Tag Archives: cosmetic changes

Twitter gets a new look, again

On Thursday Twitter announced that it’s rolling out another new look for its homepage. This time around, the desktop and mobile experiences are getting simpler and streamlined. (New) New Twitter is organized into four sections: Home, Connect, Discover, and Me. Let’s take a brief tour…

Home is home to your personal collection of tweets. The desktop version is organized into two columns. To the left there’s your personal info including your name, profile picture, your number of tweets, who you’re following, and your followers; there’s also a link to your profile page and a way to quickly compose and send out a tweet. Underneath that you’ll find follower suggestions and the trending topics list. To the right there’s the familiar list of incoming tweets from the people you follow. The new interface allows tweets that are attached with images and videos to expand so you can easily explore embedded media. Replying, retweeting, and favoriting tweets are all just one hover and click away.

Connect acts as a hub very much like the Activity Feed of the old Twitter. It’s the place where you’ll see who has followed or mentioned you, retweeted or favorited one of your tweets. Tweets are organized by Interactions and Mentions. A search bar sits at the top and you can use it to find and discover people by entering their @username or full name.

Discover highlights trending topics and stories that are being talked about on the social network. This section is organized like this: Stories, Activity, Who to follow, Find friends, and Browse categories. Stories that are shown to you are based on recent popularity as well as your connections, location and language. Activity shows everything your connections do related to the accounts that they follow. See who else your connections follow, their lists and what Tweets they favorite, retweet or reply to most. In Discover the search bar at the top allows you to enter a hashtag or keyword to further explore a topic of your choice.

Me servers as your profile page and it can be fully customized from here. A gallery of your recently tweeted photos and videos are stored here, as are your Direct Messages.

The new Twitter design is the network’s most simplistic to date, and best of all it transfers over to the mobile space too. Whether you’re accessing Twitter from a desktop or your cell phone the experience will be nearly identical. How do you enable the new look? Easy! Download and login to the latest versions of Twitter on your iPhone or Android device and then you should be able to access the new desktop version. Twitter says they’re working on rolling it out to all users “over the next few weeks.”

[Via Twitter 1, 2]

Google news: New Google bar, YouTube gets a new look, and the evolution of search

The folks at Mountain View are constantly working hard to bring new experiences to the Internet, as well as updating the ones we use most. You know that horizontal (recently painted black) navigation bar that rests at the top of every Google webpage, including the search homepage? Well, it’s going away to save screen real estate and unify all that Google has to offer. The new Google bar isn’t a bar at all, really. It’s comprised of three sections: Google menu, Search, and Google+ tools. All three of these sections will be found in the spot location across all of Google’s products. The Google menu is accessed by hovering your mouse over the Google logo in the left hand corner, saving you a click to reach Google’s other products like Images, Maps, and Gmail. Search sits in the top middle, and easy access to Google+ tools is on the right. Navigating Google, searching, and sharing links with friends is now a more streamlined and cleaner experience. The new Google bar is rolling out soon.

After months of testing a new layout dubbed “Cosmic Panda” Google has finally rolled out an updated look for YouTube. First off, the homepage is totally redesigned and built to be customized to your liking. To the left you’ll find a YouTube Channel line-up. If you’re signed in with a Google account the setup is like this: a list of your Subscriptions, including Google+ and Facebook social integration; From YouTube categories, including trending and popular videos; and Suggested channels for you. To add a channel to your list simply click the Add channels buttons up top to be directed to a listing of all video categories; subscribing to channels from there is a one-click process. Back on the homepage, when you click a channel from your line-up content will appear in the center of the page. Instead of navigating you to an entirely new URL, the new YouTube homepage keeps you in one place while you’re browsing content. Play a video and then you’ll be brought to the uploader’s channel so you can watch the video and comment on it. Speaking of channels, Google has updated those spaces as well with new templates and a sharper layout. And with inspiration from Cosmic Panda, Google has opted to stick with the trial’s consistent gray background, bigger video thumbnails, and a more streamlined watch page. The new YouTube is available to play with today; sign in with a Google account to customize.

Last, Google has produced an interesting video that tells the “short history of the evolution of search, highlighting some of the most important milestones from the past decade—and a taste of what’s coming next.” Watch it after the break. There you’ll also find videos highlighting the new Google bar and YouTube’s cosmetic transformation.

[Via Google 1, 2, 3] Continue reading Google news: New Google bar, YouTube gets a new look, and the evolution of search