COMPANY: Yomega
WHERE TO FIND IT: www.yomega.com
CRITIQUE: It is possible to create a Web site that’s creative and intelligent, yet aggravating. Fall River’s Yomega Corporation, a leader in the yo-yo making business, has done just that. NAVIGATION
Yomega University, a virtual community for yo-yo fanatics, is a difficult place to get around. The site (viewed on Netscape Navigator 3.01) is not cluttered. Rather, loading times for many of its most promising features are long.
On the home-page, a menu bar on either side of a cartoon campus looks promising. However, it turns out to be confusing. For example, categories under the “welcome” option are “history,” “news,” “dealer info” and “contact.” Is that the history of the company or the sport? (Answer: the company, sort of.) And is that news about products, yoing, or references to Yomega in the news? (Answer: none of the above. Instead, it is a dumping ground for extraneous materials such as a letter from the chief executive officer, a list of recent graduates of the undefined Team Yomega, and the mention of Yomega in a popular magazine.) Then there are those bothersome inconsistencies like “dealer info” linking to “retailer info” on pages. What’s more, these pages are consequently now titled “administration” with the “Yomega” building icon showing up as another link. If your head is spinning, don’t blame the yo-yo theme. It seems the site’s creators had trouble settling on one of many creative ideas. If so, it was to the viewer’s detriment.
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CONTENT
That said, this is a highly creative site. Much more than an on-line store, it is a place where yoers and non-yoers alike can learn about the sport. For the yoer, there are tricks of the month, as well as an archive of tricks. For the yoer and non-yoer there are interesting facts to be learned and knowledge gained. In the science building, Professor Brain (“The Brain” being one of Yomega’s most popular products) tells us that the word yo-yo comes from the native Philippine language, Tagalog, and translates literally as “come, come” or “to return.” The lesson gets more scientific when it comes to explaining physical phenomena, such as gyroscopic stability. That’s the force that keeps a yo-yo facing in one direction.
Community features include a chat room, message boards, events calendar, and online contests. In the latter category, a virtual art gallery displays a selection of yo-yo-centric drawings mailed in by viewers.
USEABILITY
Since Yomega’s ultimate goal is to sell as many yo-yos as possible, the site includes a shopping cart feature for credit-card transactions. It also includes a real-time, data-base driven inventory, fulfillment and financial tracking system on the company end. In turn, the end user can track his or her order without ever picking up the phone. These features are time- and hassle-savers on both ends.
DESIGN
The site’s vivid colors and clever cartooning are enough to draw in the most hardened of yo-yo skeptics. The university campus, with buildings constructed of various yo-yo models, is Jetsons-esque and makes you want to enroll. In the end, it’s a silly-feeling site for a silly-sounding sport that a growing number of people take quite seriously.
WHO CREATED IT: Temple Games, Inc., Providence (www.templegames.com)
