I really like the minimalism of these. I guess the interesting part of the linked article was the guy wanted to make his blog look exactly the same as it was before he made the optimisations
It's hard to tell when the irony and sarcasm gets that deep, but I think it's intentionally bad. Their changes are 1. a hipster domain, 2. monospace fonts and 3. lower contrast, which are recent design trends that I believe they are mocking and part of what the original was reacting against.
I think the idea here is to get a modern look with minimal code. Like the first page shows (the one without styling) it's easy to create a light weight website, it's hard to make it look like its from 2017.
I really like the minimalism of these. I guess the interesting part of the linked article was the guy wanted to make his blog look exactly the same as it was before he made the optimisations