There's 'ugly yet interesting' and then there's 'ugly and boring'. This is the latter I'm afraid.
At its core, the homepage is still showing the output of a CMS looping through a folder of markdown files (probably) and displaying the title wrapped in a hyperlink. There appears to be zero information architecture - no visually distinct categories, no icons, images or dates, so everything is equally weighted, just in a slightly "wacky" format.
Most dev blogs get their traffic from something showing up on organic search, so the site homepage doesn't really matter, unless the dev actively wants to make it interesting, and encourage exploration. Despite the attempt at breaking that mold, this website feels much the same as those ones using a boring default Ghost template.
No need to be afraid, the point is the author isn't creating it to please an audience. They are creating it to please themself. So your opinion isn't relevant to the author or this linked written piece.
I don't think I did. The homepage is the only thing that's unique about the design. Had you arrived on any page besides that, you would think this is a bog-standard developer's blogsite, one skinny column amid a sea of white space.
It's possible to have an ugly site that's still easily navigable and visually interesting, even if the author is the only user.
Respectfully, to the author's point, none of that matters and neither does anything in your previous post. The author likes it, and has fun creating it and enjoys molding and re-shaping it to their own changing desires over the years. That's what they find important to them, not anything that you've mentioned. As the author writes...
>Somebody with good taste could’ve made my website, but then it wouldn’t be mine.
>To bake bread, many feel compelled to grow wheat, mine salt, culture yeast, etc. Not me. My puerile palate yearns for buckets of Olive Garden breadsticks.
>That’s okay. Your “mine” is not my "mine."
... and...
>Soon it will become something else entirely. Because it’s my website and I’m perpetually becoming somebody else.
>You’ll change too. Your passions and values will pollinate; your ugly thing – whatever it is – will come alive again and again.
They've created something that is authentically "them", in a way that is authentically "them". And they love that. Not having images, or icons, or categories, or being easily navigable, or having a blog post section that looks "bog-standard" to you or anybody else are all completely irrelevant.
I guess the question is if I create something that's extremely derivative and standard/boring but I say that it's uniquely myself then is that true? I suppose it could be if I'm calling myself boring.
At its core, the homepage is still showing the output of a CMS looping through a folder of markdown files (probably) and displaying the title wrapped in a hyperlink. There appears to be zero information architecture - no visually distinct categories, no icons, images or dates, so everything is equally weighted, just in a slightly "wacky" format.
Most dev blogs get their traffic from something showing up on organic search, so the site homepage doesn't really matter, unless the dev actively wants to make it interesting, and encourage exploration. Despite the attempt at breaking that mold, this website feels much the same as those ones using a boring default Ghost template.