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So for most people that are in the situation you describe I'd say they would probably just spin up a WordPress instance, pick a theme they like, and start posti

So for most people that are in the situation you describe I'd say they would probably just spin up a WordPress instance, pick a theme they like, and start posting. A static html site? Even easier. There are tons of services out there that will let you host your own content for very little money or even free. You can set up a static site on a platform like 1mb.com for next to nothing and edit the html, css, etc. To your hearts content. JavaScript mostly runs in the browser unless you're doing something more complicated than hosting your blog. I taught myself HTML by reading source code when I was around 12 (I'm not a coder by trade). It's not a super complicated language. Nor is CSS. And there's sites like CSS Zen Garden, w3schools, and template sites all over the internet that ease that transition. You talk about that general public, but this is a site mostly of techies, so it's natural that topics like this would be present here, far more natural than politics or posts on gossip at least. For the general public it's still pretty easy with numerous site builders, hosted solutions, etc. that will do all the heavy lifting for you. If you're not willing to take the time to learn, there's always someone who will charge you for their experience and make sure you're set up well enough to do what you need to. It can't be that hard to do with the proliferation of crackpots, marketers, and homemakers who are able to set up their own sites effectively. While I can certainly sympathize and empathize with the idea that as a community we sometimes don't realize the difficulty in some things, on this particular topic, I think that between the market and open solutions there's a wide array of options available for someone to host their own blog with a number of entry ramps of differing difficulty.

Invictus0 7y ago
Home Depot sells a service where you can pay $100 to have a professional handyman come to your house and knock four nails into your wall to install a shelf. People pay this because the level of complexity of using a hammer is too high. I have seen the light go out of the eyes of people with a non-technical background trying to explain even the most basic of engineering concepts (most recently, why I can't get a 10lb meterlong brick to magically lift itself out of its packaging). HTML might be the most simple language we have, but it's not simple in an absolute sense, and nothing about setting up a website outside of the platforms really is. Ask your non-technical friends: I bet most of them are not even familiar with the concept of hosting a site.
- olooney 7y ago
  There's a weird bug in human psychology where anything we can easily do ourselves is considered "easy" in an absolute sense, even if we've literally spend years or even decades acquiring the skills that make it so easy. No patch is forthcoming and the issue has been marked WONTFIX in the tracker.
  - cannonedhamster 7y ago
    If you can't point and click then you cannot use a computer and you're not hosting a blog, you're probably not using a computer. There's no one who can post to Facebook that doesn't have the capability to host their own website.
- cannonedhamster 7y ago
  I am abundantly aware of the skills of most people. I even addressed exactly what you said in my response numerous times. I specifically said you can pay someone to host your site using site builders, templates, etc. None of that prevents someone from hosting their own site. You seem to be conflating hosting your own site from building a site from scratch. Chances are if someone doesn't have the ability to even pay someone to host their site, they aren't the target for this conversation and your point is essential moot.
  - Invictus0 7y ago
    No, you're just not grasping the difficulty here. Every time you introduce a new vocabulary word, you add cognitive load to learn that definition. Google "what is hosting" and you will get even more confused when they start talking about servers. Then they add extras: privacy guard, mail, SSL, even just getting a domain. To complicate things more, if you ask anyone vaguely technical for help, they will start talking about how you're getting ripped off and recommend S3 buckets and FTP access etc etc. These are not simple things; and I'm not saying all that to say oh, there's some idiots out there that can't do it; I'm saying this because when I built my own website, at 17 years old and with absolutely no CS background, my personal experience was that it was a very big learning curve and I think the average person just will not make it. With a platform, you just... write. And it just works.
pbhjpbhj 7y ago
I've not written a site from scratch in a few years (3 or 4) until recently, CSS has got a lot more complex (and yet also slightly easier as most of the core is the same across 98% of in-use browsers). I hadn't done flexbox or css grid, didn't know what rem was, hadn't used calc(), or media queries that target based on viewport size. Just spin-up a Wordpress instance sounds easy but most people will need/want a few plugins and things start getting complicated fast. Before long you're handling passing special headers by modifying .htaccess and looking at Leaflet.js source code ... just to stick up a simple WordPress site. And you still missed a million 'basics' like resizing media appropriately and adding aria-labels, and your site is not SEO friendly, and you didn't handle backups yet, ...
- cannonedhamster 7y ago
  None of what you're saying is more than point and click in WordPress. No one you're describing is doing anything as complicated as you're describing because they don't know to even ask for it. They are going to be perfectly happy with what they are offered stock. Paying someone to host your site means things like site builders with auto resize and point and click interfaces exist. It's like half my comment was ignored.

Invictus0 7y ago

Home Depot sells a service where you can pay $100 to have a professional handyman come to your house and knock four nails into your wall to install a shelf. People pay this because the level of complexity of using a hammer is too high. I have seen the light go out of the eyes of people with a non-technical background trying to explain even the most basic of engineering concepts (most recently, why I can't get a 10lb meterlong brick to magically lift itself out of its packaging). HTML might be the most simple language we have, but it's not simple in an absolute sense, and nothing about setting up a website outside of the platforms really is. Ask your non-technical friends: I bet most of them are not even familiar with the concept of hosting a site.

olooney 7y ago
There's a weird bug in human psychology where anything we can easily do ourselves is considered "easy" in an absolute sense, even if we've literally spend years or even decades acquiring the skills that make it so easy. No patch is forthcoming and the issue has been marked WONTFIX in the tracker.
- cannonedhamster 7y ago
  If you can't point and click then you cannot use a computer and you're not hosting a blog, you're probably not using a computer. There's no one who can post to Facebook that doesn't have the capability to host their own website.
cannonedhamster 7y ago
I am abundantly aware of the skills of most people. I even addressed exactly what you said in my response numerous times. I specifically said you can pay someone to host your site using site builders, templates, etc. None of that prevents someone from hosting their own site. You seem to be conflating hosting your own site from building a site from scratch. Chances are if someone doesn't have the ability to even pay someone to host their site, they aren't the target for this conversation and your point is essential moot.
- Invictus0 7y ago
  No, you're just not grasping the difficulty here. Every time you introduce a new vocabulary word, you add cognitive load to learn that definition. Google "what is hosting" and you will get even more confused when they start talking about servers. Then they add extras: privacy guard, mail, SSL, even just getting a domain. To complicate things more, if you ask anyone vaguely technical for help, they will start talking about how you're getting ripped off and recommend S3 buckets and FTP access etc etc. These are not simple things; and I'm not saying all that to say oh, there's some idiots out there that can't do it; I'm saying this because when I built my own website, at 17 years old and with absolutely no CS background, my personal experience was that it was a very big learning curve and I think the average person just will not make it. With a platform, you just... write. And it just works.

pbhjpbhj 7y ago

I've not written a site from scratch in a few years (3 or 4) until recently, CSS has got a lot more complex (and yet also slightly easier as most of the core is the same across 98% of in-use browsers). I hadn't done flexbox or css grid, didn't know what rem was, hadn't used calc(), or media queries that target based on viewport size. Just spin-up a Wordpress instance sounds easy but most people will need/want a few plugins and things start getting complicated fast. Before long you're handling passing special headers by modifying .htaccess and looking at Leaflet.js source code ... just to stick up a simple WordPress site. And you still missed a million 'basics' like resizing media appropriately and adding aria-labels, and your site is not SEO friendly, and you didn't handle backups yet, ...

cannonedhamster 7y ago
None of what you're saying is more than point and click in WordPress. No one you're describing is doing anything as complicated as you're describing because they don't know to even ask for it. They are going to be perfectly happy with what they are offered stock. Paying someone to host your site means things like site builders with auto resize and point and click interfaces exist. It's like half my comment was ignored.