Worst Websites of 2011: The 20 Worst Every year I look for the silver bullet that will turn all the web pages that suck into web pages that don't suck. The best I can come up with are 200+ suggestions on two different checklists. Speaking of those checklists: Initially, I planned to go through my articles Web Design Checklist 1: 165 Mortal Sins and Web Design Checklist 2: 83 Potential Mortal Sins and mark down which mistakes each site made. The scope of the project was too great. This list contains six selections and they are marked as "Bonus: Does your website make any of the mistakes made by XYZ.com?" (Click for list.) Generally, these sites are not car wrecks on the Information Highway. If you want to see those sites, go to Worst Over-The-Top Websites of 2011.

1. Xerox Real Business Submitter's comments: Probably going to win all sorts of awards for inspirational, awesome, innovative, clever and other pointless words. As a useful, helpful and informative site, it is a bit of a disaster. A Flash disaster. I have no idea what all those people are doing in the building and what I'm supposed to do except listen to all those annoying sounds. I'll also bet they spent millions on the site. Vincent Flanders' comments: The site is not a “bit of disaster,” as the submitter suggests. It's the black hole of f**king death of disasters. You can use Xerox's site as a touchstone test. Ask your favorite designer what he thinks of the site. If he likes it, you know he has his head so far up his ass he can kiss his tonsils. If he hates it, the odds are good that s/he's a designer who understands that websites are about providing information and solving needs. Reasons the Xerox Real Business Website Sucks …I swear the bald guy on the Finance and Accounting Floor is the brother of the talking bald guy at Mr. Bottles. I like Mr. Bottles' talking guy better. The Xerox tool sounds like just another pompous assh*le. The Xerox site looks even worse on a portrait monitor. If you're “lucky,” you'll get a chance to fill out a survey about the website. Please do. My readers are smart and hate stupid websites. Other comments #1: Wow…just wow. A cheap…no, expensive rehash of that same OLD stupid navigation metaphor. Crap like this just makes me mad because it is obvious that the idiot(s) who approved this are only interested in burnishing the corporate image and/or their own egos and are not interested in providing information or solving visitors' needs. Other comments #2: The problem with sites like these is that, for every designer who understands that websites are about providing information and solving needs, there's a manager over them who just loves **** like this. Other comments #3: I diagnose an excess of cleverness—poorly executed cleverness, Their "office people" movie loop not only doesn't make sense, it's out of focus. Other comments #4: I never got to anything you guys saw. I did wait patiently for the first page to load (and start making noise) while wondering what the heck Mr. Clean was blogging about. Then, I clicked a link at random. ANOTHER timer started. Screw that, I have better things to do with my time, even when I'm goofing off. Xerox Real Business Xerox Real Business

2. The Serene Experience (Mildly NSWF. Tasteful photos of nude women.)



Submitter's comments: We've been asked to do a job for a masseuse, so we've been researching their competition and found what is possibly the worst site in the world—ever! It's full of every bad thing you can think of—cheesy music, butterflies, seagulls, swans flapping all over the site, sparkly stars, growing flowers, a mad blue background and it's absolutely smothered in crap images. Reasons The Serene Experience website sucks Vincent Flanders' comments: Well, at least you can read the text. It's a classic example of Mistake #6 from Biggest Mistakes in Web Design 1995-2015 — “Have you ever seen another website? Really? Doesn't look like it.“ I call this type of design the “I haven't taken my antipsychotics in a while school of web design.” Other comments #1: How cheesy can a nudist massage site get? The photos are the only tasteful thing about it. This site is not mildly NSFW; it is totally NSFU (Not Suitable for Use). Try again, folks. Other comments #2: It wanted plugins I don't have; then Firefox seized up. I had a lot of trouble killing the page. Thank God for Linux: at least this didn't bring the whole system crashing down! What were they thinking? I guess all the "woo" got in the way of rationality. Other comments #3: Oh sweet mother of god! This site is so damn bad, it's criminal. The Serene Experience (Mildly NSWF. Tasteful photos of nude women.) The Serene Experience (Mildly NSWF. Tasteful photos of nude women.)

6. Supervideo Submitter's comments: Subtitled "Where valuable information is dumped on you without charge 24/7." This site has a lot to dump on the visitor. Vincent Flanders' comments: Dump is the operative word. Don't click anything. I clicked "Click Here" and a PowerPoint presentation immediately downloaded itself. Of course, there's no warning. I'm not an HTML Validation stickler, but I think 186 errors is a little much <grin>. Supervideo

7. P&M Computers Submitter's comments: I'm on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean from you and I can hear you ranting about this website even at this distance. Vincent Flanders' comments: That's why I love my readers. They're smart, clever, funny and right about 99% of the time. Concerning P&M — WTF? The site is completely Flash-based, which is so 2001. Complete Flash websites are dead, dead, dead. FlashSplash pages are even more dead. WTF (Who The Heck) signed off on this monstrosity? What do the symbols mean? Why hasn't this site been laughed out of existence? Reasons P&M Computers' website sucks Other comments #1: My first question was, what the heck does "engage site" mean? Also, um, contrast. I'm sure light-gray text on a white background fails numerous usabililty and accessibility tests. Third, aside from the problems of an all-Flash site, looping animations in the header are VERY distracting, especially those where things literally flash on and off. Human brains are wired to notice motion first, so something that is always moving is going to distract people from the rest of the page. Also, is there some reason why the "initialize sequence logo" is part of the loop? Either someone thinks they're being funny by including it, or else the animation is reloading every time rather than loading once and repeating. Other comments #2: Honestly, the first thing I thought was: "Hmm…web design by people who don't know enough about web design, for people who don't know anything about web design." Other comments #3: What do they sell? Meh. I can't be bothered to find out. *click* P&M Computers P&M Computers

8. Staples tells me "That's Easy" when website is unavailable Vincent Flanders' comments: I went to Staples and searched for "stickers" and this is what I got.

9. Richards Brothers Seafood Submitter's comments: Behold… Vincent Flanders' comments: I'm speechless. The site sucks as much as my tennis skills (I've never played); however, I believe this site has the worst trailing cursor on the Internet. Richards Brothers Seafood

10. George R. R. Martin Submitter's comments: This is George R. R. Martin's official website. Sure this site looks like it comes from 1993, but call me crazy, I think it kind of works. I'd rather see something like this site than J. K. Rowling's mess of a website. Reasons the George R. R. Martin website sucks Vincent Flanders' comments: Two of the scariest words in the English language are "kind of." I wouldn't want to drive something that was "kind of" a car (well, I did own a Chevrolet Vega). Still you get my point. A website works or it doesn't work. This one doesn't. That's why it's here. Except for some Beat Generation writers, my reading tastes end with Euripides. I had no clue about George R. R. Martin's writings so I looked him up in Wikipedia. Turns out he's had a successful career, but you'd never know it by his website. It looks amateurish. The color choices are wrong for many reasons, but lack of contrast with the text is the major reason it's wrong. AccessColor says that almost 67% of the home page fails its tests. There doesn't seem to be any navigation on the subpages except to click his picture. The subpages are ugly, except for the blog page, which only has 20% of its text fail the contrast test. It's not ugly because it's on Livejournal and I suspect he used one of their predesigned templates. I don't understand what the animations are about. Perhaps they mean something to his audience. To me, it means he has bad taste. Maybe this site appeals to his audience. After all, he's getting around 8,170 visitors a day. Other comments #1: To call the site amateurish is generous. It looks like it was thrown together in a few hours, without much thought devoted to design. Other comments #2: Game of Thrones, anyone? HBO? He's the man of the moment. His books are awesome, btw. Site does suck though. George R. R. Martin George R. R. Martin

17. Imprint Technologies Submitter's comments: First, we have what is just overall weird design, where the Man from Mars couldn't figure out what the site is unless he already knew an awful lot about the site. Then we have Mystery Meat Navigation: a rectangle (not obviously a link) labeled Imprint Technologies is actually the contact link. Finally, all the content is presented in frames which, at least on my browser, fill up about 1/3 of the screen. Reasons the Imprint Technologies' website sucks Vincent Flanders' comments: On my portrait monitor, they don't fill up that much space and the contact link is two-thirds down the page. The submitter is right. This is a very weird design. Usually, when people use frames they try to show all the content and try not to make their visitors scroll. On this site, they hide (unnecessarily) as much content as they can. What the Heck? We've got the repeating background, the strange colors and lack of contrast. Wow. Bizarre. Other comments: Sounds to me more like this is an example of "the way things used to be" than a page that exemplifies latter-day suckery.



The continued zombie-like existence of this page is another reminder of something the incognoscenti often don't realize: when you decide to set up a website, it's an ongoing process you are committing to, not a one-off, do-it-now-and-forget-it job. Given that the web went mainstream over fifteen years ago, you'd think by now anyone in a position of authority would be tuned in to this fact, but you'd be wrong.



It's possible that Imprint Technologies' management isn't even aware they have a website, much less that it's woefully out of date and it sucks like mad. Imprint Technologies

18. Low Price Skates Submitter's comments: Here's an ugly website. Vincent Flanders' comments: Wow! Not so much for the site, but for distant memories. Once upon a time, I was a 6-foot tall 140-lb teenager. I went roller skating every Friday night from 7:00 p.m. to midnight; every Saturday from 1:00 p.m. to midnight and every Sunday from 1-6 p.m. That's probably why I weighed 140 lbs. It was very strange to see they still make the same style of boots that I wore back in 19XX. Speaking of strange, I know the site sucks, but I'm amazed at its consistency (yes, it consistently sucks). The navigation appears logical and consistent and, unlike 95% of the sites that animated GIFs, their use here makes sense. It's quite "colorful," but you can actually read the text. Hmm. Low Price Skates

19. Paratom Investigative Unit Submitter's comments: Spooky, psychic awfulness. Every site has its day, and I think Paratom.com has earned it. Vincent Flanders' comments: To say the home page photo is inappropriate is to insult the definition of inappropriate. Paratom Investigative Unit