Biggest Crimes In Web Design – Epsiode One

This is the first of a series regarding the abuse of what otherwise would be an at least somewhat enjoyable medium (the interwebs, duh). Each part will address an often-made mistake, and go into detail about why certain things should be avoided like the plague.

We'll start with perhaps the most evil of 'em all:

THE BLINK TAG

Never include page elements that move incessantly. Moving images have an overpowering effect on the human peripheral vision. A web page should not emulate Times Square in New York City in its constant attack on the human senses: give your user some peace and quiet to actually read the text!

Of course, <BLINK> is simply evil. Enough said.

Jacob Nielsen, 1996

MySpace. Fundie sites (both the religious and political varieties). Knock-off product sites. What do they all have in common?

An incessant assault on the optic nerves, by means of animated GIFs, flash banners… and the <blink> tag.

An often asked question on Yahoo! Answers is about "how to make text blink". Sadly, there's always some ignorant dimwit that, instead of rightly berating the questioner, answers the question.

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Blunt Is Beautiful, or: How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Adhered To Standards

I could not possibly say it any better than a guy named Doug Vanderweide, right here: Stupid Web Site Tricks.

There are times when I just want to reach through my monitor, and grab some ignoramus by his or her collar and just… shake them, all the while simply yelling NO! NO! NOOOOOOOOOO!!!!! at the top of my lungs, and in their face.

Yes, the design of my main pages is a straight copy of a ready-made WordPress template, mea culpa. I started working on my own CMS, but life (as it does) got in the way so I abandoned that idea for now. Anything outside the realm of the read subdomain, though, is hand-written and hand-coded and hand-designed.

And I'm not using any fancy stuff to detract from what I have to say.

Mister Vanderweide, sir – I tip my hat to you.