Does anyone know why exactly they would do something like this? Is it because it forces users to scroll more and thus take longer for people to consume content (so more opportunity to show ads)? It looks like a disaster.
I never noticed that before, just went to the old version after seeing the default layout.
Old is a lot faster as well (at least when I checked, couldn’t be bothered after it was still horribly slow on a decent desktop PC when they had the full release). I liked the compact look, but performance is (or was) absolutely atrocious.
yes, exactly. The new format enables them to sell a lot of ad impressions and video ads too