I want to see this guy review the Tarsnap website. For all that some people don't like my web design, I'd like to think that it's very easy to figure out what Tarsnap is.
Oh, okay, that makes sense. Probably some super-secure online backup service...
>Encryption: Your data can only be accessed with your personal keys. We can't access your data even if we wanted to! >Source code: The client code is available. You don't need to trust us; you can check the encryption yourself! >Deduplication: Only the unique data between your current files and encrypted archives is uploaded.
Wow, that's... extremely clear. That's literally everything I wanted to know, save for maybe pricing...
>Storage: 250 picodollars / byte-month of encoded data >Bandwidth: 250 picodollars / byte of encoded data
...aha, it's something confusing!
>($0.25 / GB-month)
...never mind. This is extremely clear.
I could keep going, but as far as copy, this website is excellent. And even the design could be considered a plus given your target audience.
Though if Tarsnap ever gets a GUI, I would suggest giving the website one as well :)
Since we're doing website critique, here's some CSS tweaking (no serious adjustments) that fixes most of my design complaints:
Before: http://i.imgur.com/yopLaY7.png
After: http://i.imgur.com/iANMrgp.png
CSS: https://gist.github.com/madebyollin/41e7aaf1d7604c2ccd54b8f3...
Here are some easy to implement design suggestions: You should change the title of the first heading so it's not the same as the banner. I think "What is Tarsnap?" is a good choice. Speaking of the banner, vectorize it. Finally, please remove the bars from the asides.
Your product is good, so transferring a little attention to its web presence is worth the effort.
On small width device the menu will be on the bottom, so there's no duplication. (website seems to be responsive)
I like that the menu is on the bottom and not hidden behind a hamburger button.
I hope he doesn't listen to the folks saying he should follow the herd. Websites where you have to page down below the fold to get basic information on the product? We should be pointing them at Tarsnap. But flat design is king on mobile, so we won't be getting many of these website layouts anymore.
I don't think this website should be made to "look better" i.e turned into some corporate garbage, but it could definitely look better... looks kinda like an open source programmers best shot at making something look good.
There's a middle ground between looking corporate (irrelevant) and looking unprofessional.
In your shoes I would be going for a style of "very plain, but very neat" looking. Aiming for perfectly spaced between elements, attractive font, minimal but matching colors. Function graphics only.
This kinda looks OK: