Rdio Help Center

Madelyn Rdio Employee Jun 29, 2012 03:29PM PDT

Hi Scott,

The new design is here to stay, but we are still working on tweaks to it, and would love your feedback. Once you've had a few days with the update, please let us know:

- Anything particular that's really not working for you?
- Experiencing specific trouble finding or using a specific functionality post-update (scrolling, sections, etc.)?
- Just the coloring you'd like to see tweaked?

Cheers,
Madelyn

Madelyn,

Yes. The desktop/web app functions properly but I can't use it because the new theme is an assault on my eyes. I'm seriously contemplating cancelling my account!

Thanks for your reply.

- Scott

I agree with Scott,

At first, I thought it was a GUI bug, but the staff confirms it. The previous skin fits well with the application. You know what's it like to stare at a white piece of paper for a long period of time?

Madelyn Rdio Employee Jun 30, 2012 09:49AM PDT

Hi Scott & Made,

We're definitely tracking and passing this feedback along—thanks for taking the time to be an active part of the Rdio community. If you have other feedback with continued use, we'd certainly like to hear it.

Best,
Madelyn

Hopefully someone is listening to all of the complaints! I can't even search for music because of the *new ALL WHITE theme. I love Rdio, but I find it very hard to believe everyone on the UI team sat down at the end of the day with the new interface and actually said, "yeah, this is great!". It's an assault on the eyes and THE WORST UI upgrade [hahahahahaha] ever.

If you are still watching this thread Madelyn, you can pass on that unless a *dark version of this UI is released I will be reluctantly canceling my membership of two years within a week or two because I find the interface and colour especially to be beyond something I can use.

You have made Rdio something I loved into an eye sore. Why? Why?

Since the Rdio Employees just copy and paste stock responses into every similar thread, I say we all do the same. Here's what I said in ANOTHER thread discussing the AWFUL design:

"What they said. This is not so much a step backwards as it is tripping, falling off the curb, and landing in a dirty puddle.

And am I the only one who misses the circle graphs of play counts, etc.? The graphic elements when I originally signed up months ago were what put me over the fence, but everything EVERYTHING I liked about the look got tossed.

It's like Rdio fired everyone in their design department except for the intern."

No Adam, you are the not the only one who misses the circular graph of your most listened. Was there a thread with other users pleading for a new UI - I haven't searched, but even if there were one I doubt it'd have that much support; or even if a majority of one Rdio users had been asking for a UI, I don't think anyone expected what'd we get?

Seriously: anyone know if you can back rev [use the last version before this awful change]. I think the last download I kept is several months old.

this is horrible

Indeed, it is horrible. I really have no idea how it could have been vetted through testing. And I truly despise the way they are taking the hardline on it in every one of their cut and pasted responses. "It is here to stay." This simple statement sours me on the whole rdio experience. One of the things I loved about rdio was the interaction with the community and their attention to UI and a functional experience. They've taken both things and flushed them down the toilet. It may be time to give Spotify another chance.

Jeremy,

I agree with you wholeheartedly regarding Rdio's, "What? Is the functionality broken? Then shut up and get used to it!", response, it's insulting! I live in Canada so unfortunately I can't switch to Spotify, or I would have already.

I've spent some time searching for an alternative to Rdio in Canada and the only thing I've come across--that looks halfway decent--is Sony's https://music.sonyentertainmentnetwork.com/.

A friend told me that that he saw something on Twitter about Rdio's UI designer leaving and I'm assuming he took the rights to his designs with him. My theory is: Rdio had to remove all remnants of their previous designers work for legal reasons and probably have a new team working on a real UI as we speak. Just a theory!

It's telling that so many of us initially interpreted this as a rendering bug. I really liked the "mark two" design (the one previous to the current all-white design), and glad that the functionality of that design has been retained, but I have to agree that aesthetically the new(est) version is pretty amateurish-looking and not at all what I've come to expect from Rdio. The large fonts on the left sidebar wrap in ugly and unexpected ways, make quick vertical scanning of the playlists rather difficult, and tend to push a lot of my playlists "below the fold" (requiring additional scrolling to reach them). The lack of contrast between the main playlist area in the middle and the left and right sidebars really clutters up the entire interface, making it significantly harder to zero in on what I'm actually trying to do.

This certainly has the feel of an in-progress 'beta' design, and I hope that is the case. Would love to either see a return to the previous design until this new one is more thoroughly user-tested or at least some significant changes to the current design.

"The new design is here to stay"
What a horrible response. Whether or not it's true for some dumb business reasons, how can you comfortably admit to your customers that there is basically nothing they can do to revert a unanimously awful design decision? You're saying it's impossible that you made a mistake with the white design? Get real. At least pretend your customers have some influence on your product direction.

I may not cancel my subscription over bad design decisions, but I'd definitely cancel over responses like that, "still working of tweaks" or not.

I really dislike this new look. Thought it was an error, and let it ride a couple days. The labels on the left-hand side of the screen look terrible.

I hope you will create additional themes (e.g. all black) and let us choose between them.
Thanks.

The best solution I've found so far is to hit the (Mac) minimize button -- the app reverses colour and shrinks to a simple player, iTunes-style, lacking the window space to perpetuate any of the dreadful UI changes from last week.

Rdio folks: you could merely apply that black/grey theme to the app and 90% of your troubles would be over. How about "Switch to Black Theme"? How about rolling back the app?

At least the iOS apps are still in good shape. If they inherit the white theme, I'm cancelling.

I thought the last design which had only recently be introduced was perfect. I gave the new design a couple of days but still completely hate it. And I am someone who is usually not ranting about design changes...

As I was evaluating Spotify and Rdio currently that design fauxpas helped me with my decision. I just canceled my Rdio subscription and will use Spotify from now on as the UI is one of the most important features for me.

I switched to Spotify because of Madeline's response above. And that decision, my friends, "is here to stay."

Please change the fucking white design, it's hurtfull to my eyes and not very appealing!

What up guys. Made a video on how to change the theme for a much more pleasent darker style. It only works inside the web application, but it actually works quite nice.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hOhyrvtixxw

Peter, amazing work! Thanks man!

I've just recently come back to rdio from Spotify and this theme is driving me nuts. Workarounds are ok, but PLEASE rdio folks give us the option of a dark/light theme!

Agree, the white design hurts eyes! Please add a darker theme!

I agree. I'm currently a Spotify, and the fact that there's no Dark them for Rdio means that I would never really want to switch over to Rdio.

Oh gosh, I did not proof read that post I just wrote. Here, let me rewrite that:

I agree. I'm currently on Spotify, and the fact that there's no Dark theme for Rdio means that I would never really want to switch over to Rdio.

Amazing how bent out of shape people are here. Guess you buy your music for it's looks? Is everywhere here hoping Rdio developers will take some time away from more important features to make the site appeal to everyone's color whims?

If you want a "Dark Theme" here is a start it's not hard. I use the Chrome extension called style bot to apply them..

#header .right_container {
color: #000;
}
.App_Rdio .footer {
background-color: #222;
background-image: none;
}
.PeopleRow {
background-color: #000;
}
.main_nav a {
color: #fff;
}
.manual_hover a {
color: #000;
}
.username_link {
color: #fff;
text-shadow: 1px 1px rgba(100, 100, 100, 0.5);
}
a.album_title {
color: #fff;
}
a.artist_title {
color: #fff;
}
div.app_main {
background-color: #111;
color: #fff;
}
div.name.truncated_line a {
color: #fff;
}
div.section_header {
color: #fff;
text-shadow: 1px 1px rgba(100, 100, 100, 0.5);
}
div.truncated_line.num_songs_row {
color: #ccc;
}
header {
background-color: #000;
}
header.App_Header {
background-color: #222;
background-image: none;
}