Google users are griping over what appears to be a new sparse layout for Google search results being tested by the search giant. Google says it is doing what’s sometimes called a “bucket test” – experimenting with changes by only making them visible to some users. Google’s search pages that are a part of this test show a lot more white space, and inevitably, fewer search results per page.
Image Courtesy TwitPic user @BenjamMartin (http://twitpic.com/4v2lm4)In addition to more spacing between each result and line of text, the familiar blue links are no longer underlined, and each item is now separated by a dotted line in the new design. The color scheme also seems a bit softer and greener, overall.
Testing from my location in the Mountain time zone early Sunday didn’t reveal any changes in the results, but a number of Twitter users have posted screen shots from around the world.
The redesign has provoked the (occasionally profanity-laced) ire of many users on Twitter and elsewhere on the Web, with a critic at TechCrunch declaring it “ugly.”
I suspect the aim of the new design may be about more than just aesthetics, and may have to do with integration of new features – like folding in Voice Search, which Google recently began testing – or perhaps new ads. Either way, it’s likely to take some getting used to, but not very likely to drive users to Bing or elsewhere.
