I admit that I don't check the posts on my guestbook all that often. And when someone leaves a message, I have no way of knowing when they left the message because the ultra simple Yahoo! guestbook is stripped of all features--including the date and time. Yeah, I should get something more sophisticated, but frankly, most of the messages worth reading are left at the comments at the end of the post.
Anyways, this post isn't about griping about my guestbook. No, it's about site design. A visitor left a message in the guestbook inviting me to enter some sort of website contest called The Rumbles. My first thought was that there was no way that it could be serious--I have the web design skills of a gnat--and that it was just an advertisement for a new meme that I have no inclination or energy for participating in.
But being curious, I checked it out.
Gah! Cutesy girly designs!
Okay, so there's nothing inherently wrong about cutesy girly designs, but they're definitely not my style. Or at least I don't think so. (Is my drooling monster mascot at the side of this blog considered a cutesy girly design?) The kittens and puppies, the borders, the lavender, the adoption graphics, the blinking backgrounds, the cliquey webrings--reminds me of late 90's web design. While fun during that time, it gives me a headache now.
I prefer rather minimalist design nowadays--sites where the showcase is the writing and content and not the frame of the content. Sure, there could be a graphic or two but not so many that it slows down loading and freezes up my browser.
