Love how many of the sites listed here have brutalist low-JS design. The only thing I despise more than the new social media focused internet is, JS-heavy blogs containing one post that explains how that monstrosity was created.
Then after a few months the author will rewrite the blog again with a different framework and add another entry explaining why and how they did it.
Here's mine. Built with Hugo and deployed with GitHub Pages. The whole publication process is automated with GitHub Actions and takes a few key strokes to go from an idea to execution.
Honestly I don't think a low JS usage makes a website better. For me, I always cherished a separation of concerns approach, where I am trying to make a website work as good as possible with HTML and CSS only (including print stylesheets).
JS on the other hand is for me where the fun interaction comes from, where the little details can shine through, where visualizations can be made interactive so the user can play around and really start to understand what's going on.
But yeah, I guess in the golden age of React and Angular, I also understand why people hade JS bloated websites.
Here's mine, there is multiple scavenger hunts, games and challenges hidden on the website and/or in the code:
Your website is delightful. I love the Recipe Creator feature on your projects page.
Your approach to using JS is like mine. I work with HTML and CSS first then sometimes add JS to progressively enhance a page (i.e. add dark mode, add hovercards on links, make emojis appear on different days of the year).
I'm confused by that cookie banner. Is it a joke or not? What do you mean by "Do you consent to sharing cookies?" are sharing cookies a special kind of cookie or do did you just mean storing cookies?
Haha :D yeah, it is a joke/pun on cookie consent banners.
The personal problem I have with cookie banners is that in order to _not consent_ they store a local cookie to not display the banner.
And the assumption of consent is by default, which is the exact opposite behaviour of what GDPR expects you to do. Nobody can consent by default to anything, that's the foundational basis of law in the EU.
I'm not using cookies for anything on my website, so there's no point in storing cookies. The Do Not Consent game is for people that want to play off some steam.
Isn't it astounding how much more brittle those react-y monstrosities are?!
If you look twice some toolbar will silently begin to fail loading and you'll have to bump your browser to get the full experience back again.
While back someone posted a web1.0 randomizer, everything still worked, granted its static but, its like those old 90s pages are the new time capsules.
I like single column multi page blogs where folks just list out a bunch of heartfelt pieces they wrote about something and fired it into the aether.
This UI maximalism is like Marvel movies—tons of CGI and fancy visuals with poor storytelling. But at least writing these FE frameworks and JS evangelism pays the bill quite well.
It's because mindless businesstypes looked at Apple iOS over a decade ago and said "our website [with 1/9999999th the budget] should have the same polish and look and feel as that!"
This is way more organized than anything I have seen like this before. They have a section on how to host a meeting with before/during/after meeting tips. That definitely gives the impression they've got their act together as a group and are trying to make it easier for newbies.
This is the first I've heard about your event, or the preceding border:none ... despite living in Nürnberg and generally being on the lookout for English-speaking events.
I'll put both in my department's "General" Teams channel, as nearly half of us are not native German speakers - and most of the native German speakers are perfectly happy to get their web dev content in English.
The last border:none was 10 years ago IIRC. They are bringing all the same speakers back and some new ones.
A lot of IndieWeb events have been hosted in Germany.
There is an event called Beyond Tellerrand (btconf) hosted in Düsseldorf and Berlin every year, hosted by Marc and his amazing team (unaffiliated with Homebrew Website Club).
The IndieWeb sometimes hosts host events before or after Beyond Tellerrand conferences (I was at last year's Berlin btconf and IndieWeb event). I know it is a long journey from Nürnberg to those cities but both btconf and the IndieWeb events are both amazing ways to spend a few days if you love the web.
A couple of years ago I visited one of their meetings [Indieweb] in Germany. It was great fun. They are an incredibly friendly, open-minded and organised bunch.
I think I might try and join in on one of the virtual meetups. I'm in North Carolina, so hard to find something in my time zone, but eh.
My site is one of those that modern folks call "virtual gardens" sometimes. Love to have new visitors, and I'm allergic to SEO for my personal stuff, haha.
You should know that your headshot photo doesn't scale down correctly on Firefox/Pixel 7. Currently it overflows the right side of the page causing horizontal scrolling.
Hey, I like your site! Especially like the selection of fonts you linked, thanks. Also checked out the static site generator you linked to, and thought you might want to know that their website gives an error unless you include the "www." prefix in the url.
I'm gonna add you to my list of potential guests for my https://peopleandblogs.com because I really enjoy your site. So you'll get an email from me at some point in the future.
I find most of these sites follow the brutalist web design trend[0]. Nothing wrong with that. In the end, if the site is user-friendly and does what its supposed to, and is otherwise easy to navigate and is readable, then why not?
So much of the web are these copycat 'zines' which are jam-packed with all sorts of bells and whistles and have a sidebar packed with ADs and the content is laced with affiliate links so they can 'monetize' their web presence.
I enjoy other people's little 'corner of the web' which isn't housed in a walled garden social media platform, like the bulk of content these days.
Ya I love finding sites that are uniquely someone's, not SEO optimized knock-offs. I personally might not find the design appealing, but I appreciate when someone makes their site theirs. Likewise, most will not enjoy my site's design, but it's mine.
So it's really called brutalist web design? Someone mentioned it to me on IRC but I thought it was just the adjective he used to describe the https://motherfuckingwebsite.com. Had no idea this had turned into an entire design trend.
People conflate brutalist design with user hostile UI. If a site doesn't wrap properly one a decent phone, it's user hostile. The brutalist moniker mostly means low-JS and less formulaic sites that aren't SEO optimized to the bones.
I wanted to note that homebrew websites and SEO optimized websites aren't necessarily opponents here, or in opposite corners. They are often the same tech under the hood.
Case in point: SvelteJS. It's absolutely great for a homebrew website. It's also maintained by the NYTimes, which I subscribe to and like myself, but which also has a large chunk of its business in the SEO optimized website category (see: Wirecutter).
It does it in a classy way which doesn't feel so much like ads are being stuffed down your throat - but that business is SEO optimized down to its bones.
Just skimming the front page of Wirecutter now, a NYTimes owned property, shows articles like "The Best Sunscreens for Your Face", "The best beard trimmers we tested side by side surrounded by their attachments", "The Best Women’s Razors (for Every Body)" - these are all so textbook and by the SEO playbook they could be taught in a course.
Hello everyone! I have been co-hosting the Europe Homebrew Website Club for the last year and a half.
During the calls we come together to chat about websites: what you are building, what you want to build, and how you can build it! If you are interested in the web, I (and the rest of community!) would love to see you!
Hi, I'd like to come, too (virtually ofc). A few months ago I started a (very minimalist) blog [0], using a very simple blogging engine I wrote myself [1] in under 400 lines of Emacs Lisp.
Just a static site where I write stuff I think about. My idea is to write a new page every time I get the feeling I've written the same HN comment multiple times. Currently working on posts about ads and copyright which are topics I've commented on many times.
> what you want to build
I want to improve the website design. Haven't managed to create a header that doesn't look ugly yet.
> how you can build it
Some time ago I made a comment here on HN recommending pugjs for static sites and writing HTML by hand:
Not long afterwards I realized it has been unmaintained for years. So I forked it and took over maintenance. Deleted the parts I didn't need. Now it's a new variant of the language and it's powering my own site.
Hey James - I appreciate your enthusiasm about this idea. I technically never stopped https://www.theninhotline.com, but after a few years, it was clear that social networks like Twitter and Facebook had taken over as our primary channel.
About two years ago, I decided to rebuild the site (partially to get some hands-on experience building a PWA) and have basically been doing a gut-job of the frontend. I removed tracking pixels, frameworks and other javascript cruft, and brought focus to the RSS feed again. I spent time building a library of website 'cover art' too, which I cycle in periodically - typically when I post a new update to the blog. There's a lot more cleaning to do, but I'm happy to be actively iterating on the ol' website again.
I'm based in Philadelphia, but I've got a lot going on IRL compared to when I launched this site 24 years ago, and I don't think I could do a regular meetup. But keep on fighting the good fight!
> it was clear that social networks like Twitter and Facebook had taken over as our primary channel
There are a lot of people in the IndieWeb who care about, and are working toward, building different ways to interact on the web. I follow blogs and people with Monocle (https://monocle.p3k.io), a social reader powered by Microsub (draft spec) and Micropub (https://indieweb.org/Micropub)
I can like posts on websites in my feed then the likes show up on my bookmarks site (https://jamesg.coffee). If a site supports Webmention (https://indieweb.org/Webmention), the author will be notified that I liked their post.
I am always happy to talk about social interactions on the web -- there is so much work we can do!
> I spent time building a library of website 'cover art' too, which I cycle in periodically - typically when I post a new update to the blog. There's a lot more cleaning to do, but I'm happy to be actively iterating on the ol' website again.
I _love_ this!
> I don't think I could do a regular meetup
We have a lot of people who stop by for a meetup every month or two online. All interested in the web are welcome to come on whatever cadence suits you; whether you come once a week, month, or year! There is also a community chat if you prefer text at https://indieweb.org/discuss
(Apologies for all the links. As it may be noted, I get excited easily!)
I love the indieweb philosophy. I'm a bit off the topic of the tech sites shared here, but I have a recipe site (mostly from around the world) with my partner. This is the domain (in spanish, sorry!): https://www.foodisea.com
This is amazing! We talked about recipes at Homebrew Website Club a few weeks ago. We asked ourselves "how could we share our own recipes online?"
The layout of your recipes and the focus on the process without extraneous information makes me want to learn more about cooking. I have always been scared off by recipe sites. Your site looks like a great entry point for me.
Have been following your feed for a while now. Got really inspired by the HWC and started a programming meetup in my city. Also because I build https://heyhomepage.com which fits the niche.
Might see some of you in Nurnberg!
Here's mine, https://drollery.org (I have not put much effort into the mobile version, it's a bit wonky since a recent styling update, best enjoyed on desktop). This is mostly in exercise in "why not?"
The rough edges on the site reminds of the good ol' 90s web which I never experienced. My experience with the early web is limited to the Wayback Machine.
I went with an off-the-shelf, single-column theme and build mine on similar principles of simplicity and personal touch ups: https://rednafi.com
Yeah, many times I was keen to join the IndieWeb events, but I was put off by the requirement of Zoom. Jitsi would be perfect for IndieWeb as one of their principles is “owning your data”.
Have you viewed source on my site? You'll see a few comments along the way. I wanted to write my site in such a way that someone new to the web could take a look and learn how the HTML works on the page.
I used to be a regular in-person attendee here in Brighton pre-pandemic. My site is statically generated with some IndieWeb enhancements (webmentions in and out, micropub, posse, etc.) I mostly use it as a hidden log of my study sessions and for notes. A few times a year I'll write something longer form.
Hi James! Love your implementation of instagram stories, I had the same idea but never got time to implement it. Looking forward joining of your meetups.
Thank you! I’m having a blast running it honestly. All the people I got in touch with were super kind and the interviews are all incredibly interesting.
This means that the more lexemes look alike, the more they need color difference the highlighting provides. Like 'coordinate_u' and 'coordiante_v' should be distinctively different, but 'coordinate_u' and 'GetCanvasWidth' can even share the same color.
I've been following Simon on every platform under the sun for the past few years and learned so many bits and pieces of tricks from his content.
IDK how you write so many high quality stuff at such a fast pace while also doing a significant amount of OSS development work. Datasette and friends are such a joy to use.
You inspired me to get started with writing three years ago and I never stopped: https://rednafi.com.
We host a Europe and US meetup online every week and every two weeks, respectively, in addition to in person events. If there isn't an in-person event near you, reach out in https://indieweb.org/discuss to see if anyone would be interested in hosting one.
Heck yeah! I attended HWC Americas regularly for about a year, I need to log back on and catch up with folks. It's a great crowd, everyone has their own interests and goals and it's fun to cheer others on. When you spend so much time hacking on your own website, it means the world to get positive feedback!
If you nerd out about implementing protocols, there are some IndieWebers that will go out of their way to help you develop or test new ideas. We'd stay up into the night getting our servers to talk to each other in some never-seen-before way. Good times!
Feel free to write one if you are interested! We're big advocates of POSSE (https://indieweb.org/POSSE): publish on your own site, syndicate elsewhere. If you write a guide, add it to the wiki so others can learn.
For myself, back in the ‘90s, I was really into spending a bunch of time, hand-crafting Web sites, but these days, I just use rather lightly-modified WordPress sites.
Anyone remember the famous SatireWire Cubist Web Site story[0]?
Love it. It's different and the retro windows vibe doesn't feel too overwhelming. One nit, clicking on configuration brings up the page as as overlay, which is a bit hard to read on mobile devices. Tested on iPhone 14 PM safari.
Thank you for the feedback. My phone is super old, so the background blurring effect and a few other visual things do not work on it. The JS works great on the phone, so I was hoping on newer phones the presentation just works like on desktop.
Since we're all sharing our corners of the web, I guess I'll link mine as well.
I only have 6 posts over 4 years, mostly due to me thinking my ideas aren't "original" enough to warrant lengthy write-ups, but I know that's not exactly true.
I’d love it if the indie web guys made some kind of Astro style static site framework with built in components you can just drop in for integration with the various fediverse services. Every time I look at the instructions, it looks like a time sink trying to get everything set up.
I’ve never seen this before but I think it’s right up my alley (save the part where I’m pretty introverted as far as meetups and video calls).
I just went down a rabbit hole looking at the RSVP specs, h-cards (which I remember from way back but thought was dead), and comments. And, I need to go deeper!
h-cards are still alive and well, and are used by technologies Webmention [1] (decentralized likes, comments, bookmarks, RSVPs, and more) as a profile! My site has one :)
I love this. I'm a huge fan of static site generators and simple, authentic designs. It looks like lot of people who dig the indieweb philosophy use Jekyll and Hugo which is great, because they are still such amazing SSG's. Projects like this make me hopeful that everything wont be replaced by JS frameworks or Nextjs etc. For those interested
I love your site! I especially like the minimal design. I've got my own personal blog of sorts for medium-to-long form posts but have been wanting to implement a way to have smaller notes like this on the same website.
At the moment, my site only has a small handful of posts from the past four years (6 to be exact), but that's mostly due to thinking my thoughts aren't "original" enough to warrant regular-length posts/articles, which I know probably isn't exactly true.
Yours is really encouraging me to start using mine more often regardless of word count or page length. Thank you for sharing!
I had a personal blog back in the days, started out with selfhtml and went from there. Somewhere on the journey WordPress came out and I transitioned to it. About 2 years ago I started a personal blog about rowing, since I bought a rowing machine. The blog is written in German, yet often people autotranslate it with Google to match their language, since rowing seems to be a worldwide niche topic. You may find it here: https://harder-better-faster-stronger.de
You can join irrespsective of where your site is hosted or what technologies you use! We have people who use static sites (like me!), WordPress, dynamic sites, micro.blog, and so much more in the community.
I'm not sure why the Brighton one has that link. I'll take a look. The challenge you mentioned -- build (or add to) a site in an hour -- will be hosted in two weeks (see events.indieweb.org for more); last time we had someone make a bookmarks page, a PNG header reader, a game with computer vision (this one was me!), a site on the Gemini protocol, and more.
Etherpad is where we take notes during sessions. It is a collaborative, open source editor.
Absolutely! You can join no matter tool(s) what you use for your website, from WordPress to HTML sites to Notion sites! I'm now curious how Notion works as a back-end!
Love how responsive, simple, and lowJS the UI is. Also, "let's grab a coffee" in the footer is a nice touch. Unsolicited advice: automate everything to the point where you can write some markdown, git push, and the CI should take care of the whole deployment. That way it wouldn't feel too much work. I built mine with Hugo and deploy it through GitHub Pages. It's trivial to publish something now.
Looks like the Minnesota chapter is not very active, but if there are other people from the Twin Cities on here, I'd be interested in meeting up. adit.io is my blog.
This is beautiful. The simple paragraph accompanied with links to "The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows" so eloquently expresses what I've been mulling on.
Made my website myself to showcase my AI art projects (taking some inspiration from sites like David Rudnick's and Gwern's). Interested to see what people think.
Then after a few months the author will rewrite the blog again with a different framework and add another entry explaining why and how they did it.
Here's mine. Built with Hugo and deployed with GitHub Pages. The whole publication process is automated with GitHub Actions and takes a few key strokes to go from an idea to execution.
https://rednafi.com