'The Sun Online' is the online version of 'The Sun' Britain's best-selling tabloid newspaper. It is owned by newspaper mogul Rupert Murdoch.
This critical analysis aims to investigate how successful this online site is all sorts of areas such as usability and design.
The first thing I aim to find out is how good the website is for searchability.
The website proves very good on this; coming up as the number one search when typing 'Sun' into the Google search engine.
This is good for both the reader and 'The Sun Online' because it means that the reader can find the site easily- which will, in-turn, generate more hits for the site.
Looking at the site, it is a bit overwhelming. The user is hit by a barrage of information as you click on the homepage.
There are clear titles, but there are just a lot of them. For example, the titles of 'News', "Sport' and 'Showbiz' are displayed three times on the site, which can get confusing for the user.
There are also links that take you to 'The Scottish Sun' and other publications websites such as 'Fox', 'Sky News', 'Times Online' and 'New York Post' which could confuse the user if they are taken away from the site.
Good things about the navigation is that there is a clear 'home' link at the top of the page, which will always enable the user to get back to where they started.
There is also a 'site map' link right at the top of the page, that will let the user find exactly what they're looking for.
Another thing that would help users more with the site is a search bar of the site where users could search for a particular article or subject that they wanted to find.
The usability of the site seems good- all links are quick to load and lead the suer to the right page. However, this would obviously change with the individuals internet connection.
The design of the site is attractive. Red is the main colour which obviously catches the users attention. White is used against the red which obviously helps it to stand out easily.
However, as I said before, the site is quite cluttered- with lots of headlines, which can make it confusing for the user.
The content of the articles are appropriate for it's working-class readers because they are quite short and snappy with witty headlines. However, some of the showbiz stories are very short and don't contain much background information.
There is lots of video and audio included on the website. The video's are linked to the stories to give it more context and are generally of good quality.
The audio is linked in with the video footage and is quite extensive due to a 'Music' section on the website.
The interactivity of the site is very good. There is a 'My Sun' section of the website which allows you to select what news you want to receive from the website by signing up your e-mail address.
There are also forums and numerous ways you can add comments to stories.
Overall, the site is a very successful one. It has a good design and is appropriate to its audience's tastes. The interactivity level for the users is great and the content is catchy.
The only criticism I have is that the homepage is a little cluttered, but at least it offers a lot of information.
