4 ms·

Minimal Web

89 points by zacharykai 2y ago

erikgahner 2y ago
I agree with a lot of these ideas but I do not get the obsession with short urls. E.g., why not make it easy for readers to see the date of when something was published? In this case I cannot even see a publication date on the post itself (looking at the archive it says it is from December 26, 2012). I would personally prefer a URL like /2012/minimal-web/ rather than /w/.
- OtomotO 2y ago
  Depends on the post`s content whether the date is relevant at all. Also, what if it's a technical post that was published a decade ago but updated last week? Many people would probably dismiss the info just by looking at the date. I would never add the date, but I agree with the shorturls. A good URL should not be too long but also not too short. (Although intermediate paths can be short, e.g. /u/123 instead of /users/123 is fine)
  - erikgahner 2y ago
    Good point! There is a difference between blog posts and pages to take into account here. For blog posts, I would like to see at least the publication year in the URL, as well as the exact date in the post itself. For pages, I am fine with leaving out the date in the URL, but I would still like to see a publication date + last update date (if not a URL to a changelog). My issue is that it can often be difficult to evaluate whether a date 'is relevant at all' at the time of publication. For that reason, I prefer bloggers to be transparent about when something was published (and/or revised).
    - OtomotO 2y ago
      But that's exactly what I meant: I am all for a very transparent "published at" and "last updated at" BUT NOT in the URL Because either you would update the URL to the last updated_at (which leads to complications if updated often, need to keep a 302 for each updated/outdated url although it's not moved permanently, rather temporarily until next update) Or you would be stuck with the original published date in the URL and potential readers could dismiss it based on a wrong assumption (that it's outdated) An alternative is to keep posting new entries for every update, but that gets annoying as well, because you still need to show somehow that the old versions are not the newest. So I totally agree to be upfront about original publishing date as well as last update date, but I would not put it in the URL, not for blog posts or any other page.
      - erikgahner 2y ago
        Fair point. My personal preference is still for blog posts to share this information in the URL, i.e., to communicate when a blog post was published even before I click a URL. Usually bloggers tend to write new entries if they change their mind or have any updates to previous blog posts. I personally prefer this approach rather than changing the content of old blog posts. But I agree that this might be more of a personal preference.
        OtomotO 2y ago
        It may just be that we consume different bloggers is all! I read quite a few who update texts, e.g. in the space of Rust or Webgpu In any case, I got your point. Thanks for the respectful, interesting discussion. Have a wonderful day!
        JanNash 2y ago
        This kind of wonderfully civilised and respectful discussion between people who do not see something the same way is why I love hn. Thank you both, have a good Sunday!
- ezequiel-garzon 2y ago
  I feel the dates of publication and last update should be readily available, that is in the content and at the beginning. Of course this goes against minimalism, and plenty of maximalist websites omit this information as well.
lokimedes 2y ago
On the aspects of logging and analytics. Back in the dark-ages, before javascript was a thing, we relied on webserver logs and local database entries. Later came the infamous transparent pixel for cross-site tracking. How many websites could suffice with such analytics today, I wonder? Has Google Analytics, and the likes, sold us on learned helplessness to support their own interests of getting cross-site data from everyone to power their advertising? Perhaps my idea of tracking value is stuck in the dark-ages as well…
- baliex 2y ago
  Totally agree. I’ve found goaccess to be the perfect tool for this. No tracking at all on the user’s side and enough information in the logs for me to get a feel for how much traffic I’m getting. There was a post here recently about anonymising the IP addresses in the logs to be absolutely sure that you don’t end up collecting any personally identifying information (PII).
- jasode 2y ago
  >, we relied on webserver logs and local database entries. [...] How many websites could suffice with such analytics today, I wonder? Has Google Analytics, and the likes, sold us on learned helplessness to [...] to power their advertising? No, it's not just serving Google's own interests for advertising. The GoogleAnalytics tags & tracking is also serving the desires of the content creators and authors. Think of it as 2 different levels of data: (1) server connections data -- vs -- (2) demographics data (1) Local server logs of anonymous users will have data like ip addresses and web browser user agent strings. One can use this for monitoring bandwidth, analyzing DDOS attacks, decide on Cloudflare, etc. It's "sysadmin" type of data vs "marketing" data. Yes, one can do some limited demographic info such as ip geolocation cross referencing and/or "mobile-vs-desktop-ratio" from user-agent strings but server logs don't have rich enough data to satisfy content creators. (2) GoogleAnalytics has higher-level data such as demographics[1]. Content creators like to get extra insights into "who their audience is". Male-vs-female ratios, young/old, etc That's why a so-called "simple" minimalist website such as https://motherfuckingwebsite.com/ https://motherfuckingwebsite.com/ ... that lectures readers on avoiding useless tech ... still has the author motivated to embed GoogleAnalytics into it. (Ctrl+U View Source to see GA script tag at the bottom.) Can't web authors just blog without giving a care about fine-grained audience demographics?!? Sure they can. But many of them don't. To them, getting insights into their audience helps them shape the next article or adjust their content, etc. [1] https://www.google.com/search?q=google+analyltics+demographics+data https://www.google.com/search?q=google+analyltics+demographi...
abcd_f 2y ago
They probably may want to fix few things with their own design - https://imgur.com/a/xu9J1P3 https://imgur.com/a/xu9J1P3
- blisstonia 2y ago
  Yeah the headings being teeny weeny is jarring.
  - omnimus 2y ago
    Differentiating headings using smaller size than text is legit approach as hiearchy is created using difference (not size). Its often used in print. But this is so badly executed it looks more like a mistake.
    - abcd_f 2y ago
      Judging also by the lack of padding around section headers I'm pretty sure them being in a smaller font was not a design decision in this case, but rather a lack of testing.
- Y_Y 2y ago
  On my Android Firefox 129.0.2 the text only takes up the middle third of the screen horizontally. I get the same linebreaks as in your screenshot though. For me this is not nice to read and feels like way too much wasted space.
xenodium 2y ago
This looks great. I'm building a blogging platform sharing much of this simplicity: https://lmno.lol https://lmno.lol My blog is at https://lmno.lol/alvaro https://lmno.lol/alvaro You can drag and drop your entire blog from a markdown file https://indieweb.social/@xenodium/112265481282475542 https://indieweb.social/@xenodium/112265481282475542 You can read blogs from anywhere, even terminal (no JS needed). No need to sign up or log in to try it out. You can edit ephemeral blogs. I haven't officially launched, but if you'd like to start blogging now, I'll be happy to share an invite code. Ping help AT lmno.lol.
ydave22 2y ago
Minimalism definitely simplifies things, but ditching analytics entirely could be risky, especially for growth. Server logs are nice, but they don’t give you the same insights into user behavior
alternatex 2y ago
A good sized readable font is a bit funny though. That line of text is very small on my phone and I presume most people today browse on phones. I can also imagine some phones with a higher resolution show this text even smaller making it completely illegible. I'm all about minimalism so long as it doesn't hurt UX but these examples of minimalism always end up going too far. It's like it becomes a competition for minimalists - "look how much more minimal I am than you! Therefore I'm a better minimalist."
- Yaina 2y ago
  Interesting, I'm also on my phone (Pixel 6) and I found the text on the site to be somewhat too big. Sounds like it's different for some reason? But I agree, I don't think this website is revolutionizing readability by being extremely plain.
  - alternatex 2y ago
    Interesting considering the Pixel 6 has 403 PPI and my phone Nothing Phone (1) has 402 PPI. So almost identical in that regard. Maybe it's a browser difference (Firefox here).
- nxobject 2y ago
  There are other styling bugs: on an iPhone, there’s no vertical space between a subhead the content below as well, and there’s too much space between a para and a bulleted list. Why not be minimal in implementation, too, and just use default styling? Don’t fear Times New Roman…
  - persnickety 2y ago
    Ah, yes, and my favorite: white text on a white background. Default to defaults.
- ziofill 2y ago
  In my minimal blog I use this, it seems to be working pretty well on a wide range of devices: /* styles.css */ html { max-width: 70ch; padding: 3em 1em; margin: auto; line-height: 1.75; font-size: 1.25em; }
agumonkey 2y ago
The emergence of business aspect on the web was the main mistake IMO. But it's probably a common pattern in every space. It's true that it shifts focus on being viewed rather than expressing or documenting something you care about in the form you prefer. In the old days it was a natural average.. lots of websites from classical to weird, on all kinds of topics, without a lot of structure. Everytime there was a lightness aspect. Add Google/SEO on top of that and everything starts to conform to shallow metrics. I'd pay a bit every month just to have tiny, light, non marketed websites.
lumenwrites 2y ago
Same point made in a more entertaining and less pretentious way: https://motherfuckingwebsite.com/ https://motherfuckingwebsite.com/ The idea of minimal web is appealing from some angle, but people add all the non-minimal stuff because it works. If you want to have readers, it is silly to avoid making basic optimizations. If you don't care about having readers - why not just write a journal?
iainmerrick 2y ago
Mostly sensible, but... a minimalist website should leave out: [...] tags or related posts That's taking it a bit too far. Those are what make the web a web!
- diggan 2y ago
  You could replace those "tags" or "related posts" with something that I consider to make the web a web; hyperlinks! Put them inside the post when you mention said other post, and done :)
  - atoav 2y ago
    Yeah but tags are also useful, not just for the reader but the writer(s). If you have a nerds blog writing mostly about electronics, programming and rice dishes having a special hyperlink that shows you just the posts of that category can be useful. Whether it is, depends on the content, both in kind and amount. I am a proponent of minimal websites, but not at the cost of usability.
Ferret7446 2y ago
You shouldn't be setting any formatting like the font or column width for a "real" "minimal" website. The browser should be handling that, in theory anyway.
- Joeri 2y ago
  In theory you can rely in the user’s default font. In practice because every site overrides those defaults you will get something they probably don’t want. Respecting font size by only using relative sizing is a good thing, but choosing a better font than times new roman is a good idea. I do wish websites would stop using custom fonts and just use a stack from https://modernfontstacks.com/ https://modernfontstacks.com/ But I know from experience that this is often not decided by the technical team.
richrichie 2y ago
Some of the most useful websites on www are those of math and com sc faculty - typically older generation - that has C code for their famous algorithm, used freely by millions. These guys couldn’t be bothered with formatting. Nor do we care.
pacifika 2y ago
I agree with most of this, but the idea should be extended to the authoring side, which is usually the opposite of friction free and minimal, so then the author is less likely to post. Thus I created my microblog CMS
nmorenoEM 2y ago
Safari's reader mode declutters any non-minimal website.
xnx 2y ago
No need to fetishize minimalism when you can target usability instead. Things can be too minimal but they cannot be too usable.
meiraleal 2y ago
Just publish a book then? Let people be creative with the web, why not?
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
lloydatkinson 2y ago
> tags or related posts Definitely can’t get on board with this one. There’s nothing stopping some basic hyperlinks be at the top or bottom. When I find a personal site I tend to spend a lot of time browsing around as I enjoy reading posts where I enjoy the technical content and/or writing style. Having some navigation aids means I get to see what the author considers related and important.
goestoo 2y ago
All of these requirements only apply to some hobbies blog. None of this apply in real world web applications, you need comments, related post to keep your users active and engaged, you need analytics to keep track of your progress.
- weinzierl 2y ago
  The author of the page is not exactly a hobbyist. He is making a living from his publications since 2007 and it allowed him and his family of eight to move from a small pacific island to California. He was in Time Magazine even.
agmater 2y ago
I take issue with a lot of this advice, actually. - The name of the site is not a necessity, the url makes it clear. Weird recommendation if you aim for a "pure reading experience". - Having a comment section doesn't detract from the reading at all. It's after reading your content, and can then enhance the discussion. Fine if you want to leave it out, but encouraging discussion on Twitter instead isn't 'minimal'. - Minimal images isn't something to strive for, visuals can greatly enhance your content. - Short urls look nice, but just `w` as your slug is just confusing. No harm in normal length urls. - Medium.com is used as an example, that site is 80% popups. Paul Graham's site is also awful to use (especially on mobile). Great content, hidden behind bad websites. - Why would related posts, or even tags, be bad? Navigation doesn't have to distract, and is a tool for the user. The author makes some fair points, nobody likes the bloat of the modern web. But you don't have to go "full minimalist" either, your website would be greatly improved if you change the #ffffff background with #000 text. It's the same with motherfuckingwebsite.com vs bettermotherfuckingwebsite.com; small changes can greatly increase the appeal, which will help your content get seen and spread. Like others mentioned, prioritizing a good user experience is probably what you want, not striving for minimalism.
snappr021 2y ago
Can we have a search engine that only indexes sites like this and does not index any site that does meet the requirements listed?
nsonha 2y ago
can we get all these "pure web" people to put their content on RSS or some sort of "pure information hub" like wikipedia? HTML clearly is not the medium for this anymore, have you seen how bloated and NOT content-centric (anymore) the spec is?
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
sneak 2y ago
Disagree. A popup asking for email (contact info) is an essential part of building and maintaining an audience. Blog posts don't exist in a vacuum. It's as important as ever to maintain direct relationships with your audience.
thih9 2y ago
This could be limiting for more complex content: forms with autocomplete, sortable tables, image galleries with navigation and zoom, etc. That’s fine - the project intends to support a minimalist UX after all. My point is that maximalist UX has user friendly patterns too.
shubhamjain 2y ago
Motherfucking Website[1] Law: Every year, someone reinvents a minimalistic, no-nonsense website concept / CSS framework. [1]: https://motherfuckingwebsite.com/ https://motherfuckingwebsite.com/
- perilunar 2y ago
  The better version was better: http://bettermotherfuckingwebsite.com http://bettermotherfuckingwebsite.com

89 points by zacharykai 2y ago

I agree with a lot of these ideas but I do not get the obsession with short urls. E.g., why not make it easy for readers to see the date of when something was published? In this case I cannot even see a publication date on the post itself (looking at the archive it says it is from December 26, 2012). I would personally prefer a URL like /2012/minimal-web/ rather than /w/.

OtomotO 2y ago
Depends on the post`s content whether the date is relevant at all. Also, what if it's a technical post that was published a decade ago but updated last week? Many people would probably dismiss the info just by looking at the date. I would never add the date, but I agree with the shorturls. A good URL should not be too long but also not too short. (Although intermediate paths can be short, e.g. /u/123 instead of /users/123 is fine)
- erikgahner 2y ago
  Good point! There is a difference between blog posts and pages to take into account here. For blog posts, I would like to see at least the publication year in the URL, as well as the exact date in the post itself. For pages, I am fine with leaving out the date in the URL, but I would still like to see a publication date + last update date (if not a URL to a changelog). My issue is that it can often be difficult to evaluate whether a date 'is relevant at all' at the time of publication. For that reason, I prefer bloggers to be transparent about when something was published (and/or revised).
  - OtomotO 2y ago
    But that's exactly what I meant: I am all for a very transparent "published at" and "last updated at" BUT NOT in the URL Because either you would update the URL to the last updated_at (which leads to complications if updated often, need to keep a 302 for each updated/outdated url although it's not moved permanently, rather temporarily until next update) Or you would be stuck with the original published date in the URL and potential readers could dismiss it based on a wrong assumption (that it's outdated) An alternative is to keep posting new entries for every update, but that gets annoying as well, because you still need to show somehow that the old versions are not the newest. So I totally agree to be upfront about original publishing date as well as last update date, but I would not put it in the URL, not for blog posts or any other page.
    - erikgahner 2y ago
      Fair point. My personal preference is still for blog posts to share this information in the URL, i.e., to communicate when a blog post was published even before I click a URL. Usually bloggers tend to write new entries if they change their mind or have any updates to previous blog posts. I personally prefer this approach rather than changing the content of old blog posts. But I agree that this might be more of a personal preference.
      - OtomotO 2y ago
        It may just be that we consume different bloggers is all! I read quite a few who update texts, e.g. in the space of Rust or Webgpu In any case, I got your point. Thanks for the respectful, interesting discussion. Have a wonderful day!
        JanNash 2y ago
        This kind of wonderfully civilised and respectful discussion between people who do not see something the same way is why I love hn. Thank you both, have a good Sunday!
ezequiel-garzon 2y ago
I feel the dates of publication and last update should be readily available, that is in the content and at the beginning. Of course this goes against minimalism, and plenty of maximalist websites omit this information as well.

lokimedes 2y ago

On the aspects of logging and analytics. Back in the dark-ages, before javascript was a thing, we relied on webserver logs and local database entries. Later came the infamous transparent pixel for cross-site tracking. How many websites could suffice with such analytics today, I wonder? Has Google Analytics, and the likes, sold us on learned helplessness to support their own interests of getting cross-site data from everyone to power their advertising? Perhaps my idea of tracking value is stuck in the dark-ages as well…

baliex 2y ago
Totally agree. I’ve found goaccess to be the perfect tool for this. No tracking at all on the user’s side and enough information in the logs for me to get a feel for how much traffic I’m getting. There was a post here recently about anonymising the IP addresses in the logs to be absolutely sure that you don’t end up collecting any personally identifying information (PII).
jasode 2y ago
>, we relied on webserver logs and local database entries. [...] How many websites could suffice with such analytics today, I wonder? Has Google Analytics, and the likes, sold us on learned helplessness to [...] to power their advertising? No, it's not just serving Google's own interests for advertising. The GoogleAnalytics tags & tracking is also serving the desires of the content creators and authors. Think of it as 2 different levels of data: (1) server connections data -- vs -- (2) demographics data (1) Local server logs of anonymous users will have data like ip addresses and web browser user agent strings. One can use this for monitoring bandwidth, analyzing DDOS attacks, decide on Cloudflare, etc. It's "sysadmin" type of data vs "marketing" data. Yes, one can do some limited demographic info such as ip geolocation cross referencing and/or "mobile-vs-desktop-ratio" from user-agent strings but server logs don't have rich enough data to satisfy content creators. (2) GoogleAnalytics has higher-level data such as demographics[1]. Content creators like to get extra insights into "who their audience is". Male-vs-female ratios, young/old, etc That's why a so-called "simple" minimalist website such as https://motherfuckingwebsite.com/ https://motherfuckingwebsite.com/ ... that lectures readers on avoiding useless tech ... still has the author motivated to embed GoogleAnalytics into it. (Ctrl+U View Source to see GA script tag at the bottom.) Can't web authors just blog without giving a care about fine-grained audience demographics?!? Sure they can. But many of them don't. To them, getting insights into their audience helps them shape the next article or adjust their content, etc. [1] https://www.google.com/search?q=google+analyltics+demographics+data https://www.google.com/search?q=google+analyltics+demographi...

abcd_f 2y ago

They probably may want to fix few things with their own design - https://imgur.com/a/xu9J1P3 https://imgur.com/a/xu9J1P3

blisstonia 2y ago
Yeah the headings being teeny weeny is jarring.
- omnimus 2y ago
  Differentiating headings using smaller size than text is legit approach as hiearchy is created using difference (not size). Its often used in print. But this is so badly executed it looks more like a mistake.
  - abcd_f 2y ago
    Judging also by the lack of padding around section headers I'm pretty sure them being in a smaller font was not a design decision in this case, but rather a lack of testing.
Y_Y 2y ago
On my Android Firefox 129.0.2 the text only takes up the middle third of the screen horizontally. I get the same linebreaks as in your screenshot though. For me this is not nice to read and feels like way too much wasted space.

xenodium 2y ago

This looks great. I'm building a blogging platform sharing much of this simplicity: https://lmno.lol https://lmno.lol My blog is at https://lmno.lol/alvaro https://lmno.lol/alvaro You can drag and drop your entire blog from a markdown file https://indieweb.social/@xenodium/112265481282475542 https://indieweb.social/@xenodium/112265481282475542 You can read blogs from anywhere, even terminal (no JS needed). No need to sign up or log in to try it out. You can edit ephemeral blogs. I haven't officially launched, but if you'd like to start blogging now, I'll be happy to share an invite code. Ping help AT lmno.lol.

ydave22 2y ago

Minimalism definitely simplifies things, but ditching analytics entirely could be risky, especially for growth. Server logs are nice, but they don’t give you the same insights into user behavior

alternatex 2y ago

A good sized readable font is a bit funny though. That line of text is very small on my phone and I presume most people today browse on phones. I can also imagine some phones with a higher resolution show this text even smaller making it completely illegible. I'm all about minimalism so long as it doesn't hurt UX but these examples of minimalism always end up going too far. It's like it becomes a competition for minimalists - "look how much more minimal I am than you! Therefore I'm a better minimalist."

Yaina 2y ago
Interesting, I'm also on my phone (Pixel 6) and I found the text on the site to be somewhat too big. Sounds like it's different for some reason? But I agree, I don't think this website is revolutionizing readability by being extremely plain.
- alternatex 2y ago
  Interesting considering the Pixel 6 has 403 PPI and my phone Nothing Phone (1) has 402 PPI. So almost identical in that regard. Maybe it's a browser difference (Firefox here).
nxobject 2y ago
There are other styling bugs: on an iPhone, there’s no vertical space between a subhead the content below as well, and there’s too much space between a para and a bulleted list. Why not be minimal in implementation, too, and just use default styling? Don’t fear Times New Roman…
- persnickety 2y ago
  Ah, yes, and my favorite: white text on a white background. Default to defaults.
ziofill 2y ago
In my minimal blog I use this, it seems to be working pretty well on a wide range of devices: /* styles.css */ html { max-width: 70ch; padding: 3em 1em; margin: auto; line-height: 1.75; font-size: 1.25em; }

agumonkey 2y ago

The emergence of business aspect on the web was the main mistake IMO. But it's probably a common pattern in every space. It's true that it shifts focus on being viewed rather than expressing or documenting something you care about in the form you prefer. In the old days it was a natural average.. lots of websites from classical to weird, on all kinds of topics, without a lot of structure. Everytime there was a lightness aspect. Add Google/SEO on top of that and everything starts to conform to shallow metrics. I'd pay a bit every month just to have tiny, light, non marketed websites.

lumenwrites 2y ago

Same point made in a more entertaining and less pretentious way: https://motherfuckingwebsite.com/ https://motherfuckingwebsite.com/ The idea of minimal web is appealing from some angle, but people add all the non-minimal stuff because it works. If you want to have readers, it is silly to avoid making basic optimizations. If you don't care about having readers - why not just write a journal?

iainmerrick 2y ago

Mostly sensible, but... a minimalist website should leave out: [...] tags or related posts That's taking it a bit too far. Those are what make the web a web!

diggan 2y ago
You could replace those "tags" or "related posts" with something that I consider to make the web a web; hyperlinks! Put them inside the post when you mention said other post, and done :)
- atoav 2y ago
  Yeah but tags are also useful, not just for the reader but the writer(s). If you have a nerds blog writing mostly about electronics, programming and rice dishes having a special hyperlink that shows you just the posts of that category can be useful. Whether it is, depends on the content, both in kind and amount. I am a proponent of minimal websites, but not at the cost of usability.

Ferret7446 2y ago

You shouldn't be setting any formatting like the font or column width for a "real" "minimal" website. The browser should be handling that, in theory anyway.

Joeri 2y ago
In theory you can rely in the user’s default font. In practice because every site overrides those defaults you will get something they probably don’t want. Respecting font size by only using relative sizing is a good thing, but choosing a better font than times new roman is a good idea. I do wish websites would stop using custom fonts and just use a stack from https://modernfontstacks.com/ https://modernfontstacks.com/ But I know from experience that this is often not decided by the technical team.

richrichie 2y ago

Some of the most useful websites on www are those of math and com sc faculty - typically older generation - that has C code for their famous algorithm, used freely by millions. These guys couldn’t be bothered with formatting. Nor do we care.

pacifika 2y ago

I agree with most of this, but the idea should be extended to the authoring side, which is usually the opposite of friction free and minimal, so then the author is less likely to post. Thus I created my microblog CMS

nmorenoEM 2y ago

Safari's reader mode declutters any non-minimal website.

xnx 2y ago

No need to fetishize minimalism when you can target usability instead. Things can be too minimal but they cannot be too usable.

meiraleal 2y ago

Just publish a book then? Let people be creative with the web, why not?

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

lloydatkinson 2y ago

> tags or related posts Definitely can’t get on board with this one. There’s nothing stopping some basic hyperlinks be at the top or bottom. When I find a personal site I tend to spend a lot of time browsing around as I enjoy reading posts where I enjoy the technical content and/or writing style. Having some navigation aids means I get to see what the author considers related and important.

goestoo 2y ago

All of these requirements only apply to some hobbies blog. None of this apply in real world web applications, you need comments, related post to keep your users active and engaged, you need analytics to keep track of your progress.

weinzierl 2y ago
The author of the page is not exactly a hobbyist. He is making a living from his publications since 2007 and it allowed him and his family of eight to move from a small pacific island to California. He was in Time Magazine even.

agmater 2y ago

I take issue with a lot of this advice, actually. - The name of the site is not a necessity, the url makes it clear. Weird recommendation if you aim for a "pure reading experience". - Having a comment section doesn't detract from the reading at all. It's after reading your content, and can then enhance the discussion. Fine if you want to leave it out, but encouraging discussion on Twitter instead isn't 'minimal'. - Minimal images isn't something to strive for, visuals can greatly enhance your content. - Short urls look nice, but just `w` as your slug is just confusing. No harm in normal length urls. - Medium.com is used as an example, that site is 80% popups. Paul Graham's site is also awful to use (especially on mobile). Great content, hidden behind bad websites. - Why would related posts, or even tags, be bad? Navigation doesn't have to distract, and is a tool for the user. The author makes some fair points, nobody likes the bloat of the modern web. But you don't have to go "full minimalist" either, your website would be greatly improved if you change the #ffffff background with #000 text. It's the same with motherfuckingwebsite.com vs bettermotherfuckingwebsite.com; small changes can greatly increase the appeal, which will help your content get seen and spread. Like others mentioned, prioritizing a good user experience is probably what you want, not striving for minimalism.

snappr021 2y ago

Can we have a search engine that only indexes sites like this and does not index any site that does meet the requirements listed?

nsonha 2y ago

can we get all these "pure web" people to put their content on RSS or some sort of "pure information hub" like wikipedia? HTML clearly is not the medium for this anymore, have you seen how bloated and NOT content-centric (anymore) the spec is?

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

sneak 2y ago

Disagree. A popup asking for email (contact info) is an essential part of building and maintaining an audience. Blog posts don't exist in a vacuum. It's as important as ever to maintain direct relationships with your audience.

thih9 2y ago

This could be limiting for more complex content: forms with autocomplete, sortable tables, image galleries with navigation and zoom, etc. That’s fine - the project intends to support a minimalist UX after all. My point is that maximalist UX has user friendly patterns too.

shubhamjain 2y ago

Motherfucking Website[1] Law: Every year, someone reinvents a minimalistic, no-nonsense website concept / CSS framework. [1]: https://motherfuckingwebsite.com/ https://motherfuckingwebsite.com/

perilunar 2y ago
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