Ignoring the security implications, I miss kb large old raw html websites that loaded instantly on DSL internet. Nowadays shit is too fancy because hardware allows that, but I feel we’re just constantly running into more bugs first and then worry about them later.
Edit: I’ve thought more about it, and I think I just missed the simplicity of the internet back then. There’s just too much bloat these days with ad trackers and misinformation. I kinda forgot just how bright and eye jarring most old UIs were lol.
I don’t have any real knowledge of html but I have a vague memory about reading an article where it was mentioned there was a very simple way for a website to “ask” what was the available resolution and fit itself to it in human friendly format.
When comes to manually zooming in or out - especially when on a smartphone - on a webpage, I admit I prefer it. It had a very short learning curve and it transmits a cleaner feeling of interacting with the website instead of having whatever it may be running behind the scenes shifting and adjusting the focus to some random point I have no interest on.
This is the wiki of an old game: wiki.spiralknights.com
As you can see, on mibile the text is hard to read and you have to zoom and move around a lot to navigate. It’s the same software as wikipedia, but an older design.
What responsive UI optimization does is it changes all of this into vertical scrolling and makes it readable right away. You just swipe up until you see what you wanted to. As you can see on the modernized en.m.wikipedia.org on mobile the search is right on top and the font size and zoom are easily readable. If you tilt your phone it auto rearranges some content for better readability. That’s what some people and designers want for sites nowadays.
I have used the search of that old game a lot and I tell you: It sucks when you miss tapping the search box and hit a button instead. It loads a different page and the server is often slow. I could prevent it by pinch zooming beforehand, so it’s more easy to hit, but it’s unintuitive. I usually forget to do it.
You mention wikipedia and that is one site where regardless being essentialy text, pages can take immense time to load.
I respect the efforts to make things more accessible but there is the feeling that much more effort goes towards fluff and eye-candy than real, tangible, improvement.
Yeah, thar’s not a counter argument; just demonstrates the usability gains.
Btw, did you open the browser tools (usually F12) of a desktop browser and check if it’s the server response or the rendering, that takes long for you in the network tab? I’m asking, because for me wikioedia isn’t that slow.
Never looked into it but I’ll check.