The Huffington Post is a blog about all things newsy and popular. When you first access the site, you are greeted by headlines related to politics, entertainment and human interest. There’s also a bit of news and business related updates. The HuffPost prides itself as having a good balance between serious, traditional news and opinions and insignhts from its bloggers and contributors, both celebrity and otherwise. What’s noteable on this blog is the participation of celebrities, such as politicians like John Kerry, and actors like John Cusack and Alec Baldwin, among many others.
Visual Aesthetics – 7
The Huffington Post uses a custom Movable Type theme, and the layout is similar to that of a newspaper. There’s the masthead, there are headlines, and then there are three columns with either post summaries or titles only. The copy is easy to read, with large font sizes and high contrast (black on white). However, if you’re not familiar with the site yet, you might be overwhelmed by the amount of headlines and information on the frontpage. The site is moderately heavy on graphics, too particularly with advertisements.
User Friendliness – 8
The site might overwhelm a first-time visitor because of the amount of content at the frontpage. But if you consider that the publisher chooses which main headlines to feature as the site’s main content, then I can say it’s easy for users to access this. That aside, the blog features easily accessible navigation links on all pages, which are located just below the heading/masthead. Each headline title also serves as the static link to the article, and users will find it easy to access the full content of each post.
Reading Enjoyment – 8
If you’re a fan of heavily-opinionated columns about politics, or opinion and rumor about celebrities, or even columns from the politicians and celebrities themselves, then The Huffington Post is a good read. You won’t run out of insights about the stars or politicians, or controversies surrounding these personalities. Of course, there’s the serious news, too, but I would say that the celeb opinion is the meat of this blog. The site does syndicate some content from the AP and other news sources, though, so that’s a plus.
Useful Info – 9
The Huffington Post contains news tidbits that you wouldn’t find on the more mainstream news sites or blogs. The HuffPost‘s strong point here is the participation of celebrities themselves.
Overall Experience – 8
The Huffington Post is definitely a good read. But it doesn’t exactly address the needs of a single niche. In a way, that’s its weakness as a blog–it can tend to be too general. However, highlights are mostly about politics and entertainment, and people looking for commentary on those are sure to find what they’re looking for. Overall, The HuffPost is an above average blog and something I’ll keep in my bookmarks to visit from time to time (though not as frequently as my favorite blogs).
[tags]politics, entertainment, huffington, celebrities, writers, actors, politicians[/tags]
