Time decay garishness of new UI elements

[skybluecircles]

I was thinking about the discussion in Issue #1360 and also the issue I just posted #1378.

It seems like there is merit on both sides of the discussion. I agree with @neilbowers that "Chat with us" is too visually intrusive. For me it can distract from the core content I seek when searching on Meta::Cpan.

On the other hand, if a lot of work goes into a new feature and no one notices it, that isn't good either.

What if the "garishness" level of a new UI element time-decayed so that it was more noticeable and distracting at first and then blended more into the background over time.

For example, the color of the arrow to move the contents box right and left could gradually move from a bold black to a regular light/medium gray over a certain period of time.

[haarg]

Promoting new features just because they are new isn't really the point.

The IRC link is meant to stand out so that new users find it easily and have an convenient point of contact with the community. How to approach that is arguable, but it isn't a goal that goes away over time.

The TOC right toggle isn't black because we're trying to promote it, it just seemed the most natural color for it when I was designing it. I personally don't find it distracting, and think it looks better as black than a shade of grey. Others can disagree and maybe we'll change it, but I don't think having it change color over time really resolves anything there. It isn't a change from "new" to "old", but from one persons preference to another.

[oalders]

I'm going to close this as it hasn't had any discussion over the past month. We can re-open if anyone wishes to bump this.