The question is not whether your Mom could figure out the site, but whether your Mom is the target of the site, now frequently she uses the site, and if she is the one who is representative of your target customer. If she is, then yes the enhancements are well designed; if not, then you will be alienating your core visitors who make up the bulk of your usage.

Speaking of the video, I am still having trouble getting it to play on FF 2.0. Help!
Otherwise, this is my news site of choice.

Your mom is not the target of this site, at least it shouldnt be. Rather you should be looking to the viewers your READ YOUR SITE EVERYDAY. Jo is absolutly right, if your going to diminsih to value of your product for a generation less prone to use it you will turn your base users to other sites that will continue to provide them more, indepth news. Taking away news articles to appeal to grandma is not appropiate.

At the top, where the search is, the three "sections" of search should be more clear; make them tabs or something.

The fade on the "more stories" on the main page is far too slow and takes a long time to flip through the sections.

The "we recommend" this is really awesome at the bottom of the page when you finish a story.

On a story page, when there's a NEW icon in the bullet points, make the bullet red too.

The "hot topics" thing at the top under the main navigation is kind of confusing– it looks like it's showing your navigation with the double bracket, but it's really just showing random topics; maybe it should be related to the location on the page, or to the higher order navigation selected above it.

On the blog page, the "follow this topic" text is 1 pixel too high next to the rss logo.

Where it says "personalize your weather" and "international edition", make it SHOW the weather there. I hate having to scroll down to find that.

The way the "most popular" stories/videos/topics sectioning works confused lots of people i showed it to; that is an unorthodox method of changing sections, and it requires lots of mouse movement. Maybe you should convert it to tabs similar to the story/video tabs at the top of main story pages (which looks VERY sleek by the way).

So when do I get hired?

Wait just a minute. I am a mom and a grandma. Just because I have those titles does NOT mean that I do not go to this site several times a day. Did it ever occur to you that I have not only the time to go there but also the interest. The title of mom and grandma does not make me dead or not quite alive nor interested.

i believe andy's comments regarding "mom test" had more to do with usability than content. the "web 2.0" model, finding it's way into many mainstream web sites' can either be an obstacle or a more effective engagement tool.

all usability should pass the "mom test." the "web 2.0" user interface and information design tends to like to picture itself as being less intrusive and less clumsy.

i think with the wave of "jumpers on the band wagon" we are seeing a lot of superficial implementation of this approach. i wold think most media companies see the issue on their radar and are trying to figure out a way to incorporate the model into their site in a meaningful way.

those who simply choose to design their site to just appear to look "web 2.0" will like be re-thinking their strategy in the very near future.

As someone who was somewhat of a CNN junkie, I'm so disappointed with the color changes in the fonts. Light gray or light blue...anything low contrast should never be used for the text. It's hard to read if you don't have perfect vision. I may have to find another news source that is easier to read.

Take it easy people! All the man was saying, in a light hearted manner, was that the beta version passed the rhetorical "would your mom be able to figure it out” test – I'm quite sure that their focus is not on mom's and grand-mom's.

Is there a way to adjust the font size in my browser so I can make the page type larger? Small font size coupled with some greyed-out text is very difficult to read.

Maybe mom's and grandmother's should be the target audience.

Older mom's have more disposable income, are more highly educated than ever before, research or as it should be called "comparison shop,." More women live alone than any other group, buy houses more than single men, furniture shop, buy cars and every other big ticket item

More women vote and are involved in the political process. That means women read more news though men might be the ones who usually love to comment.

Yet people still love to assume men make the decisions in every baby boomer household–or if a woman is single relies on men to make the decisions for her

Women who are 50 and over aren't going away. Actually we're just beginning to hit 50 in big numbers

I liked that post and wasn't insulted by it. I think too much is made of Web 2.0, but there's a certain comfort to the look. I read too many tech blogs and am always appalled by the certainty that each blogger, being young and cool, has the answers

I just find it interesting how much people love to bash older people as not being with the times, especially women

Why, given what I said, shouldn't mom's and grand-mom's be the focus?