Resolution for Designers: Ditch the Bloat
Category: Design...
Posted Thursday, December 29, 2005 at 05:55 PM [GMT-6]

Gene Redlin is fed up with sloppy, bloated websites.

So, how do you spot them? They have the "look what I can do" factor in them. Lots of fancy smancy flashing things, lots of downloaded junk that does nothing except take time.

I use a dialup ISP. It’s 52.000 bps. If your website takes longer than 30 seconds to load, I’ll never see it. It’s not worth the wait.

According to a September, 2005 survey for the Pew Internet & American Life Project, 39% of home internet access is via dial-up. That's a large minority of potential website visitors who are continually feeling frustrated by bloated websites with long download times dedicated to delivering useless stuff.

Heck, I've got cable and I still encounter sites that annoy me to no end with their long download times. SI.com is a prime example.

Most of my clients understand the issue and ask for a clean, fast-loading layout, and I'm happy to accommodate them. However, I still get the occasional request for a splash page (no one has yet been able to explain to me what they want to accomplish with it) or the automatic display of a 20-megabyte movie (usually a TV commercial; I'm like, "dude*, people don't want to watch your TV commercials on TV; why do you think they want to come to your website to watch them?").

So, for 2006, I suggest that website designers (and that goes for you bloggers, too...don't get that smug "he's talking about someone else" look) try to remember that broadband hasn't penetrated the market to the extent you might think. There's still virtue in optimizing your photos and other graphics and using CSS to tighten up your code and eliminate bulky Javascript/graphic rollovers. You'll make 39% more people happy without alienating the other 61%, and there's not much downside to that scenario, is there?

*OK, I confess that I have yet to address a client as "dude," but I'm working my way up to it.

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Say - is my site one of those bloated ones? I do try to keep things small, and my recent redesign removed rollovers and some bloat, but I still wonder how it looks & loads on a non-broadband connection...

Posted by: Ian Wood at December 29, 2005 06:35 PM

I whole heartedly agree with this post - I admit that I get fedup when sites take half an hour to load because I am still on dial up!!!

The sad thing is that if we got broadband - it wouldn't make our connection go much faster anyway - We are geographically challenged in that way hehehe :).

Posted by: Rachel at December 29, 2005 07:21 PM

Funny but when I read your taglines on the RSS reader I was going to come over and mention SI.Com as one place I just won't go. Nice to see you covered that already...!

Posted by: Wallace-Midland, Texas at December 29, 2005 09:21 PM

Ian, I'm not on dialup so I can say for sure, but I can't imagine that your blog falls at the slow-loading end of the spectrum, based on what I see. And, despite my parenthetical warning to bloggers, I'm willing to cut them a bit of slack in this area, as most don't have absolute control over their layout, either due to lack of expertise or limitations of the blogging software. Still, those who insist on including a series of 150kb photos of their cats should understand that not everyone will be pleased to visit on a regular basis. (Of course, cute dogs are an entirely different matter.)

Rachel, you're right of course. By the time the signal gets to New Zealand, it's weary and ragged and can barely crawl into your computer. ;-)

Wallace, I wish I knew what kind of abominable scripting SI.com uses that causes that "partial load -- then freeze -- then load" phenomenon. It drives me absolutely crazy.

Posted by: Eric at December 29, 2005 11:23 PM

I'm glad you granted the indulgence to dogs. I was about to have a cow... though a picture of that would definitely be too large to post.

Posted by: Jim at December 30, 2005 08:22 AM

Ian, I am on dial-up (26.4 K, as a matter of fact) and your site loads really slow. The blog posts appear very quickly, but your header and all the right-side navigation take forever. I never actually saw what all the right-side stuff was because it took so long.

And ditto Eric on the SI.com site. I'd add ESPN.com to that category as well. What is it about sports media and pitiful web design?

Posted by: bryan at December 30, 2005 05:02 PM

What is it about sports media and pitiful web design?

I don't know about ESPN.com but I think SI.com would load faster if they'd stick to actual, you know, sports instead of devoting 50% of their resources to the swimsuit gals.

Posted by: Eric at December 30, 2005 06:11 PM

Well, Eric, I kind of disagree. I feel bad for the 39 percent...but not bad enough.

Posted by: Julie at December 31, 2005 02:04 AM

Julie,

I feel bad for people who have an attitude that they can't accomodate 40 percent of the Internet audience. 40 percent! And, fyi, it's not like some of us wouldn't LIKE to have broadband. But we're stuck with dial-up or satellite robbery fees.

As for your site, who's reading it for the pretty graphics, anyway? Your *content* loaded first thing. I read your entry and left. The *attitude* is one that leaves me with a bad taste, but hey, if you can say "go blow" to everyone who doesn't have the luxury of broadband (and it's still a luxury for a lot of folks), then more power to you.

Posted by: bryan at January 1, 2006 12:37 AM
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