A website to destroy all websites

Original Article ↗ Hacker News Discussion ↗

Design, JavaScript, and Readability

  • Many liked the site’s aesthetics, calling it beautiful, art-gallery-like, or “magazine-like,” especially on mobile.
  • Others found it hard to read: very small fonts, narrow columns, overlapping images and text on desktop, and motion/animation interfering with focus.
  • Debate over JS: some insist text pages should work without JS; others say requiring JS is a valid design choice. A few note it works with JS off if CSS is also disabled or via reader mode.
  • Consensus: strong, opinionated design invites equally strong criticism; for some, it reinforces the essay’s message, for others, it undermines it.

Nostalgia for the “Old Web”

  • Some miss forums, hand-coded sites, quirky personal pages, and slower, less monetized interaction.
  • Others argue the “old web” still exists alongside everything else; what changed is mainstream adoption and scale.
  • Several comments say nostalgia glosses over past problems (poor discoverability, low audiences, technical friction) and romanticizes a small, self-selected community.
  • A recurring view: people resent that the internet now serves a much broader population with very different tastes.

Personal Websites, IndieWeb, and Barriers

  • Many appreciate the call to build personal sites and some report being inspired to start or revive blogs.
  • Others see the proposed steps (HTML, self-hosting, IndieWeb, Webmentions) as hobbyist-level and unrealistic for most people.
  • Real friction points highlighted: buying domains, hosting, spam/security concerns, and—above all—discoverability and audience.
  • Static sites and free hosts (Neocities, WordPress.com, Cloudflare Pages) are cited as viable for non-dynamic content.

Centralization, Capitalism, and Distribution

  • Strong agreement that ad-driven, engagement-maximizing platforms shape much of what feels “bad” about today’s web.
  • Several argue the core problem is the funding model (advertising and attention markets), not technology itself; without changing that, indie efforts are “mugs of coffee on a forest fire.”
  • Others stress network effects and distribution: people use YouTube, TikTok, Reddit, etc. because that’s where audiences and discovery are; self-hosted sites can’t match that.

Meta: HN Culture and Coping Strategies

  • Some lament HN’s negativity and cynicism, noting how much of this thread nitpicks the site’s design rather than engaging the thesis. Others defend critique without offering solutions.
  • Practical “escape hatches” mentioned: RSS, newsletters, personal blogs, private forums, federated platforms, and browser/extension “overlay networks” that filter out low-quality or aggravating content.