That seems quite excessive and only applicable for web sites that display articles.
Amazon without javascript and multi-column pages would be unbearable. Ad-supported content is fine and keeps the web free, as long as ads are sufficiently on-topic and unobtrusive (sponsored posts, light banners à la The Deck, native advertising...).
Also, the fact that the page is unreadable without either using a custom CSS or resizing the window does not add much to the credibility of the author.
I works quite fine without any css for me with any window size I tried. Are you using a mobile device? However, he does include images from third party sites which may cause referrer leakage which goes against the no-tracking issue he raised. (I'm only being this harsh because the article is too)
No, I am viewing it on a 24" screen. However I consider long lines of text as unreadable and my default size for a browser window is quite large. I really think most sites with simplistic CSS would include
body { max-width: 11in; }
or something similar in their stylesheet.
Note that my own personal website conforms very well to his expectations (except loading images from flickr (without javascript) which, as you pointed out, leaks private data).
I would add however that the most important thing is readability, responsiveness and speed.
A webpage without stylesheets is technically responsive, but in practice not very readable, due to pretty bad defaults in most browsers (i.e.: tiny fonts and cramped text)
Finally, the most important part of any article-based website (for me) is a full text RSS, which enables me to have actually good reading experience - outside of a web browser.
This probably depends on the browser but Safari, for example, scales inches (and centimetres) with the zoom level, so the result is probably the same. I don't like em and rem much as they do not really reflect the actual size in tangible units, but that is largely a personal preference.
That is a valid point. Although I think that if you are modifying CSS then you either know exactly what you are doing, or disabling it altogether and replacing it with your own stylesheet. I think that there is quite a lot of stuff that will break if you increase the font size too much.
I'll play with it a little bit more, the ems might be a better solution after all.
don't specify max width in physical units, except for print. Specify them in either em or rem units.
My preference is ems for text width as that translates naturally to line length. Toss in an auto left an right margin for centered text and a padding directive for keeping text out of the gutters and you're a long way to readability.
Browsing amazon without css seem to be an improvement in Firefox, as Amazon seems to do something in the background that basically chokes the render engine.
I believe the point was that you probably don't need the user to make an account. If they don't need an account, they have no password, and you need no email address, unless your true goal is to put as many people as possible on your mailing list and spam them.
actually, in the same paragraph he goes on to say:
In any case, if a login is required, take the absolute minimum of necessary information, ideally only a login name and a password.
maybe better than a login name and password, make it an email address and password. email address seems pretty vital for any kind of future communication
If you have any kind of non-tech savvy users, it's a terrible practice, as you would be flooded with support requests on how to get into their accounts with no way of verifiying the actual owner.
yes.. even having an unconfirmed email address can get really messy when you need to get in touch with someone but just can't because the address is invalid
Marco Arment has had problems with this and resumed it quite nicely in the Overcast FAQ (scroll a bit down for the relevant part): https://overcast.fm/skeptics_faq
> email address seems pretty vital for any kind of future communication
That's actually a reason many users don't like supplying an e-mail address. They don't want an ongoing relationship with a website, they just want to buy a box of widgets today. What I do in that case is provide a customised e-mail address and then blacklist it after the item arrives.
As for using e-mail address as the account identifier, if you do that please ensure it can be changed everywhere in your system.
I recently moved to a new domain ( cheaper annual renewal ) and whilst Amazon and eBay were painless for changing e-mail address, many other large operators were messy. Tesco, for example, is still sending half of its communications to my old address.
He clearly makes a point of supporting user CSS, but also a point of being usable by default, so it clearly misses that...
Also, I doubt most regular users could be bothered to actually write custom CSS for the entire web. Most people have zero knowledge of how to do it, not to mention how to actually improve what they want to improve.
The only reasonable real world case I can see is accessibility, which is certainly a valid case, and should be considered by all web designers/developers.
I think the article is a bit extreme but he does raise a lot of good points. I actually went and checked my website without css, and even tried it in [links](http://www.jikos.cz/~mikulas/links/). I very much agree that the the use of JavaScript for the simplest of things has gone overboard, but I wouldn't be as harsh as the OP. Cross site scripting is out of the question in my book.
I don't see the point of these manifesto-rants. To quote : "designers with goals often counter to our own interests". Well of course and it's perfectly fine. The website you visit is not yours, and is not made to comply to all of your demands. If you don't like what you see don't visit it. The day you pay to visit a website, you will have the right to complain.
What the article proposes is an extreme position, and while I don't agree that the entire web can work this way, a lot of it can. Look at the page you're currently viewing (hacker news): It's by no means a terrible experience, and yet it manages to check all the boxes: it has no javascript necessary for viewing (there is one function for voting, but that is non-essential), no proprietary plugins, no ads, no visual clutter, doesn't download fonts, no tracking, and if I just want to read content, no account is required.
So we see that it's not impossible to make sites that follow the goals of this "manifesto", and I would say that all of these non-features speaks in favor of the quality of HN.
Clearly, there are sites that do not follow these guidelines, and their business model makes it impossible for them to do so (Facebook, anyone?). As a consumer, which one of those would I rather use?
That's exactly my point. Most users do not care about javascript, css override and whatnot. Web designers build website with their specifics goals in minds (maximise revenue, maximise viewers etc...). And thats fine, that's what make the web viable. I am not saying it's impossible to build a website following that manifesto, as indeed HN is pretty close, but HN target a specific audience. Their designers didn't search to monetize but to maximise their presence on the web. In that case their interests do not conflict with yours (no advertisements, simple design etc..). They did not design HN with your specific preferences in mind but the majority of viewers.
"As a consumer, which one of those would I rather use?" Well you might prefer HN to Facebook design, but the majority of Facebook users would not.
Most of the web is about reading content, and this is where all points on the page shine.
I agree with basically everything on that page.
In fact, we built fully-fledged browser extensions to override website's choices in fonts, colors and whatnot (point 1).
We build extensions to kill js by default (point 2).
We increasingly disable plugins by default (point 3).
We have extensions to block advertising, including inline ones (point 4).
Frames are a thing of the past (point 5), although visual clutter still reigns in "web tabloids" (although we still patch the css via custom styles/extensions)
6) Web fonts have very often poor hinting and lower quality than the exact equivalent in the system. The difference between my locally installed Roboto font and the Woff version is insane. The worst part is that the google font loaders loads the woff version ANYWAY!
Web tablois will still chose random fonts based purely on the looks. Combined with poor hinting, this has prompted me to disable web fonts on my standard browsing profile.
Of course, nobody wants tracking, this seems quite widespread now, with browsers including the useless DNT header (point 7)
"No pagination" went even overboard with continuous loading pages, which many (including myself) hate (point 8).
What about the "facebook/linkedin" login that many websites/betas require to join, and that almost everybody hates? (point 9)
And when all you need to do is reading, you don't want over-the-top animations when you hover on this, dynamic loading that prevents pages to be saved to disk for later reading, and whatever webdesigners think "it's cool" nowdays, because in the end what matters most is the content.
The fact that we have "reader modes" in browsers now is pretty saddening. And it's all due to massive, abusive design using otherwise good browsers extensions.
Yes. There is a difference between optimizing the design of the parts of the web which are for reading text, or filtering the web as it is to your liking through plugins or whatnot, and forbidding the web from ever being about anything more than simply reading text.
Because of course, most people don't have a problem with the web as it is, except maybe for a few details like intrusive advertising which could be done away with without eliminating javascript, css and layout complexity entirely. They use it, and enjoy it, and it brings value to their lives.
Insisting that the web is wrong, that most of the people using it are wrong to accept it, that most of the creative decisions made in it are wrong for even attempting to design it, that every possible use of javascript is wrong by definition, and that the only "proper" web is one in which simple, static text documents be allowed to exist is, yes, "really that bad."
I think you're conflating too many things in your argument. I'm not against evolution, and there's plenty of good uses for most of the recent browser developments in the last decade.
Heck, I love what you can do in interactive python notebooks, and there's plenty of very successful pages that use modern technologies at their finest.
But it's a very small minority. So small, in fact, that a "whitelist-based" approach, such as disabling webfonts everywhere but selected sites, has a net-positive effect: it also works on the websites that choose good fonts, because those websites are ironically also the websites that gracefully degrade and/or use html semantically. Similarly for other features.
Many websites, to put it simply, are simply "badly styled" (I don't like to use "designed", because designed would imply some tuning based on a real usage pattern).
I also don't think that users that think that way are in minority: it cannot be that "reader" extensions (which do - in essence - exactly what has been described in the manifesto!) got bundled into browsers as a selling point. If there was no need, they wouldn't be bundled at all. Clearly, there are some non-insignificant amount of people that see this as a plus.
Fair enough - it's impossible to argue that the backlash isn't due to a real phenomenon. Although, browsers also ship with developer tools so I don't know how widely used the reader mode is, or whether it's targeted at a general audience or the tech audience. Most of the (admittedly anecdotal) complaints I see on social media sites have to do more with changing the UI around and messing with people's expectations than with poor fonts or loading times, or javascript.
I wasn't sarcastic, I am just pointing out that most of the shiny single-page apps don't have to be shiny whatsoever.
Take stooq.com for example, I am using it because is reliable, fast and clean - but it still looks like from early 90'.
The thing is, many companies decide to use fancy technologies/solution to bump theirs market value - it is not a way to go, but you cant change the environment.
What's more - It is quite often a managers call to say 'we need our site to be cutting-edge', so they pick angular, react, whatever just because other companies do it.
Not everyone has these demands and well.. cares this much, to be honest. I would say that the majority of web browsers (the human kind) simply don't mind the different fonts, and colors and what not, it's part of the experience and who the hell even knows what CSS is?
This is of course obvious to all of us, and probably to this author as well, but I felt like I had to point that out.
I really hate those. Especially sites like github who capture the Tibetan Unicode block for their font, as this is a character set that I need. http://kephra.de/src/WylieUTF8/
ok I'm likely one of the few who can read Tibetan, but this shows a typical US ignorance, and certainly gives github a bad karma, as they make it impossible to display any Tibetan text on github.
11: Sites that can be viewed better without CSS, if you are a NoScript user. e.g. main page of Medium shows a grayed out layout where its not possible to click on articles without JS. But the become readable again once you disable CSS also. eBay does similar.
I really hate sites that send all content as html, but then hide it only to unhide it with JavaScript. It's getting quite common though. I wouldn't go as far as the OP and say no JS, but how about: don't use JS just because you can, use it to actually do something that makes the site more usable.
Adblockers take care of that. I run NoScript for security and not because it makes pages look prettier - believe me, it doesn't.
I see hiding the content of the site for lack of JS simply as lazy web development, which only considers the most common use case. I don't bother visiting sites who don't support NoScript or text-mode browsers such as Links2.
I'd say it is better. The first one is very uncomfortable to read in a full-screen/maximized-window browser on a widescreen, and mine is only 1080p.
I think it's a great counterexample of the point it's trying to make. Of course is a satire, and the author probably would add a bit of design in a "real" web site.
How much of the difference between those two pages is enshrined in web standards? Are Firefox or Chrome still standards-compliant if they set the default line-height to 1.4? If they bump up the default font-size and change the background colour to a light grey?
I imagine bumping up the margins could be problematic, but I'd say all of the other problems are just browser bugs.
"If you are trying to make a web application, just stop. Build a native application. It's nicer for everyone." <-- On which platforms? Windows + iOS + Android + OS X + ...? Or, I could just make it a web application. Not a hard choice. This point was ill-considered.
Somehow all the annoyances, abuse and clutter mentioned in the manifesto have won after the mobile app/javascript framework duo dominated to influence the newest web apps.
Maybe we should build a new "sub-web" for hackers with a unique safe browser with no plugins, ajax, javascript, css-animations, html5-* with only non obstrusive sound, video, image and form support.
> With regards to visual design, the fact is that any individual has a far better idea of what constitutes comfortable-to-read text for them than a designer could. A designer either designing for his or her own tastes or trying to find some best-of-all-worlds design will ultimately fail to satisfy the vast majority of visitors to the sit
> Designers, it may come as a surprise to you, but not everyone loves your work.
Computer scientist, it may come as a surprise to you, but there are competent people outside of your field of expertise. You're not a genius, and everyone else isn't stupid.
If a designer (or whoever decides) chooses to have custom fonts, client-side scripting or custom style sheets, it's because he weighted the downsides of said choice and still opted for it. If he did not, or he is not aware of the downsides, then it's a matter of incompetence, not web design. So, your pseudo-manifesto should be anti-incompetence, not anti-web-design.
Being "anti-web-design" only tells us that a) you know nothing about design (you don't have the smallest idea regarding methodology or even simply what a designer actually does); and b) it's no more than a rant - all your valid points (which are a few) are obscured by the arrogant and oblivious attitude.
I think you are judging this on the wrong premise.
It's a manifesto not a lecture it's even an anti-web-design manifesto. I for one appreciate someone trying to establish other perspectives than my own.
Yes we designers know a lot that he doesn't, but a trip to Dribbble will tell you that there are also many of us who are victims of some of the patterns he is trying to establish an opposition against.
> Yes we designers know a lot that he doesn't, but a trip to Dribbble will tell you that there are also many of us who are victims of some of the patterns he is trying to establish an opposition against.
Still, that's a problem with incompetence, not with web design. And Dribbble it's not a good example at all - what's the ratio of pixel-pushers to designers? 10:1? 100:1?
I wouldn't say that it's a problem with "us", since it's clearly a separate group which deserves addressing. There are designers who actually "design" (meaning, they conceive a solution to "someone"), and there are pixel-pushers which mix and mash the latest fads without any particular regard for users and their context (elderly? Here, take flat design! Teens? Flat will do!).
These are two completely distinct objectives: designing vs. doing "something" which looks good. I think the "manifesto" is - or should - be aimed at the latter: gratuitous usage of UI elements/patterns/options. But that's not what design is about, so the "manifesto" is totally misguided and - to be honest - it even becomes ridiculous when the author starts to speak condescendingly to designers (as in the example in my original replies), while being completely oblivious that "design" in itself would imply that any of the options he criticizes were adequately considered (against users and their context).
> If a designer (or whoever decides) chooses [whatever] it's because...
Sorry, but you are not the authority on the reasons why competent professional designers (or whoever) chose anything. (and I'd argue thtat most professional web designers are bound by many, many requirements that they can't even change, like having intrusive advertising, javascript, tracking and plugins)
Everybody has a right to their opinion and obviously a lot of people don't like the way the web is being "designed" or else we wouldn't have scores of plugins used by millions of people to block or change things they don't like.
I'm under the impression that you haven't read, at least fully, my reply.
> Sorry, but you are not the authority on the reasons why competent professional designers (or whoever) chose anything.
That's why, after the portion you quoted, I added an addendum: "If he did not, or he is not aware of the downsides, then it's a matter of incompetence, not web design".
> Most professional designers are bound by requirements that they can't change, like having intrusive advertising, javascript, tracking and plugins
... and that's why I added, exactly in the portion you quoted, a parenthesis stating "or whoever decides". How could it be clearer?
If "whoever decides" decided for any of these options, it's because he considered it outweighed the "cons" (so, by design), or he didn't considered the "cons" (so, by incompetence).
I read it. You think "whoever" decided that their web page needs intrusive advertising, tracking, etc. did it in consideration of pros and cons... but with regards to the user experience?
I doubt it. They're thinking about money and that's it.
Does it matter? What's at stake here is the manifesto being pinpointed at web design. If, whoever decides, decided that he should sacrifice UX for ads/tracking/whatever, then either he did it knowingly or unknowingly (so, a problem of competence). Either way, it's not solved by being against web design, it's solved by being against incompetence - in web design, in UX, in product decisions, whatever.
How can you blame "web designing" if someone decides that intrusive ads outweigh the UX cons or if someone doesn't even consider said cons? That's my point here - this is not a matter of web design, being anti-web design is misguided and futile. The problem is not web design, the problem is: frivolous or oblivious decision-making, lack of knowledge and consideration about whoever uses the digital product being designed, lack of knowledge about design process, lack of knowledge about design "elements" (layout, color, typography), lack of knowledge of the implications of using extensive e.g. JS...
If you meant to say that "it has nothing to do with web design" then you should have said that instead of trying to defend "competent web designers" as if competence actually had anything to do with it.
No, I did not and - if you don't mind - I would suggest you spend some more time reading and analysing, instead of skim-reading and assuming my argument matches one of the predefined "boxes" you have. See below:
>If you meant to say that "it has nothing to do with web design" then you should have said that
Well, I did. How explicit do I have to be? I said: "then it's a matter of incompetence, not web design".
> instead of trying to defend "competent web designers"
Defend competent web designers? Again, it's a matter of competence. I defended competence - either from designers, programmers or PMs, "whoever decides" (as I stated, very explicitly).
> as if competence actually had anything to do with it.
As if? This is starting to sound very troll-like behaviour. From the beginning, I made it clear that this was about competence.
As if competence in web design had anything to do with it. There's a subtle difference there. Rage harder though dude, it's Friday!
Someone who bitterly states that "you know nothing about design" is obviously a web designer who is personally insulted by this article, who is obviously defending "web design competence".
You've been arguing that "web design competence" is key here since you said that " A designer either designing for his or her own tastes or trying to find some best-of-all-worlds design will ultimately fail to satisfy the vast majority of visitors to the sit". As if.... but no, they add things we don't like because they have to. That's all you had to say. I think we agree otherwise, so whatever no big deal...
> You've been arguing that "web design competence" is key here since you said that " A designer either designing for his or her own tastes or trying to find some best-of-all-worlds design will ultimately fail to satisfy the vast majority of visitors to the sit".
I did not. That came from the "manifesto"; I quoted it to counterpoint. I know it's Friday, but - come on - a little more attention. :)
Wow, I pasted the wrong sentence. But you're still obviously lying or completely missing my point. And who are you trying to convince here? People can easily read what you wrote, there really wasn't much there.
My point is that it has nothing to do with incompetence, web-design or other. People do bad things for money.
You, OTOH clearly are addressing competence and web-design competence when you said "If a designer (or whoever decides) chooses to have custom fonts, client-side scripting or custom style sheets, it's because he weighted the downsides of said choice and still opted for it. If he did not, or he is not aware of the downsides, then it's a matter of incompetence, not web design."
It's OK to be completely wrong and off-point, but honestly - don't turn around and try to lie about it because someone called you out and you're embarrassed.
(Maybe the reason you're depressed at 30, the prime of your life, is that you're a high-strung prick who tends to take a simple misunderstanding and turn it into a shit-storm. C'est la vie. You put out crap and it comes right back to you ;)
Of course the web is full of crap design – there's a very low barrier to entry. That's a good thing. There's also some great design. And a lot of in-between stuff (otherwise decent sites compromised by too many ads/scripts). It serves whoever pays for it and makes it. Don't use it if you find it 'abusive'. This guy needs to get over himself.
Seriously, i looked over the page and could not tell the difference for the most part. Only ones i noticed some difference was those where you had a single prominent letter doing all the work.
> 2) No client-side scripts If your website cannot be viewed properly with Javascript disabled, it is broken.
Completely disagree with this one. The web has evolved into a landscape that exceeds its original intended use. It's not just about semantic documents any more - its community, interaction, and more in the most portable format we've ever seen.
The web has taken on a life of its own, beyond what it was initially designed for.
My favourite part was when, after reading a rant about the evils of web applications, client side scripts and plugins, I was encouraged to visit his Bandcamp to load up a web app with client side scripts and plugins.
I would love to browse proper internet described in this manifesto. Too bad that noone will listen to it, and many people are forced to disable JS, disable CSS, etc, just to be able to read articles without much annoyance.
All the shitty things we do to websites is to make money. We stuff them full of ads because ads make money. We load 10 megabytes of JS trackers because it helps the ads make money. We paginate articles in order to show more ads, to make money. We add unnecessary columns of social media streams, related articles, and share widgets to trap people in an endless cycle of clicks (to see more ads. To make more money.)
These arguments are poisonous for the web. This may shock some people, but JavaScript is not evil. Its use should be limited, yes, but declaring that it should never be used is just ignorant.
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[ 3.2 ms ] story [ 151 ms ] threadAmazon without javascript and multi-column pages would be unbearable. Ad-supported content is fine and keeps the web free, as long as ads are sufficiently on-topic and unobtrusive (sponsored posts, light banners à la The Deck, native advertising...).
Also, the fact that the page is unreadable without either using a custom CSS or resizing the window does not add much to the credibility of the author.
Note that my own personal website conforms very well to his expectations (except loading images from flickr (without javascript) which, as you pointed out, leaks private data). I would add however that the most important thing is readability, responsiveness and speed.
A webpage without stylesheets is technically responsive, but in practice not very readable, due to pretty bad defaults in most browsers (i.e.: tiny fonts and cramped text)
Finally, the most important part of any article-based website (for me) is a full text RSS, which enables me to have actually good reading experience - outside of a web browser.
I'll play with it a little bit more, the ems might be a better solution after all.
It's a fact proven out by years of practice in print.
My preference is ems for text width as that translates naturally to line length. Toss in an auto left an right margin for centered text and a padding directive for keeping text out of the gutters and you're a long way to readability.
how do you retreive a forgotten password?
In any case, if a login is required, take the absolute minimum of necessary information, ideally only a login name and a password.
maybe better than a login name and password, make it an email address and password. email address seems pretty vital for any kind of future communication
That's actually a reason many users don't like supplying an e-mail address. They don't want an ongoing relationship with a website, they just want to buy a box of widgets today. What I do in that case is provide a customised e-mail address and then blacklist it after the item arrives.
As for using e-mail address as the account identifier, if you do that please ensure it can be changed everywhere in your system.
I recently moved to a new domain ( cheaper annual renewal ) and whilst Amazon and eBay were painless for changing e-mail address, many other large operators were messy. Tesco, for example, is still sending half of its communications to my old address.
Ahh. Much better.
Maybe they really want to show the importance of user CSS?
Also, I doubt most regular users could be bothered to actually write custom CSS for the entire web. Most people have zero knowledge of how to do it, not to mention how to actually improve what they want to improve.
The only reasonable real world case I can see is accessibility, which is certainly a valid case, and should be considered by all web designers/developers.
So we see that it's not impossible to make sites that follow the goals of this "manifesto", and I would say that all of these non-features speaks in favor of the quality of HN.
Clearly, there are sites that do not follow these guidelines, and their business model makes it impossible for them to do so (Facebook, anyone?). As a consumer, which one of those would I rather use?
"As a consumer, which one of those would I rather use?" Well you might prefer HN to Facebook design, but the majority of Facebook users would not.
Most of the web is about reading content, and this is where all points on the page shine.
I agree with basically everything on that page.
In fact, we built fully-fledged browser extensions to override website's choices in fonts, colors and whatnot (point 1).
We build extensions to kill js by default (point 2).
We increasingly disable plugins by default (point 3).
We have extensions to block advertising, including inline ones (point 4).
Frames are a thing of the past (point 5), although visual clutter still reigns in "web tabloids" (although we still patch the css via custom styles/extensions)
6) Web fonts have very often poor hinting and lower quality than the exact equivalent in the system. The difference between my locally installed Roboto font and the Woff version is insane. The worst part is that the google font loaders loads the woff version ANYWAY!
Web tablois will still chose random fonts based purely on the looks. Combined with poor hinting, this has prompted me to disable web fonts on my standard browsing profile.
Of course, nobody wants tracking, this seems quite widespread now, with browsers including the useless DNT header (point 7)
"No pagination" went even overboard with continuous loading pages, which many (including myself) hate (point 8).
What about the "facebook/linkedin" login that many websites/betas require to join, and that almost everybody hates? (point 9)
And when all you need to do is reading, you don't want over-the-top animations when you hover on this, dynamic loading that prevents pages to be saved to disk for later reading, and whatever webdesigners think "it's cool" nowdays, because in the end what matters most is the content.
The fact that we have "reader modes" in browsers now is pretty saddening. And it's all due to massive, abusive design using otherwise good browsers extensions.
Because of course, most people don't have a problem with the web as it is, except maybe for a few details like intrusive advertising which could be done away with without eliminating javascript, css and layout complexity entirely. They use it, and enjoy it, and it brings value to their lives.
Insisting that the web is wrong, that most of the people using it are wrong to accept it, that most of the creative decisions made in it are wrong for even attempting to design it, that every possible use of javascript is wrong by definition, and that the only "proper" web is one in which simple, static text documents be allowed to exist is, yes, "really that bad."
Heck, I love what you can do in interactive python notebooks, and there's plenty of very successful pages that use modern technologies at their finest.
But it's a very small minority. So small, in fact, that a "whitelist-based" approach, such as disabling webfonts everywhere but selected sites, has a net-positive effect: it also works on the websites that choose good fonts, because those websites are ironically also the websites that gracefully degrade and/or use html semantically. Similarly for other features.
Many websites, to put it simply, are simply "badly styled" (I don't like to use "designed", because designed would imply some tuning based on a real usage pattern).
I also don't think that users that think that way are in minority: it cannot be that "reader" extensions (which do - in essence - exactly what has been described in the manifesto!) got bundled into browsers as a selling point. If there was no need, they wouldn't be bundled at all. Clearly, there are some non-insignificant amount of people that see this as a plus.
Oh wait, you were being sarcastic :(
This is of course obvious to all of us, and probably to this author as well, but I felt like I had to point that out.
Strange.
obey you heathens.
I really hate those. Especially sites like github who capture the Tibetan Unicode block for their font, as this is a character set that I need. http://kephra.de/src/WylieUTF8/
ok I'm likely one of the few who can read Tibetan, but this shows a typical US ignorance, and certainly gives github a bad karma, as they make it impossible to display any Tibetan text on github.
11: Sites that can be viewed better without CSS, if you are a NoScript user. e.g. main page of Medium shows a grayed out layout where its not possible to click on articles without JS. But the become readable again once you disable CSS also. eBay does similar.
I see hiding the content of the site for lack of JS simply as lazy web development, which only considers the most common use case. I don't bother visiting sites who don't support NoScript or text-mode browsers such as Links2.
Unsure is it better, should check on more devices/systems/browsers.
I think it's a great counterexample of the point it's trying to make. Of course is a satire, and the author probably would add a bit of design in a "real" web site.
I imagine bumping up the margins could be problematic, but I'd say all of the other problems are just browser bugs.
http://codepen.io/dredmorbius/pen/KpMqqB
Maybe we should build a new "sub-web" for hackers with a unique safe browser with no plugins, ajax, javascript, css-animations, html5-* with only non obstrusive sound, video, image and form support.
> Designers, it may come as a surprise to you, but not everyone loves your work.
Computer scientist, it may come as a surprise to you, but there are competent people outside of your field of expertise. You're not a genius, and everyone else isn't stupid.
If a designer (or whoever decides) chooses to have custom fonts, client-side scripting or custom style sheets, it's because he weighted the downsides of said choice and still opted for it. If he did not, or he is not aware of the downsides, then it's a matter of incompetence, not web design. So, your pseudo-manifesto should be anti-incompetence, not anti-web-design.
Being "anti-web-design" only tells us that a) you know nothing about design (you don't have the smallest idea regarding methodology or even simply what a designer actually does); and b) it's no more than a rant - all your valid points (which are a few) are obscured by the arrogant and oblivious attitude.
It's a manifesto not a lecture it's even an anti-web-design manifesto. I for one appreciate someone trying to establish other perspectives than my own.
Yes we designers know a lot that he doesn't, but a trip to Dribbble will tell you that there are also many of us who are victims of some of the patterns he is trying to establish an opposition against.
Still, that's a problem with incompetence, not with web design. And Dribbble it's not a good example at all - what's the ratio of pixel-pushers to designers? 10:1? 100:1?
I wouldn't say that it's a problem with "us", since it's clearly a separate group which deserves addressing. There are designers who actually "design" (meaning, they conceive a solution to "someone"), and there are pixel-pushers which mix and mash the latest fads without any particular regard for users and their context (elderly? Here, take flat design! Teens? Flat will do!).
These are two completely distinct objectives: designing vs. doing "something" which looks good. I think the "manifesto" is - or should - be aimed at the latter: gratuitous usage of UI elements/patterns/options. But that's not what design is about, so the "manifesto" is totally misguided and - to be honest - it even becomes ridiculous when the author starts to speak condescendingly to designers (as in the example in my original replies), while being completely oblivious that "design" in itself would imply that any of the options he criticizes were adequately considered (against users and their context).
Sorry, but you are not the authority on the reasons why competent professional designers (or whoever) chose anything. (and I'd argue thtat most professional web designers are bound by many, many requirements that they can't even change, like having intrusive advertising, javascript, tracking and plugins)
Everybody has a right to their opinion and obviously a lot of people don't like the way the web is being "designed" or else we wouldn't have scores of plugins used by millions of people to block or change things they don't like.
> Sorry, but you are not the authority on the reasons why competent professional designers (or whoever) chose anything.
That's why, after the portion you quoted, I added an addendum: "If he did not, or he is not aware of the downsides, then it's a matter of incompetence, not web design".
> Most professional designers are bound by requirements that they can't change, like having intrusive advertising, javascript, tracking and plugins
... and that's why I added, exactly in the portion you quoted, a parenthesis stating "or whoever decides". How could it be clearer?
If "whoever decides" decided for any of these options, it's because he considered it outweighed the "cons" (so, by design), or he didn't considered the "cons" (so, by incompetence).
I doubt it. They're thinking about money and that's it.
How can you blame "web designing" if someone decides that intrusive ads outweigh the UX cons or if someone doesn't even consider said cons? That's my point here - this is not a matter of web design, being anti-web design is misguided and futile. The problem is not web design, the problem is: frivolous or oblivious decision-making, lack of knowledge and consideration about whoever uses the digital product being designed, lack of knowledge about design process, lack of knowledge about design "elements" (layout, color, typography), lack of knowledge of the implications of using extensive e.g. JS...
If you meant to say that "it has nothing to do with web design" then you should have said that instead of trying to defend "competent web designers" as if competence actually had anything to do with it.
No, I did not and - if you don't mind - I would suggest you spend some more time reading and analysing, instead of skim-reading and assuming my argument matches one of the predefined "boxes" you have. See below:
>If you meant to say that "it has nothing to do with web design" then you should have said that
Well, I did. How explicit do I have to be? I said: "then it's a matter of incompetence, not web design".
> instead of trying to defend "competent web designers"
Defend competent web designers? Again, it's a matter of competence. I defended competence - either from designers, programmers or PMs, "whoever decides" (as I stated, very explicitly).
> as if competence actually had anything to do with it.
As if? This is starting to sound very troll-like behaviour. From the beginning, I made it clear that this was about competence.
Someone who bitterly states that "you know nothing about design" is obviously a web designer who is personally insulted by this article, who is obviously defending "web design competence".
You've been arguing that "web design competence" is key here since you said that " A designer either designing for his or her own tastes or trying to find some best-of-all-worlds design will ultimately fail to satisfy the vast majority of visitors to the sit". As if.... but no, they add things we don't like because they have to. That's all you had to say. I think we agree otherwise, so whatever no big deal...
I did not. That came from the "manifesto"; I quoted it to counterpoint. I know it's Friday, but - come on - a little more attention. :)
My point is that it has nothing to do with incompetence, web-design or other. People do bad things for money.
You, OTOH clearly are addressing competence and web-design competence when you said "If a designer (or whoever decides) chooses to have custom fonts, client-side scripting or custom style sheets, it's because he weighted the downsides of said choice and still opted for it. If he did not, or he is not aware of the downsides, then it's a matter of incompetence, not web design."
It's OK to be completely wrong and off-point, but honestly - don't turn around and try to lie about it because someone called you out and you're embarrassed.
(Maybe the reason you're depressed at 30, the prime of your life, is that you're a high-strung prick who tends to take a simple misunderstanding and turn it into a shit-storm. C'est la vie. You put out crap and it comes right back to you ;)
False. Fonts make a massive difference in how people perceive a brand, and different fonts can be used for different types of content.
Imagine if every company used Comic Sans for their logo font. http://comicsansproject.tumblr.com/
Seriously, i looked over the page and could not tell the difference for the most part. Only ones i noticed some difference was those where you had a single prominent letter doing all the work.
Completely disagree with this one. The web has evolved into a landscape that exceeds its original intended use. It's not just about semantic documents any more - its community, interaction, and more in the most portable format we've ever seen.
The web has taken on a life of its own, beyond what it was initially designed for.
Don't expect your users to surf your website with a magnifying glass, e.g. http://smittenkitchen.com/
9) bis - If your site/app/product/service requires an account, show me what I'll get BEFORE forcing me to sign-up!