Do you feel this is an upgrade from the previous homepage? Let us know.

Below is a brief description of the new design:

"Today we’re trying a redesigned front page for folks who are new to Twitter.com. If you’re a regular around these parts, then you won’t notice the new look unless you sign out of your account. Helping people access Twitter in more relevant and useful ways upon first introduction lowers the barrier to accessing the value Twitter has to offer and presents the service more consistently with how it has evolved."

The new homepage features some pretty interesting trend information, which includes: popular topics by minute, day and week. Sort of makes you wonder if they’ll add this info to the profile pages, doesn’t it?

Even though the new homepage sports a more modern design, @Biz is quick to admit there is "More Work Ahead".

"The open and timely exchange of information will have a positive impact on the world and Twitter has a role to play. We have a lot of work to do when it comes to the quality of our search results and trend analysis but repositioning the product to focus more on discovery is an important first step in presenting Twitter to a wider audience of folks around the world who are eager to start engaging with new people, ideas, opinions, events, and sources of information.

We’ll likely continue to make changes to the Twitter home page as we respond to feedback and ideas. We’re eager to see if encouraging a sense of wonder and discovery leads to a better first impression of Twitter."

What do you think of the new Twitter homepage? Let us know.

SpaceGravy.com has become known as the site to visit when it comes to decorating ones page. The word that is actually being used to describe page design is "Pimping". This is no relation to the other kind of "pimping" that some of you maybe familiar with.

"When a MySpace user says ‘I pimped my MySpace page,’ what they’re really saying is that they’ve decorated their page with cool layouts, backgrounds, graphics and pictures," said Jennifer Lange, president and CEO of SpaceGravy.com. Lange goes on to say that pimping is just another way for users to express themselves and communicate their uniqueness.

There are other sites that do similar things. Skize.com, Bigoo.ws and FreeWebLayouts.net. For now though SpaceGravy is enjoying their moment in the sun.

"In the last two months alone, from November to December, traffic to SpaceGravy grew 291%," said Lange, "and with our Google Analytics tool, we can see the regions from where our visitors are coming. We’ve had visitors from as far away as Australia, the UK, Saudi Arabia, Hawaii, Spain, Brazil and Argentina. We’ve even had visitors from Yigo, Guam. The worldwide popularity of MySpace is truly mind boggling."

Lange credits the success of SpaceGravy to market research and the user friendliness of the site. "SpaceGravy features an easy-to-use interface, tasteful designs spearheaded by one of the leading graphic artists in the business, zero pop-up ads, and most importantly, detailed instructions to help new MySpace users learn how to pimp their pages like experienced MySpace users do."

Add to Del.icio.us | Digg | Reddit | Furl

Mike is a staff writer for WebProNews. Visit WebProNews for the latest ebusiness news.

Color This is the first and most important. Color is everything. It’s why we buy HDTV sets to get better color. You want to consider your product first. Is there a color that fits the item? Are you selling beach items, chose a sand color. Are you selling electronics, chose a metallic color. Next make sure the color is eye-catching but possible to look at. If you can’t stare at the color for at least the minimum amount of time that you’d want your customer’s attention, then don’t use it.

Line And I don’t mean "a line" I mean the line of the elements in your project. Stand back and squint at your creation. Notice the line of the text and the images. Where are the lines moving? They should all direct your customer’s attention from the top of your page to the bottom in a seamless movement. If you notice an out of place line the directs your eyes back to the top of the page or stops it all together then you need to rearrange a few items.

Form Related to line. Squint again and notice the text as a block, or rectangular form, instead of individual lines. Notice the images or art as shapes. And notice the entire piece as a form. All of the forms should flow from one to another. Each form should direct your eye to the next form on the page from top to bottom, again in a seamless flowing line.

Movement I’ve already touched on this but this is very important. You want your customer to start at the top left corner and end in the bottom right corner. The traditional form of movement is a "Z" meaning the eye should start in the top left, go to the top right, make a diagonal to the bottom left, and end up in the bottom right. This form is ideal for advertizing and web pages with a lot of graphics or images. The exception would be a page with all text, where you would want the reader’s eye to move left to right on each line.

Space (Negative space) We all pay attention to the amount of space that we use on our projects. What about the space that you don’t use? Do you notice that? Well it’s just as important. Stand back and squint again. Notice the percentage of items filling up your project, what is the percentage of negative, unused space? While you want to make the most of your space available, you don’t want all of it used up either. Using too much makes an ad look busy too little it looks empty. An appropriate percentage can be anywhere from 60% to 80% used space and 40% to 20% negative or unused space. Keep your percentages in that range and you’ll have a nicely balanced ad, web page, or project.

Texture This is becoming important again with web design. All of the really cool and interesting textures that you can use for anything from backgrounds to text is amazing. Remember one thing that a texture carries almost as much weight to the eye as a photo. Just as you would not place a lot of photos on your page don’t use too many textures. Also watch your placement of these they can pull the eye away from where you want it to move.

Remember one thing, when it doubt simplify.

Kelly Paal is a Freelance Nature and Landscape Photographer, exhibiting nationally and internationally. Recently she started her own business Kelly Paal Photography (www.kellypaalphotography.com). She has an educational background in photography, business, and commercial art. She enjoys applying graphic design and photography principles to her web design.