I have to say I'm somewhat disappointed by what I see compared to Aarons proposed look¹.
a) Regarding the space below the two horizontal menus: A continuous image looks much better than these "cells" with a lot of useless and redundant links above them. If you think the space is wasted - well then drop it at all or make the image a small bar so there's more place for imformation. b) Adverts: Title them as what they are and draw a line between contents and adverts. The way it is now is very unfriendly to the reader. c) The cow pictogram and the text beside it is completely superfluous. d) I really don't think viewing the cvs is so important for first time users, that it needs to be linked that prominent. e) I like the thre vertical menus with the pictres above them. But from a usability point of view it's really questionable to expect a first time user finds them instantly when there's so much information on the front page that he has to scroll down. Either limit the information and make an extra news page (including searchable archive, that's missing atm.) or drop these menus at all. f) Handbook and other links: Usually you want to read the page and not metadata about it. The summary/date/author part takes too much place and the title is redundant. Make that a box next to the title or what else, but don't let the first action a user has to do instead to read to press scroll down. Carsten [1] http://www.gentoo.org/images/wwwcontest/contest1_front.png
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