Facebook is currently previewing their new profile / site redesign at www.new.facebook.com. I have to admit -- I hate it. Here are three things that bother me about the new layout.
1) Fonts are inconsistent.
This might just be my own inertia around the consistency and measured font sizes of the previous facebook site. But it really does detract from what was a signature Facebook experience. The minifeed and content text size seems to be larger for no real particular reason. They're verging on 'just another Web 2.0' visual design here.
2) Poorly formed header/footers!
I really don't like the way they've done the top and bottom bars. Why the left and right margins on these otherwise global elements? It really results in some bad eye movement around the four hot corners of the page. I want to be able to easily transition to the content of the site, but the padding causes my eye to get trapped there. Why not just extend them all the way to the side, for a flush, cleaner look?
3) Centered body content = too many horizontal lines of alignment
I can't stand how the centered body changes position based on the overall width of the browser. That coupled with #2 results in a really disconnected visual feel. I like sites that feel pretty solid and cohesive, but doing a centered body with fixed top and bottom headers really undermines that cohesion. What facebook really should do is a liquid layout with fixed maximum and minimum bounds, to take advantage of space for larger browsers while limiting line length for very large browsers.
Facebook has a tough job of trying to build a visual style that works across a huge range of possible features. It has to be careful about these global changes. Consistency was a huge factor in the success of the original Facebook design, and it feels like they're starting to lose that.