MSNBC redesigns

Interesting insight here and here into the creative process involved in the huge (and much-needed) MSNBC.com redesign that launched last weekend. Having been involved in a few large redesigns, I can only imagine the immense amount of time and effort that went into this.

The new site nicely integrates news with photos and videos, allows for some customization of the site by the user and provides a cleaner yet more comprehensive look at the news. It's interesting to note, however, that they chose not to include other popular avenues for user participation (story ranking/social networking/comments, etc). Paraphrasing the design team, they were able to redesign without needing to reinvent themselves as a "social news site" like Digg or Newsvine.

I'm still absorbing it, but at first blush the new site is a vast improvement over the old MSNBC site and a better effort than the recent redesigns from other news sites.