Updated by @LarkAnderson to raise the visibility of this response:
Thanks for all the feedback, this has been super helpful!
As some of you have pointed out, these changes have been in the works for some time now--this has actually been how the newsreading experience has worked for signed out users since E3. After making a few tweaks, most notably the addition of comment upvoting (which will be fixed today, by the way!), we made the decision to release this to everyone.
As for why we've made these changes, what we're trying to do here is make it easier for our users to read articles by letting them transition seamlessly from one into the next. With this layout, we also wanted to reduce some of the clutter in and around the articles by removing the right column and the "skin" ads that box in the content, and adding in more whitespace. This type of newsreading experience is increasingly commonplace, and variations of it can be seen right now on sites such as ESPN, Time, and the AV Club.
That said, we hear you loud and clear, and we'll be making further adjustments based on your feedback in the immediate future:
The sticky footer bar that shows what other content is coming up next will be removedDONE on 12/3The button to expand comments will be moved above the Yahoo unit, just below the large Upvote button to place more emphasis on them and reduce the chance to scroll past and miss themDONE on 12/3The comments link at the top of the article will be changed so it expands the comments and moves you to themDone on 12/17Reply notifications will be fixed so they link correctly to commentsDone on 12/17We will fix a bug that should remove the CSRF-related error reported by @mesome713Done on 12/11
Thanks again for the feedback!
I didn't like this layout in the past and I don't like it now. When I see articles I want to read I open them in different tabs from the main page, I don't need an annoying bar on the bottom of my screen following me around and taking up space. And it has managed to become less intuitive than the old layout, because if I want to see the comments I have to click a button, whereas before I could just see them by scrolling down. I can see what you're trying to do, but I don't need random articles attached to the ones I care about.
And if you're going to insist on this suggestion bar of articles, might I suggest placing it in the margins to the left or right of the article at least?
Just my two cents.
Stickied and had headline changed by Admin
~DD
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