Dear Google,
I used to be one of your biggest fans. When Google first appeared I quickly caught on that it was better than AltaVista and Lycos and DogPile. My website even touted Google as "possibly the best search engine in the world." Heady days.
Then Gmail came along and I signed up straight away, lured by the carrot of "never delete anything ever again". Of course, that turned out to be a rash promise and I'm using up space quicker than it's growing but hey! Who'd have guessed it would take off so well?
But now. Now. Now the unspeakable has happened. You've changed me over to the new look Gmail against my will and there's nothing I can do. And it's missing a scroll arrow!
I know it's the fashion to get rid of the bottom arrow on the vertical scroll bar but I use it all the time. And now it's gone. RIP scrollbar arrow; you will be greatly missed.
Whatever happened to "don't be a jerk"?
18 COMMENTS:
I am similarly restive about Hotmail. They keep offering me frills I don't want, yet don't allow me to change the font to my preference. There used to be a workaround for this, but now it is gone and I am stuck with Verdana.
A plague on all businesses that think They Know Better Than The Customer.
Lexi, I totally agree! I do wonder who they test these things out on; and whether they ever listen to feedback.
I stick to my aol account! So far it's been very good but OH! You have to ignore their penchant for salacious headlines before you get to your email! AOL website is totally obsessed with ogling women - they remind me of a dirtly old man in a mac with serious psychological problems - but their email is very generous and like I said so far (touch wood) they've not messed with it!
Google (like all the other sites providing free stuff e.g. facebook etc) KNOW users have absolutely no clout or say cos what they offer is free so they do whatever they want! :-(
Take care
x
Kitty, after reading your comments about AOL I almost like Gmail again! At least it's pretty and it doesn't flash young women at me!
The trouble with all these "free" sites is that they make a shedload of money from advertising to us, so they're not as generous as they seem. And they just don't listen to us!
I love (and I mean that in the full sarcastic sense) how every time an email host or other site or program changes its formatting it's to make it "more user friendly"... that only applies to new users, for anyone who's used to the program you have now made it un-user friendly because we knew were to go, and now we don't.
My husband has done a lot of game and program testing and he said the target for "user friendly" format changes are the middle aged and up age group, but having worked tech support he can tell you that's the age group that has the hardest time navigating format changes.
If it ain't broke, don't fix it. But everyone wants stuff to look good on their iPhones now - so the rest of us who still use 'proper' screens have to put up with it.
Ya boo hiss.
Hmm, I'm confused. I have a scroll arrow still. Where is it that you had a scroll arrow that is now missing?
I still have my scroll arrow too.
Sx
FH, I use Adblock and never see advertising. I wonder if it would remove Kitty's unwanted females?
Katharyn, the impression I get is that they focus more on looks than on usability. My missing scroll arrows could be made to appear when I mouseover, thus preserving the clean new look but also keeping functionality. But they don't!
MAJ, I wonder if it is the iPhone problem. That would explain a lot!
Jessi and Scarlet, on the right hand side scroll bar I now have a slider but not the little arrows top and bottom. Maybe it's a browser issue; I'm using Chrome.
FH, I use Adblock too. I hope Kitty's reading this in case it could solve her problem!
Yep, and you know they've killed Friend Connect (i.e. "Followers") on non-blogger blogs? I've read dark rumours they might get rid of it completely some time soon ...
Simon, I didn't know that. I've not been using it much lately because it got so you couldn't unfollow any blogs. It made it pretty unmanageable. It's a shame to get rid of it completely.
Ohhhhh!!!
I thought you meant the whole slider or scroll bar was gone. You're right...the arrows are gone. I wouldn't have noticed because I always use my mouse wheel...or if I'm clicking, I always click the bar to drag it anyway.
As a side note, if it's because you like moving it tiny amounts at a time, you might want to use your arrow keys to move up and down the page then.
Jessi, mwah! Thank you, thank you! Arrow keys it is from now on! I'm so glad you wrote that.
Oh goodie! I know it can be weird moving from the mouse to the keyboard sometimes for stuff like that, so some people hate it, but if it works for you, awesome!!
Jessi, I wouldn't do it if I was using a mouse, but instead of fiddling awkwardly with the touchpad it's much better.
Oh! And now it makes way more sense why you'd be missing the arrow buttons on the scroll bar, too. Duh!
Well I'm glad that helped then. <3 :)
Jessi, I'm glad you did too!
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