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From: John Ames <commodorejohn@gmail.com>
Newsgroups: comp.os.linux.misc
Subject: Re: The Web (HTML) Sux
Date: Mon, 22 Dec 2025 13:58:23 -0800
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On 22 Dec 2025 08:14:15 +1000
not@telling.you.invalid (Computer Nerd Kev) wrote:

> That's perfectly reasonable in my book. I don't believe in
> specifying exact fonts, sizes, etc. via CSS. Use <small> in plain
> HTML if you want small text and the user can configure their
> browser to display it in the way that works for them. Except where
> some browser makers choose silly default behaviours for some
> elements, plain HTML (4.0 Transitional) works to the user's best
> advantage. I do most of my browsing with CSS turned off so all that
> styling nonsense is ignored.

I do use some basic CSS for basic theming and layout, but overall I
agree that treating webpages as a medium for graphic design (not to
mention gimmicky JS navigation that all too often breaks standard
browser-navigation conventions) is wrong-headed and counterproductive,
if not outright abusive. Unfortunately, "wrong-headed, counter-
productive, and abusive" is the name of the game in this year of our
Lord 2025 :/

Whether it's things like hijacking or "papering over" links with CSS
constructs that make it impossible to get to one page without going
through another page first and artificially boosting page views thereby
(looking at you, YouTube,) designing layouts that are completely non-
functional if assumptions about DPI/resolution aren't met, requiring JS
to display static page content, or any of a dozen other common abuses,
it's absolutely epidemic - and while I can keep my own little corner of
the Web tidy and sane, and I've seen an encouraging trend in that
direction among young hackers and hacker-adjacent blogosphere types,
there's only so far you can go without being exposed to some godawful
bletcherous monstrosity of mainstream web design. It's enough to make
you long for Gopher...