TUAW's new background for your computer

Oh here is the default desktop you see in the tour its large enough to resize and re-color...
http://jawnx108.deviantart.com/art/New-Default-Leopard-Desktop-63238927

Can someone say Halloween? That's what I thought about when I saw the new background I didn't think about Leopard at all.

Here is a better one:
http://leonhart90.deviantart.com/art/Welcome-Stardust-67383767
and another
http://emoryu21.deviantart.com/art/BITUF-Explosion-of-Life-Resize-66997868

Hey - I too am not a fan of the background. Now avoid reading your site on my iPhone since it takes so dang long to load.

(Though Engadget takes a while to load now as well. And why did your previous background image load so fast compared to this one?)

Looks like you have just tweaked the image again. But actually this confuses me even more. Can't tell if I am looking out at space, or at dark rain clouds with the sun shining thru.

Keep on working on it... it's not quite there yet.

I've never been a fan of sites who put their design before the content. You know, like anything Phil Ryu gets involved with. But here are two observations about TUAW I've made over the last several months.

One:
TUAW has no real content beyond the iPhone. It's been so long since anything besides the iPhone was posted I can't even remember.
Note: Don't be a smart-arse and point out a post, because I know they exist, I'm illustrating a point here.

Two:
TUAW has one of the worst layouts on the Mac web. Could you fit more ads on the page? It's hard enough to find the content amongst all the ads, but then to drop a subtle (easy on the eyes) blue background for this barely visible anyway space thing is just silly. It makes the contrast too great.

I will also be joining those who stick with reading the news feeds... as long as the word "iPhone" doesn't appear in the headline - so that makes it like 2 articles per week.

By the way, why don't you just rename the entire site "AOL's news about the AOL sponsored Apple iPhone - sponsored by AOL - and published by AOL networks."

Not a fan. It's just too 90's for me...

I wouldn't say it was ugly, just incredibly pointless and a huge waste of bandwidth. For a site that writes so much about the iPhone it seems odd that you've never tried loading your own site on it.
We only get to see it because it makes the page loads so slow. As soon as the page loads the background image gets covered up..! How pointless is that..!
The background picture, along with 80% iPhone hacking stories, are reasons I look at this site about once a week now, not several time a day. Way to lose readership.

Your comments: Wow, a lot of haters here. The image itself is GOOD and it could be used effectively (and I am also a professional designer), but some people make valid points...

The black to white is obviously not a good thing. It's also a good idea to have a larger resolution of all your branding imagery, and this post would suggest that you do not. Also, people are right, the rest of this site needs some serious work. It's very cluttered, and reloading the page every time is very frustrating... especially when reading through comments. I hit "Next 20 Comments" and then press page down a few times to get where I want to be and start reading. Then, halfway through the first sentence, the page scrolls somewhere else, or sticks me at the top or something.

Anyway, the most important aspect of web design is not design at all, it's content, and aside from the whole Erica-writes-10,000-posts-a-day-and-no-one-else-writes-anything deal, TUAW gets an A+. Keep it up.

Oh, hey! Just noticed you changed the image. VERY NICE! I quite like it! Only thing is, I don't really see a point to the logo being on there...gets covered up by the content anyway. Doesn't really matter though. Good work.

I'd be willing to make a completely new design. Mac users like good looking simplicity, and honestly, this doesn't fit :

This isn't about not liking change; it's about how much my EYES HURT when I read the site now. I wouldn't think your advertisers would be too crazy about that, would they? If your background is actually discouraging people from spending more time looking over your page?

Don't try and make out that some people like it and some people don't the fact is MOST people don't make a poll I dare you