University of Sydney website template. I kid you not. A generous person might call it “functional”. A less generous person might… well, let’s leave this blog G-rated. It’s grotesque. It has all the charm of a late 90s website. It carries none of the personality that the university aims to project, and all of the air of design-by-committee and oh-look-I-learnt-css-in-24-hours. There’s no warmth; the design alienates.
For bonus marks, it even displays in Arial on a Mac.
(For comparison, here’s a screenshot of the website as at 5 January.)
