On Victory day

On Victory day I decided to have a look at Russian web-sites about Second World War. Russians celebrate Victory (in Europe) not like other nations on 8th of May but on 9th of May. The final of the Second World War is very important for them because it was their last big victory.

When we are going to analyze design we have to know what this site was arranged for. I think the main goal is to show people how terrible the war was and how important this Victory is.


 The first site I want to tell you about is: http://www.9maya.ru

The header of the site is overdosed with heavy elements. There are five of them. The first impression is very far from showing the horrors of the war. Design has to be light. But here are plenty of fonts and gradients that make this header difficult for quick perception.  There are more elements under it. We can find absolutely unreadable login form, search and social network buttons. These buttons are too big. Another problem is navigation. It is very complicated and consists of 15 items.


 The next one is: http://9may.ru

The site is absolutely nonadaptive. The layout is made with tables. It takes narrow stripe in the left side and has huge blank area in the right. Design mistakes are here similar to previous site's ones. The header is overdosed and unreadable. Usability is very low. Users don’t want to read all of 14 menu items and look at deformed pictures. This site doesn’t even have favicon.


 The next one is: http://victory-day.ru

This site wins the first prize. The header is really disgusting. It is against the 4th rule: design has to make information readable. 24 menu items “help” users to find what they want. If you loose the way - many Russian soldier-clones on the background will help you. Why did they put plastic glass and white rose on the picture?

 All these sites are on the top of Google. They are very popular.  I think the content is more important for Russians then its form. Even if it is as complicated as 24 menu items.