> I struggle to see why anyone would want to dilute Hacker News with the affect-laden decadence of contemporary web design.
>I am a visual artist and this is sincere.
As a visual artist, you should be aware that your opinions on contemporary web design are subjective, and that those who disagree with you are not wrong in doing so. The sites posted here simply aren't for you, and that's fine. No one is forcing you to even acknowledge their existence.
>My hopes are that the HN community holds stable at least until I can find a new hole to run to.
Do you believe there is a strong inverse correlation between intellectual and aesthetic value? If so, PG and much of the userbase here seems to agree with you, given the pearl-clutching and hand-wringing whenever new features or styles are discussed. I would disagree, as I believe it is quite possible to have a site that is both well designed and which hosts content of high intellectual value. You don't have to choose one or the other, you can have both.
Aesthetics are not as subjective as you seem to think. I am not sitting on a high-horse here; I argue closer to the opposite.
My assertion that contemporary web design is affect-laden has proof in the pudding. It is ridden with commercial "trend" and "delight". Contemporary web design lacks concern for either content or form. It is a maze of 'interactive expressionism'.
I would go as far as to say it bears some responsibility for the current ICO bubble, for example; the "whitepaper" being the only lucid concept (form of content) in a sea of slivering serpents. Of course technical whitepapers are not new but their declarative function is being psychologically undermined by their symbolic form. How is this possible? It is a function of decadence, a delusion of form and meaning.
>I believe it is quite possible to have a site thay is both well designed and which hosts content of high intellectual value.
You won't find anyone on the internet to argue with this statement, of course. I agree. I think hackernews.come has done about as good of job as any by acknowledging 'form' as necessary context for intellectual 'content'. Your issue is with what "well designed" means. See above.
>My assertion that contemporary web design is affect-laden has proof in the pudding. It is ridden with commercial "trend" and "delight". Contemporary web design lacks concern for either content or form. It is a maze of 'interactive expressionism'.
We seem to disagree on what "contemporary web design" means, then, because I see little lack of concern for content nor anything which could be described as "interactive expressionism" in many of the Hacker News alternatives posted here. The exception in my mind (and personal opinion) is "Tiled HN"[0], which I find difficult to even look at, but the rest seem to be little more noisy than HN itself, and arguably in some cases easier to read.
As a visual artist, you should be aware that your opinions on contemporary web design are subjective, and that those who disagree with you are not wrong in doing so. The sites posted here simply aren't for you, and that's fine. No one is forcing you to even acknowledge their existence.
>My hopes are that the HN community holds stable at least until I can find a new hole to run to.
Do you believe there is a strong inverse correlation between intellectual and aesthetic value? If so, PG and much of the userbase here seems to agree with you, given the pearl-clutching and hand-wringing whenever new features or styles are discussed. I would disagree, as I believe it is quite possible to have a site that is both well designed and which hosts content of high intellectual value. You don't have to choose one or the other, you can have both.