I just stopped by OpenOffice.org to download their fine software. I hadn’t seen their site for awhile, and while the current design is pretty nice, they made one tragic error that I can’t help but point out. Here is the current design:

Everything you’d come to the site for, laid with convenient icons. However, for some reason, each of the main links in the body of the page is an entire sentence. If I’m looking for the download link, I just need to see “Download”. The sentences add nothing, but they do make it harder to scan the page, since they distract from the key terms. Further, each line already has an explanation beneath it, if you’re really not sure what the links do. I would have done it more like this:

Much better. If you came here to get help, visually scanning the page will reveal the “Help” link instantly, instead of a couple seconds later. In web design, seconds matter.