Matt Gemmell discusses the way his blog's design has changed over the last decade, and lists some ground rules for making your own site more readable.
“I don’t think there’s any reasonable way, or any need, to separate vanity and ego from a personal blog. Writing is inherently about its author, and is a product of their personality and opinions – that’s not something to be shy about, and we shouldn’t try to change it either. So, write for yourself – and hold yourself to an appropriate standard, because you’d better believe that others are judging the person as well as the piece – but as soon as you publish your views, you’re inviting readers to take a look. I think that the needs of the reader and the author are more aligned than many blogging systems seem to believe.”
I went through the list and discovered that Unretrofied meets many of the criteria Matt calls for, which I'm kinda proud of because I'm not a web designer by any stretch of the imagination.
I've just always strongly believed that sites explicitly meant to be read should not be designed so as to interfere with anybody's reading experience. That would be stupid, and I'm glad I'm not the only one who thinks so.
There are a few little things that could be changed to meet his standards (such as making visited links more obvious), along with some items that have always bugged me but I haven't gotten around to fixing yet (like the way my Fusion ad can interfere with other elements on mobile devices), but overall I'm glad to know I've tinkered my way into a fairly readable site.
