The EE Times website redesign, delayed for several weeks because of performance issues, hit the internet today and frankly, I'm pretty damn impressed. It's clean, modern, easy for follow (as opposed to the hopelessly cluttered and confusing site it was previously) and, damn, does it fly! Even their crappy search engine seems to have been updated.

Some people might be put off with all the animation going on, but that is a cultural issue that we are going to have to get used to. Asian websites are usually filled with all kinds of flashing lights, animations and web-design gimmicks used for catching your attention and it's something we are going to have to learn how to deal with, but the site design is really quite pleasing.

However, I'm not a design guy. I dig content and what I have not dug for years is the preponderance of rewritten press releases cluttering up the landing pages of trade publications. That crap is not gone, but now you are going to have to look for it on EE Times. That, in itself, makes this site worth your time. You will have to start looking for the corporate line in EE Times now and the original content that made the publication a must read is back to being front and center.

What really excited me was the new EE Life section that brings back the real value of EE Times -- engineers talking about problems anyone can identify with. My favorite in the initial launch was the article about a kid's high school science project to use shake charged flashlights as a personal power source.

It's well been worth the wait for this site.