Web Developer's Review: computerchronicles.tv

Here I'll offer a quick review on a website I've been using a lot lately. It is an independent website that is managed by David Glover-Aoki. It presents and organizes info for the entire collection of the beloved Computer Chronicles TV show. I don't know the developer and haven't seen his work before, but I think computerchronicles.tv is pretty darn swell.

The world that is the web provides us with a near-endless pile of examples of both good and bad design. It is interesting that usability does not always correspond to a website's popularity or ability to rake in income. In fact, some popular sites are designed to be crappy so they can make more money. I'm sure you've heard of "dark patterns"... if not now you have.

Then there's the other side: the free, passion-project side. Sometimes they have ads of course. The ones that manage to do it without ads earn my automatic gratitude. Considering just those without ads, we can see another wide variety of quality among these free or indie projects. Sometimes these sites have a lot of things that are unintentionally frustrating or broken. Sometimes they do just about everything right.

I think it should be worth an article of appreciation when I come across a website that has so many good things going for it. computerchronicles.tv is a website that presents highly-useful information efficiently and effectively without resorting to ads, dark patterns, general money mongering, or so fourth. They don't even set any cookies! The creators are doing it for free because their work is priceless, obviously. This website represents the true ideal of the independent web.

Here I'll put the things I like about it in a list, so you may have EZ (easy) access:

• Efficient with a capital "E". I never figured out what that phrasing means but here I am attempting to express that this website is efficient on multiple levels. They leverage embedded media hosted by archive.org. They load only information and visual elements that are necessary and useful.
• Clean. Of course this goes hand-in-hand with loading efficiency. The visual presentation of computerchronicles.tv is excellent. It even lets me select two modes! Light and dark have been rebranded as boring and fun here. I very much dislike when websites choose based on my system and hide the options somewhere.
• Non-frustrating responsive layout. There's not anything frustrating about resizing the website on desktop. Responsive design is apparently nearly-impossible for most systems to figure out. It is such a great relief to land on a website that uses responsive design responsibly. Of course breakpoints can be a matter of aesthetic opinion; maybe nothing will be perfect for everyone. I'd say computerchronicles.tv does responsive design beyond right.
• Committed community cause. This is my favorite part. computerchronicles.tv is not only a free service that adds great value to the world, but it is also the door to an ongoing collaborative project do re-digitize and make more available the existing archival videos for this classic show. It also feels quite official. I found out about this website through Stewart Cheifet's website - also managed by David Glover-Aoki.

Of course I could go on and on. Those are the main points that come to mind immediately. But is it all diamonds and roses? Sorry for making up sayings. I mean, is it completely perfect? Of course not, but it sure comes closer than most. There are a few minor aspects that I'm thinking the developers will have fun experimenting with to improve over time. One would be keyboard navigation for accessibility: I might want to tab instead of scroll. Another might be making the style mode switching option more obvious. Overall, it is very hard to see any significant or non-subjective issues with computerchronicles.tv.

I think that's all from me. Before I go, I'll say way to go David! Not that he is meant to hear it. I'm sure he knows what he is doing is good, it is work that speaks for itself. I appreciate developers like David who are out there doing what is right, and doing it in style. Here here.

Ok really I'm going now. The article is over. That's all. End. Stop transcription. Stop. End transcription. Stop. Stop. Stop. End. Stop. End. Exit.

<3 Grant