X

AOL Beta launches, blatant rip-off of Yahoo [UPDATE]

AOL's new page looks mighty familiar. Oh wait, it's identical to Yahoo.com!

Josh Lowensohn Former Senior Writer
Josh Lowensohn joined CNET in 2006 and now covers Apple. Before that, Josh wrote about everything from new Web start-ups, to remote-controlled robots that watch your house. Prior to joining CNET, Josh covered breaking video game news, as well as reviewing game software. His current console favorite is the Xbox 360.
Josh Lowensohn
CNET Networks

So we've seen copycats and similarities floating around the internets before. Missing vowels in site names (understandable, domain names are getting pricey), reflections, gradient backgrounds, rounded corners. You name it we've seen it. What we haven't seen in a while is a copycat page design on this scale. AOL's new Beta page looks mighty familiar. So familiar, one of our readers sent us a tip, pointing out that it looks dangerously like Yahoo's home page. The real question here, is how does a company with so much money to throw around skimp on something as important as page design?

Yahoo's homepage. AOL's new Beta page. You be the judge (larger version here)

[Thanks Scott!]

Update: Added animated comparison GIF.