Style Guide for Online Hypertext (1992)
4 points by lim
4 points by lim
You know what makes this cool? It's in the document - Cool URIs Don't Change baby.
If only websites actually followed this advice. Then I wouldn’t have to be in the habit of archiving a page in the wayback machine whenever there’s a small chance I’ll want to read it again in 5 years.
There is a particular control-oriented philosophy about web site design, used by some sites and some site-building tools, which attempts not to enable the user but to constrain the user. The idea is to control the user's experience completely. These sites typically have entrance tunnels -- the home page sequences which forces one to sit and click through a little presentation before accessing the real site. These are a disrespectful waste of user's time in almost all cases. [...]
If you are tempted to use this form of design, or if a consultant offers it, stop. Don't. Make a real web site. The ability to link into the data is too important to throw away
Really rings a bell these days, with sites trying to force you to install an app, hiding public content beind a login pop-up, and SPAs commonly presenting un-bookmarkable views that break the browser's back button.
O, how I wish there was a standards body today that had the balls to tell the industry that the way they are using the web is wrong.