[GoLUG] What do you think of this website?

[Steve Litt]

On Fri, 31 Jan 2025 13:07:12 -0800
Ron / BCLUG <admin at bclug.ca> wrote:

> Steve Litt wrote on 2025-01-31 04:44:
> 
> > When you say "Hero Image", do you mean the giant image of a bunch
> > of people around a table and a perfectly coifed man, who has never
> > ridden a skateboard in his life, in the foreground?  
> 
> Yeah. I think that's what they're called, "Hero Image".
> 
> Dumb name for a concept that I find dumb - giant image not related to
> content requiring scrolling to get to content of main page.
> 
> See, I'm not blindly 100% on-board with modern web design...
> 
> 
> 
> > If so, what are the problems with it?  
> Highly subjective answer:
> 
> First, see point above...
> 
> 
> Secondly, it's too busy.

It's busy alright. If I viewed it as anything but background, it would
be crazy.

> There are annoyingly perfectly dressed and groomed people acting all 
> businessy - it just feels phony.

I'm going to get subjective here and go on a rant. The whole scene
portrayed by this image is what caused me to start my own business.
They're all dressed the same, they all have the same haircut, they're
such perfect slave drones. From the time I started working, at 16, I
could NEVER be one of these people, and I found them annoying,
intimidating, and in most cases, not very bright.

Ramping up the rant: And notice there's exactly one guy with gray hair
in the whole bunch. I don't care if this is a realistic portrayal or
not, this really pisses me off. Age discrimination pissed me off when I
was 45, and I benefited from age discrimination because I was sheltered
from competition from older workers, and it pisses me off now, when no
matter how much I changed my vocabulary and how I dressed and coifed my
hair, and even if I lost a hundred pounds, and even if I was a full
stack web ninja with complete devops skills, no organization with more
than 5 people would hire me once they saw the wrinkles in my face. When
I was 45, my buddy Paul was 55. Paul was an electrical engineer, had
double my IQ, double my skills, double my productivity, but because of
his age Paul was the first to get laid off at the start of a recession
and the last to be brought back in the boom that followed. I had
another buddy named Carl who was exactly the same way.

The three things that annoy me to death are age discrimination, college
degree discrimination, and discrimination based on things other than
ability to quickly produce the quality result one is asked to produce,
and enough of a personality to get along with reasonable customers and
coworkers. OK, I'm done with this rant.

> 
> 
> Then there's some overlaid light bulbs and other stuff
> "Devel[something] Innovation" which is illegible (AI slop?);
> meaningless clutter.
> 
> 
> There seems to be a nod to daVinci or something with the glowing
> light bulb and other clutter surrounding it. It adds negative value.

It's funny. At a single glance, I had none of these reactions. But
yeah, now that you mention it, meaningless clutter with negative value.

> 
> 
> At least brown suit jacket guy's tie matches the blue menu bar.

<rant>I hated this guy when I was 25, and he was so cock sure of
himself. I laughed at this guy at 35 to 50, with his unfounded sureness
of his competency and his easy acceptance of being a cog in a "shit
rolls downhill" huge hierarchical situation. Not a startup, because
startups don't dress like that. This guy's never ridden a skateboard,
he's never been in a fight, he's never been arrested, and he can't
produce shit. And by my late 30's I was making more money than this sad
sack. Contrast this guy to this 1983 picture of me at an after
hours party at Steve's Stereo Repair, and yes, I was very drunk: We all
were:

https://a3b3.com/stuff/ssr_party_2.jpg

Imagine me sitting at that table. I think not!

Past the age of 50 these guys were just a handy stepping stone to the
guy who could actually sign the check so I could give their company a
course.

Yeah, this guy pisses me off. </rant>

> The only hero images I find mildly tolerable are landscape images -
> they can be soothing and the eye can linger and take in the sights.

Are you ok with heros heros that have no image?

SteveT

Steve Litt 
Spring 2023 featured book: Troubleshooting Techniques of the Successful
Technologist http://www.troubleshooters.com/techniques