The Worst Thing to Happen to College Newspapers Since Sex Columnists

by Nick Summers | September 21, 2006 at 1:42 pm

The Worst Thing to Happen to College Newspapers Since Sex ColumnistsLast week, we brought you Penn readers' "truly terrible," "horrific," "godawful" reviews of dailypennsylvanian.com's redesign. Some of you have been asking: How did the DP, a reliably damn good paper, screw up so bad?

By signing up with College Publisher, a near monopolist in the field of putting college newspapers online. The Crimson, YDN, Dart, Prince and Sun all have indie sites. And while their looks don't always go over so well themselves, everything College Publisher touches turns to blocky, ad-infested dreck.

Penn's daily isn't the only student paper to get hit by the ugly truck. Thanks to College Publisher, it's a pile-up. The Columbia Spectator signed on this summer, and -- oh crap, here we go again. Some sample comments at the Spec-sniping Bwog:

  • "horrible"
  • "go[d]forsaken shit"
  • "an embarrassment...it's not like you have to design a whole new one, just use the old templates. anything that was up before was far, far better. or will your new masters at collegepublisher not let you?"
  • "cheesy, childish 'collegepublisher' ticker up top"
  • "college publisher is what every school uses and frankly it sucks. not to mention the new site has like a billion adds. it looks like a yahoo homepage circa 1998"
  • "dumb dumb dumb"
  • "get rid of it and college publisher NOW while it's summer and no one notices"
  • "awful. ... Just stop this little project now before you get in over your little heads"
  • "At least the old look had some class"

Ouch! We know IvyGate isn't the belle of the ball, but can't they these guys take a cue from their hot cousins to the west? Them Stanford kids code some fine-ass HTML.

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3 Responses to “The Worst Thing to Happen to College Newspapers Since Sex Columnists”

  1. slinkybender Says:
    September 21st, 2006 at 2:07 pm

    What’s wrong with sex columnists?

    GO CORNELL!!!

  2. atlantic Says:
    September 21st, 2006 at 3:47 pm

    My personal favorite design — also happens to be the “liveliest college newspaper” whatever that means. http://www.nique.net/

  3. Evan Goldin Says:
    September 22nd, 2006 at 2:22 am

    Is that a joke? Not like CP’s sites are the greatest thing ever, btu Stanford’s site is absolutely hideous.