Snippet: The Bullshit Web ☇

Nick Heer (via Mike Mulvey):

The average internet connection in the United States is about six times as fast as it was just ten years ago, but instead of making it faster to browse the same types of websites, we’re simply occupying that extra bandwidth with more stuff. Some of this stuff is amazing: in 2006, Apple added movies to the iTunes Store that were 640 × 480 pixels, but you can now stream movies in HD resolution and (pretend) 4K. These much higher speeds also allow us to see more detailed photos, and that’s very nice.

But a lot of the stuff we’re seeing is a pile-up of garbage on seemingly every major website that does nothing to make visitors happier — if anything, much of this stuff is deeply irritating and morally indefensible.

In the early days of the Web, the people making sites were often focused around function, partially due to tools available in the day. In many organizations today, web design (not the actual skeleton of development) falls under a marketing area and form, no matter how inefficient, seems to be more important. The pressure to cram ads and trackers and every other little bit of nonsense takes content that really should be effortless with today’s technology and requires fast devices and fast connections.

I don’t really have a solution to this, but I do recommend taking a moment to reflect on the capabilities we have now that are being squandered.