I remember Andy Budd blogged about this a while back - here’s his take on it - http://www.andybudd.com/archives/2003/08/using_css_to_replace_text_with_images/

We’ll take a look and see if we can adjust the css slightly. A shame about having to use a redundant SPAN in this workaround…

Thanks for letting me know. It’s always good to get some feedback on the work we do. If you could point out some of the more glaring points of bad design practice I’ll make sure that they are fixed.

At least you agree with me that the work that’s been done on the UCE site shows ’shoddy design practice’.

I don’t recall using an image map since about 1998 so it would be good to know where you’ve found that…

A quick browse across of some of your recent work throws up countless XHTML validation errors, image maps as navigation and general shoddy design practice.

The UCE site is an awful, hideous thing. And the most bizarre aspect of all of this is that their namechange (after ‘consultation’ where they basically say “we’re going with one of these three names, pick the least worst one please” and ignore any comments you might have about how the original one was absolutely fine and it’s a waste of money and time to change it AGAIN)… Well, they redo the web site, and then two months later they change the university’s name AGAIN?

Utter stupidity. They must have money to burn… I just hope it’s not my tuition fees.

For most large organisations, the biggest selling points of Web Standards is that they make content accessible, and forward-compatible, and this new site is neither of those things.

I have a feeling that once the novelty of the new bright vector images has worn off, the same maintenance nightmares that this site was redesigned to fix will gradually creep back in.

At first glance, since the BIAD department page now resembles the main UCE page so closely, I had to double-check the link was correct. When I first opened the page, I was presented with a site-wide randomized header image of people eating. What on earth has that got to do with BIAD?!) Gone is the Flash header* that gave sighted visitors a GREAT introduction to the lush work that BIAD students produce, and instead we’re presented with a dry list of courses. *There was no alternate text, long desc, or link to a description page for accessibility, but that could have been fixed in this redesign.

It’s relatively easy to retain the look and feel of a site, bring it into the same design space as the main site, and make it Standards-compliant while allowing it the freedom to be different. I think it’s a shame that UCE will be kicking themselves in a year’s time when they discover the site needs to be overhauled (again) rather than gently upgraded…

I’m not sure how many students this sort of thing would actually put off tho’ - they’d either be the sort that would have done some actually research on the content of the course, or would they be the ones you wanted anyway?

To george - it’s not about reading vs. looking good. A site done will can look good, navigate well and be readable. The UCE site barely manages to get the reading part right.

The upshot of this (in my opinion) is that the more discerning students will gravitate to universities who present themselves well, sell themselves well and generate a level of excitement. The UCE site does non of this and as a result Birmingham will probably get an influx of 3rd rate students who care about as much about their education as the UCE does about it’s site.

As an employer within this city I want talent coming to study here. This is fundamental to improving Birmingham.

It looks like Marketing people like “presence” and to “speak”, but there’s useit.com, there’s colourlovers.com, there’s smashingmagazine.com, and probably a hundred other sites on looking good and expressing yourself online. How about some “read”ing?

Thumbs up to the developers! I think they’ve reflected on the design elegantly.