Visual and aesthetic appeal of redesigned site is completely "broken"

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I'm not completely sure what you mean here. Are you saying that the redesigned home is not pleasant or are you asking for a community poll about it, or what?

I am saying both.
The redesigned home is not only "not pleasant" but also "visually and aesthetically broken"
&& this can be confirmed easily by volunteer or user tests (like usability tests) and/or measured by quantified, numbered input from a statistical survey of user likes and dislikes.

By the way, without meaning any disrespect, Mark Boulton was not chosen by the community at the drupal.org in the drupal.org. There were no front page article or short-lists of various persons presented to the community to choose from. That is okay. I am not questioning or criticizing the process of selection. Personally, I feel Mark's portfolio is too unimpressive and not worthy as I said elsewhere he had no experience of dealing with a similar task of even the half complexity as Drupal.

The "other point" in making the drupal.org as beautiful as acquia or drupalgardens is what seems to be not reaching the head honchos at those sites : drupal.org is the main entry point to drupal.com, acquia or drupalgardens and it will remain at least like these for the next 5 or 10 years. Thus to generate more visitors at those drupal sites, advertising and propaganda in other sites and media is okay and is needed too, but till now not as powerful as the means by which people find about those sites from drupal.org itself. Thus if the entrance is pathetic and ugly (first look counts for first time) those sites will lose some or much business even if those sites are themselves actually more beautiful and aesthetic.

Time is not at the discussion anymore, time is at the implementation.

That is what I am at - the implementation. I appreciate and admire the structural and back-bone ( or the bony and muscular and visceral ) changes that has been done. Now I am saying about how it should be implemented - that is, the skin or dress. Unless there is proper implementation (=skin/dress/presentation) a very knowledgeable and useful person may be rejected as a madcap if he is dressed wrongly or ugly or has missing buttons in his dress etc. Similarly, a very good useful kind person if de-skined or has visible skin disease will look horrible and will turn away people.

If you mean uploading the new files and updating the database by "implementation" then there is no point in the issues. The category can be temporarily removed till the "implementation" is done.

If nothing else, like websites like Yahoo or many softwares , give the option to the people to choose between "default" and "classical" skin that is, let them toggle from their edit area the redesigned theme and the current theme. Surely that can be done? It should be done!

@lisarex

This has been already done. Thanks.

However, when you look at a logo or a theme as a whole, in general you get the feel of it, attracted, neutral or repulsied by it. Imagine when people browse through screenshots of various themes they look at a glance and choose one over the other even in the same group of themes ( for example 1 column, 2 color etc). Same with logos - you choose one logo over another, when all other factors are equal or settled, on aesthetic and visual grounds

Thus the "actionable suggestion" here is confirmation of the wide, general and at the same time specific issue: "Visual and aesthetic appeal of redesigned site is completely "broken""
Once this is confirmed and agreed then you can move onto the next step.

How is this actionable : this has already been stated in the first step :
Do these two simple things:
1. Ask virgin volunteers in test groups like usability tests or gather opinion via forum/issues/rating to assess the looks of which is more appealing: the current drupal.org, the Acquia site, the drupal.com site, the drupal gardens site OR the redesign site? As a matter of fact, throughout the iterations the looks have been criticized and consensus not reached.
For example, put up a sticky front page post at drupal.org "Which theme you like most - this, this or this or the current redesign?"

2. What you (anyone reading this issue) can do: Answer this simple question: Tell honestly which of the above [ this, this or this] appeals to you more if you see without bias?

Why is this necessary and critical? Because apart from structure/function we want the best looking look for drupal.org.

This issue asks for the above two actions. When the answer is there we can move on.

[ A relevant quote : ‘‘Diversity and independence are important because the best collective decisions are the product of disagreement and contest, not consensus or compromise. An intelligent group, especially when confronted with cognition problem --- [truncated]---- figures out how to use mechanisms like -- intelligent voting systems’’-- - from http://www.randomhouse.com/features/wisdomofcrowds/ ]

@coltrane

Are the audiences to drupal.org, drupal acquia, drupalgardens in water-tight compartment?
What are the examples of audience to each of the above three?

Since you have no objection to poll, which as a web-page design appeals to you more visually and is more easy to the eyes - drupal acquia, drupal gardens or drupal redesigned ? Waiting for your answer.

If the visual appearance did not matter to the issue of redesign we would not have change of theme and appearance in the redesign site. We would have continued with the current web page design and theme.
That is why it matters apart from other important and basic things.

‘‘Since you obviously know so much about UI design, they will naturally select yours, right?’’

No wrong. There are specific actionable issues in support of this issue, which "they" have already said "won't fix" or closed etc. Those were the first and initial steps to a changed design.
To keep this thread productive, do you care to see my tracker and opine individually on those?

To repeat, an excellent visual appeal ( like the main drupal sites acquia or drupalgardens) is NOT in confrontation with all that you say.

"The left half of the page is largely for potential new users. The right is for devs or people using Drupal"

You know that - fine! How do the visitors (and those coming for the first time) know that?

A prominent search box, 90% time module hunt, 2 key demographics etc etc - nothing will be hampered if there is a good visual and aesthetic appeal. In fact they will be enhanced.

Thanks for your time.