Comments on: Amazon.com Redesign

By: Brian Dillard

Brian Dillard — Fri, 12 Oct 2007 17:32:39 +0000

To get the beta test, just keep clearing your cookies and reloading the homepage. It’s appears to be based on session ID. In fact, even if you get the beta test and then log into your account, that’s no guarantee that you’ll continue to see the beta when you log into the same account from another machine or browser.

By: Alexei White

Alexei White — Fri, 12 Oct 2007 01:49:46 +0000

I heard they run hundreds of A/B tests every day testing layout elements and seeing how people respond.. from one moment to the next you may have a slightly different Amazon.

By: Will Peavy

Will Peavy — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 16:15:37 +0000

@Jason – I just viewed and it shows me the new design in FF2 (Win), but the old design in IE7…

By: Glen Lipka

Glen Lipka — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 16:12:54 +0000

I wrote a UX review of the changes a few days ago.
http://commadot.com/?p=631
I didn’t think it was much of an improvement.

@Jason: I think they are doing the rollout as a split A/B test. So clear your cache and refresh. You might get it.

By: Jason Batchelor

Jason Batchelor — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 15:28:29 +0000

Interestingly, I went there to check it out in Firefox 2.0.0.7 (MacBook Pro), and the new design didn’t show up. Some of the widgets (like the carousel) did, but the rest of the layout was the old tabbed layout of yore.

However, I loaded the site up in Safari 2.0.4, and the new design was in place over there.

Does this foreshadow a new trend, where Webkit and IE are being targeted first, or do their servers randomly send incoming users to one design or the other (perhaps the new design hasn’t propagated across all clusters?)?