All Websites Look the Same • Hacker News Board

Re: All Websites Look the Same

#11

Post by orthoganol » Mon, Sep 07, 2015, 5:40 AM UTC

He's right that most bootstrapped startup websites look the same, because they don't have designers on their team, their founders aren't trained in design, and they don't have the money or time to really flesh out the design. They just follow easy examples that are passable or in vogue. Or worse, maybe they just buy a template.

But OP is wrong once you talk about startups that get money. I mean for some well known ones, just look at Stripe, Mattermark, Branient, Mixpanel, Filepicker, Buildzoom... these sites aren't the same at all. If you spend time studying the design of hundreds of YC startups you'll see what I mean... almost to the point where I wonder if YC specifically instructs their startups not to copy other YC startups.

Re: All Websites Look the Same

#12

Post by avodonosov » Mon, Sep 07, 2015, 5:41 AM UTC

It's just one example of fashion in tech. Around ten years ago there was another fashion for web sites - all the panels had rounded corners (and it wasn't supported by CSS, so people created the rounded corners from pieces of images - very unproductive waste of time).

Non-tech people, when ordering a web side, often just don't accept things which look different than other web sites they have seen. At that times it was difficult to convince people rounded panels with borders are not necessary. People often are unable to judge themselves, so they rely on what others do.

There are many other examples of such unhealthy fashion: Spring framework in Java, XML, SOAP, gray text on web pages (even despite it violates W3C accessibility recommendations), not using tables in markup (even if I want tabular layout), etc, etc

On the other hand I agree that uniformity can help people to consume information, and also inventing unique design is often a waste - the content is the most important part. Still, there are many cases of harmful fashion.

Re: All Websites Look the Same

#13

Post by totemizer » Mon, Sep 07, 2015, 5:44 AM UTC

All websites should look the same, but they don't. Sadly. It's all just information in some kind of format. A video as an mp4 or some text as... well text in whatever way your machine stores it, but mixed with a bunch of irrelevant other text.

But then there is "design" and then you get stuff like inconsistent search, inconsistent site layout, you never know where to look, what to look for, you miss things because they are placed somewhere where you are not used to look. It's a mess.

All websites should look the same.

Re: All Websites Look the Same

#14

Post by analog31 » Mon, Sep 07, 2015, 5:48 AM UTC

pun_Krawk wrote: post #10

I take issue with the current 'standard' design, but only indirectly. I feel like giant home screens give companies the freedom to create a great looking webpage without any actual content - like a giant landing page. Since they all look the same, it's easy to compare and contrast. I can recall a number of times scrolling through the entire home page for a company, only to still be confused about what the product act…

I find it's often easier to find out what a company does by doing a quick Google search, than to figure it out from their website.

Re: All Websites Look the Same

#15

Post by dpcan » Mon, Sep 07, 2015, 5:58 AM UTC

I could not disagree more. Don't fix what isn't broken (anymore). I believe that after years of designing websites, we found something that works, and works well. Consumers land on sites and see something familiar. It makes for a comfortable and easier web. I'm all for this "standard" in web design.

Re: All Websites Look the Same

#16

Post by rblatz » Mon, Sep 07, 2015, 6:08 AM UTC

Spivak wrote: post #5

21echoes wrote: post #4

(Most) all websites should look the same. Most browsers look the same. Most car dashes look the same. Most newspapers look the same. Most books look the same. The web is not art. At least, not most of the time. Websites should only look markedly different with good reason. For most clients, there is not a good reason.

Of course, then the question should be why most websites settled on this particular style originally.

Because it flows naturally between mobile and desktop. Mobile first design is harder than most of us admit, and mobile first that looks good is even harder.

Re: All Websites Look the Same

#17

Post by mc32 » Mon, Sep 07, 2015, 6:08 AM UTC

Spivak wrote: post #5

21echoes wrote: post #4

(Most) all websites should look the same. Most browsers look the same. Most car dashes look the same. Most newspapers look the same. Most books look the same. The web is not art. At least, not most of the time. Websites should only look markedly different with good reason. For most clients, there is not a good reason.

Of course, then the question should be why most websites settled on this particular style originally.

It's probably dictated to some degree by some aspect of culture. When you visit the websites where another culture dominates, one might find things to be different from what we're used to but similar to others where that other culture dominates the design.

Re: All Websites Look the Same

#18

Post by flockonus » Mon, Sep 07, 2015, 6:11 AM UTC

Phlow wrote: post #7

I think it's safe to say, at least from my view, that Bootstrap is the reason for it. Bootstrap made this format easy and clean, and it works well with mobile. Websites will look like this until someone comes out with the next thing that's easier and/or cleaner and/or works better in mobile and then a couple years later THAT will be the format you're seeing everywhere. I don't think this is a bad thing. At least it's…

Bootstrap didn't invent such websdesign, it was experimented with, learned and improved collectively. If anything, the library implemented these (almost) standards that were wildly used.

Re: All Websites Look the Same

#19

Post by kagamine » Mon, Sep 07, 2015, 6:14 AM UTC

mc32 wrote: post #17

Spivak wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course, then the question should be why most websites settled on this particular style originally.

It's probably dictated to some degree by some aspect of culture. When you visit the websites where another culture dominates, one might find things to be different from what we're used to but similar to others where that other culture dominates the design.

A very good point I think, the web in your language is not always the same as the web in other languages, for example sites like nicovideo.js do tend to be different and carry a lot more information per page than American or European sites.

Re: All Websites Look the Same

#20

Post by s_dev » Mon, Sep 07, 2015, 6:16 AM UTC

I found this on Intercoms blog post entitled "Some Things can't be Wireframed". This picture reflects the meta design of many websites. https://blog.intercom.io/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/SquareSp...

We've arrived with this design from years of design evolution and no one person is responsible. All products seem to ultimately converge on some optimal universal archetype. Websites, books and radio towers are no different in this sense. The same will be true of mobile Apps someday but I don't think its the case at the moment.

https://blog.intercom.io/things-cant-wireframed/