Today I pick on websites

Businesses of all sorts need to face the facts, as much as many hope that the internet is a passing fad like hula hoops or He-Man, it's here to stay. I make it a part of my blathering at the office that many of our customers have websites that are hopelessly out of date, have extremely poor functionality and that they should be rather ashamed that they even have this poor online image available for all to see. Hell, plenty of websites look like something I would have created in my high school multimedia class and that's not a good thing.

I know that many businesses will say "nobody uses my webiste". Well, of course they don't. Frankly, it sucks. I'd then ask "when was the last time you picked up the yellow pages for information?" I know that my desk at work doesn't have a phone book because it would do nothing but gather dust. My phone books at home are used to prop up our electric griddle in a kitchen cupboard. If I need a phone number, a map or hours of operation, I look to the internet. That, like it or not, is where information resides and it's easily and instantly updateable.

Still, plenty of businesses fail to understand how people consume information. With more being available each and every day, they consume it faster and in more streamlined ways. I, for one, use a plethora of RSS feeds on my iGoogle start page. I've got blogs, local news, CNN, local news blogs, local blogs, Star Tribune, movie times and the weather all just a click away.

The worst offenders, though (that I'll single out today), seems to be smaller city newspapers. A former semi-competitor newspaper, the Fairbault Daily News, has at least launched its second version of its website but it is rough at best. First impressions, as I said last Thursday, count for plenty and their website leaves plenty to be desired. I feel bad for the folks in Faribault, Minnesota as well as former residents who attempt to use this site on a somewhat regular basis. It contains elements that don't function, motion which is choppy at best and seems to exist merely for the sake of existing and the biggest problem (and the reason I visited it in the first place) is the lack of any visible RSS feed. I wanted to add it to my collection but can't and now won't because of that single reason.
I've said my piece about one missing item turning me off from a website but what website shortcomings have turned you off?