Why Is Chinese Web Design So Bad?

On the side, a block of chinese text will -always- look busier than an equivalent block of latin alphabet text. It's just the nature of the symbols. There's a lot more stuff being packed into the same space.

Also, I really dislike the interchangeable use of chinese and eastern here. Just because the author states that he's going to interchange, and is possibly overgeneralizing, doesn't mean that he should do it. You recognized and -admitted- that you're probably in the wrong. And then go ahead and do it anyways.

Take a look at some of these popular Western portals. They are no less busy than the Chinese portals discussed in this article.

http://www.yahoo.com/

http://www.aol.com/

http://www.msn.com/

Google and Baidu both share a minimalist aesthetic because they aren't portals! They are just search engines.

Also consider America's most popular local classifieds site, http://craigslist.org/.

nice article, i've also often thought the same that sites in china lack sophistication. a quick note about myself, i've spent the past four years living in japan and china, originally from america.

i think japan is an exception, there are a lot of very good designers in general in japan, web design being no exception. and china reminds me of how japan was in the 70's, rapidly growing, quite far behind and needing to catch up. so just like the japanese who started making cheap cars and televisions following in the footsteps of the western companies, china is doing the same except across many other industries. and because things are rapidly growing here, it's about time to market, grabbing the opportunity which often times means taking whatever's out there (that worked locally), copying it and going to production.

over time the chinese customers will seek simpler, cleaner designs. it's just a matter of time.