please empty your brain below

Responsive design. What a lovely phrase.
Rather than the truth - some teenage hipster insisting I read in the format they like rather than letting me choose how things are displayed. Websites that insist I look at a mobile template when using an iPad really grind my gears. I know, I'm a grumpy old man....
I read your blog on my i- pad in landscape form.This seems the natural way to me as I 'learnt' to use the internet on our old desk top computer. I didn't like the example of the smartphone layout. It reminds me of my mobile phone which was set up for me in the shop by a nice young man who set it to VERY LARGE PRINT and extra loud sound. When your hair turns to silver, your brain doesn't follow. Anyway,DG, if you keep writing these blogs,I'll read 'em!
Happy Blogday! Thank you for 13 years of exceptional content.

Now you are a teenager will you be getting grumpier? ;)

Due to my poor eyesight, I have to read using a low res on my large screen, so get served the mobile template on many sites, which is very frustrating.

The BBC News website is now somewhere I rarely go - not only for the reason you give, but also because the written content has been so dumbed down that it is insulting to anyone with half a brain.
Responsive templates can have a revert to desktop mode/icon when viewed on a mobile device.

I find the blog a bit difficult to read as there is only one column on the desktop and words go all the way across. It may read better in columns.
#Running Correspondent

I quite like responsive templates
Of course if you're one of those evil people who read by the RSS feed (hello!) you get stripped back anyway.

Has to be said that one of the reasons that websites are favouring bigger text is because a major bug-bearer of users was that web designers set the fonts to small.

Likewise with whitespace - you get complaints of screen clutter, and a cleaner page is more readable.
As a visually impaired person accessing the Internet with a screen reader (usually VoiceOver on iOS) my main bugbears are the prevalence of advertisements in in-line frames and complex multi column designs. I therefore love DG's blog for its simple, minimalist and most importantly, advertisement free, style which allows me to get my morning fix quickly and without fuss.
I'm still old school.

I read your blog either via a PC in 2560x1440, or on a laptop 1440x900 or via the iPhone.
I only use the iPhone for when I'm on vacation.
Old school here too. PC only and in landscape ....... my morning DG treat with coffee before I start to do any work. :)
i hate modern websites that have been designed to work well on phones. eg the guardian and the evening standard,

its all massive photos everywhere. why? its like some sort of kiddie's toy.
The DG blog should stay defiantly widescreen and upmarket; please don't take it tabloid ! Twitter is there for that.

A well-written, thought-provoking article deserves to be read in a civilised way. You wouldn't try to squash a decent meal into a pizza box and munch it walking along the street.

The Times used to be quite good when it was a broadsheet, but I stopped buying it when it morphed into a dumbed-down tabloid.
Long may your present format continue. I speak as someone who reads your blog avidly every morning on a 15 year old desktop, who likes an intelligent written explanation and who hates the trend (especially from the BBC) towards big pictures and sod all text.
I like the way your blog is, DG, but then I read it on our desktop, in landscape.

I'll probably keep reading if you keep writing, but please don't dumb down - not that I think you're the sort who would. That latest 'reformatting' of the BBC News site . . . Aaaarrrggh!
I can vaguely understand the need to allow for using a site on mobile devices, but my local council has gone a step too far. The website has been designed ONLY for mobile devices and looks/feels a bit condescending on a desktop browser. The main reason is you are presented with a 3x2 grid of buttons and when you click on one, you get a 5 item menu that fills the WHOLE SCREEN!!
I think Gerry has summed it up very well.
Just stay old fashioned dg. Change isn't always good. You are a breath of fresh air in a dumbed down online world.
DG, you keep on doing what you're doing, I'll read every day no matter what ... your format works brilliantly with my laptop, and on my mobile I just turn it sideways, no big deal ... I prefer content over presentation any day
RSS here!
A while ago our company switched to a modern graphical, responsive website.

It sucks

There is so much cruft at the top of the page that you always have to scroll to get to the text.

Plus they insist that there's got to be pictures, big ones mind, on every page.Why?! Often a page just needs to be plain and simple text.

Maybe I'm getting old, but I feel everyone is making things too complex.
And to think some people don't have a PC, laptop, tablet or smartphone... guess they have other "problems". If they lucky may, I guess, have a television (though if can't afford the licence then not even that)maybe a basic PAYG mobile (you know the type...calls & texts only)...and perhaps a radio. They can (if have one close by) go to the library to read the "newspapers" and could (if have prove of address) become a member and use the internet/computers. Or find one those (now disappearing) "cyber-cafes" (remember them?)...where for a small fee can use a "log-on" and use a computer. So regardless of how you are reading this, you can count your blessings that you are, for there is a "digital divide" that still exists in this country.
I have a basic PAYG mobile, as does my son. I asked him if he wanted to upgrade to a smartphone as he's off to uni this month, but he's happy with his as it is! Maybe there's some hope for the youth after all!

So yes, I have to use my laptop to view your blog, and I like it just fine! A constant quality in a dumbing down world.
Happy blog-day! :)
@ Tim: Thanks !

Good to see that most people seem to want the original, full fat version of DG. Accept no watered down substitutes !
Most people who have commented want the full fat version. Not the same as most people. People who comment on websites are a self selecting audience and are - usually - a tiny minority of a website's users. I have a feeling DG has a high rate of engagement with his readers that many sites would be very envious of, however it's still only going to be a minority of visitors.

Like it or not though, much browsing is going mobile.

In August 2013 64% of the page view of my own website were on desktop desktops. By August 2015 that had gone down to 47%.

Almost of all the change has come from mobile phones - up from 12% in 2013 to 26% now. Tablet views have only increased by a small amount.

Desktop's still the dominant platform but it's no longer the majority. Mobile is a big growth area, and that's why people are designing their webpages to be responsive. Because a lot of people really hate viewing a full fat web page on a mobile phone. And that's why Google is now punishing sites that aren't mobile friendly.

Responsive doesn't mean lots of white space and big fonts. That's just a design fad. Responsive means putting something that's appropriate to the screen size, to the user. If you have a big screen you want a bigger experience - like what is here now. Be that on tablet or computer. But small screens are different kettles of fish.

It's DG's website. It's up to him what he does of course. I'd never presume to tell anyone with a personal site what to do.
a) Less than 1% of today's visitors have commented.

b) Anyone viewing a stripped-out mobile version of the blog won't have seen a link to the comments box.

c) Blogger once had a menu option to allow me to serve up a different mobile template - they appear to have removed this option.

d) When I load up my blog on my iPhone...
i) it's legible
ii) Safari offers me the option of a stripped-out mobile template if I choose
@ Andrew Bowden

Hope I didn't come across as dictating to DG what he should do ! I read today's blog as a lament about simplification and dumbing down caused by small screens, and how Google is encouraging this trend. If so, I share DG's view wholeheartedly.

You only have to look at sites such as the Telegraph to see how dire things can become. Once a quality paper, albeit stuffy and right wing, much of its content is now written (or copied and pasted) by bimbos who clearly have little knowledge or experience of the subject matter. Nothing seems to be spell checked let alone proof read, and tiresome stock photos add no value. And as for the comments that they attract, the less said the better !

In contrast, DG's posts represent a welcome oasis of brain nectar, subscription and ad free as well. I very much hope that DG continues unchanged, but of course it's his call.
No guarantees, and apologies if you have already looked into it, but it may be worth adding the following into the "head" section :

ltmeta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1"gt where the opening lt and closing gt are the mathematical symbols for less than and greater than.

My experience elsewhere has been that it improves the basic display on modern devices alongside humouring Google without messing up traditional views in one fell swoop.

DavidC
Wonder what the 99% think?
DG: Why did you start blogging, and why do you get it out on the ether before you go to work?

Do you not have a bowl of wheaties and a cup of tea in the morning after you wake up, before you avail yourself to TfL services on the daily commute?
The site looks good on a desktop, and fine on a smartphone - so is just right!

Also it's quick to load on both, for those of us without super-fast connections.
Couldn't agree more with DavidC.

Of necessity, I read your webpage on my phone or my tablet, neither of which will show your site at a legible resolution (something you suffer from too, but Android doesn't seem to give me the option of swapping to a mobile template). If you follow DavidC's suggestion and add the following html tag to your template, then all of your readers should be better off:

<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0">

Perhaps you can give it a try at least?

Thanks
Your post and many of the comments here reminded me of this article I read last week:
http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/08/why-people-hate-making-phone-calls/401114/

I suppose portability has not only ruined the telephone call, but portability has now ruined the internet. Or at least it has ruined content quality of the internet.

Another article rounded out the picture:
http://www.phillymag.com/news/2013/09/04/young-people-talk-cell-phones/

As you read the article, take particular note at how someone in New York is now teaching young corporate workers how to use the telephone... at a whopping $1800 for the day-long seminar.

Who knows where all this is going. Seems to me the technology is driving the content, not the other way around as it should be.










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