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november 27, 2025 @ 04:53 pm | est. reading time: 9 - 10 mins | word count 1731
no! personal web isn’t dead, you’re just stupid
there’s nothing i fucking hate more than know-it-alls that pretend personal web is dead. because it isn’t. sure, it’s niche and not mainstream but doesn’t mean its dead. but “personal websites are dead” is the exact take id expect from someone publishing their shit on medium. yay! u linked your domain to a centralized soulless service how clever of you! you go!!
this post is a re: to “The End of Personal Websites - And why it may be a good thing”. spoiler alert: it is not a good thing. also Why The Fuck Are You Titling It Like This?
and so you have the audacity to say
you betrayed us, you betrayed everyone. if you truly believed in “your own playground”, you would’ve stayed. but instead, you’ve decided to chase after corporate entities, because i guess it’s easier for you, huh?
Personal websites used to be awesome. Your own URL. Your own layout. Your own playground. Design freedom.
it still would’ve been like that for you, if only you had a spine. but i guess it’s easier to be a cuck to some corporate entity, letting them take care after your website. you aren’t a webmaster, you’re a pussy.
For a long time, it felt like my own website was a form of digital independence.
you’re part of the problem. because of spineless idiots like you, and shit takes like yours, a lot of people are AFRAID to have their own platform(s). we live in a society where being perceived as “cringe” is faux pas, and most want to avoid that. meanwhile i’m pretty sure many of those same people with “a short bio” would have full fledged websites if fuckers like you wouldn’t look down at them!
Most creators don’t have personal websites anymore. Or if they do, it’s a short bio and the last three links.
you mean, YOU moved and a handful of techbros from your circle? anyone who’s actually passionate about the web, stayed exactly where you once were. you call it “outsorcing” i call it digital rent. you don’t truly own your space, when it’s not running your own code. while doing shit on your own is cutting edge, and never fully prod-ready, it gives you more freedom than anything premade ever will. a website you’d call your own doesn’t need to be fully prod. and that’s the hill id die on. idfc
We moved. We migrated. We outsourced our digital homes to platforms that promised reach, ease of use, discoverability, community, monetization, and speed.
you think you need your medium bullshit page to be discovered? that’s truly kinda cute lol. in the last month alone my website had 815 vistors, 1.07k total visits, and 2.7k page views. this you’d hopefully agree, not bad at all.
the decline of personal websites isn’t inevitable but a concious choice people like you made.
oh, a “website”? even YOU are aware those arent real fucking sites? you love contradicting yourself, don’t you now!? so is your medium bullshit a website, or not? decide already lol.
Personal websites are not dead, but they’re increasingly replaced by tools that come with a “website”.
chatgpt ahh sentence. and no it’s not progress, it’s quite literally a retrogress. i don’t want another fully white or fully black website with minimal design? where is the fucking soul of it? because of “standards” idiots like you follow, the web feels more hollow than it ever did! are you proud of yourself?
And maybe that’s not a tragedy. It’s progress.
and yet you replaced it with a soulless entity like medium. the moment it became “easier”, huh? you say yourself that having your own site meant you controlled the space with your own rules, but you gave that the fuck away, so now medium can set rules? from an owner you became renter. and you’re fucking okay with that? are you serious? are you like serius-serious? you say that owning the space also meant owning the maintenance, like that isn’t half the charm of personal web? If you see it as a chore, here’s a thought, maybe you shouldn’t fucking have a website in the first place? do you truly fucking think anyone gives a shit about your fucking, stupid little medium page, that looks exactly the same like every other fucking, stupid, little medium page? there is absolutely NO personality. the lack of customizability is laughable. and yet, somehow, you’re okay with it? are you stupid!?
Back in the 2000s and early 2010s, a personal website was your identity. I loved having my own site.
It was the place I sent people. My long-term resume. My homepage. My blog. My store. Everything…
no, it’s not better, just way easier for lazy “webmasters” like yourself. you don’t want a website, you want fame. you want people to click your shit. you want views. they feed your ego. you see a website the exact same as social media page, while they were never fucking meant to be the same.
Then something changed. Platforms started doing everything better than personal websites.
tiktok or twitter, sure. i’m on there too. but no-one makes concious decision to go on substack or medium. also i find it weird that your name is burk, but your example was juliawrites lol. and for your information, people actually type in riri.my into their address bar. its easy to remember. if no one types your URL, you’re either not memorable or have a complicated url, both of which is a YOU problem anyways. and oh “people search, not type in” yeah my website is on google too, you don’t need medium or substack or whatever the fuck else you want to use for your “website”. just admit you’re lazy and go lmfao.
People stopped typing URLs. Entirely. No one goes to “juliawrites.com” anymore. They go to TikTok. Or Substack. Or Medium. Or Twitter. Or anything that has a feed and an algorithm.
you call them platforms and services that made it easier, i call it enshittification. its not better, just easier. easier!== better.
“Readers don’t browse homepages” you don’t. people still do. you also talk about how seo is weird and hard how websites arent discoverable by default. hmm ever heard of this little thing called webring. people who actually care about personal web, brought them back from the dead! that’s pretty neat isn’t it. but someone like you likely would never use such thing anyways. so mentioning them is likely futile. you’re very unlikely to even read this response and that’s okay i guess. but i wish you could realize how fucking wrong you are.
yeah, people get used to what you call “design quirks”, or whatever eventually. what actually pisses most people off is that almost every website looks like copy-paste of another. people actually hate this. everyone outside your stupid fucking little bubble hates this. and maybe one day you’ll realize that. but you probably wont. also somewhere in your post you said how “AI tools filled in the gaps”. no one wants to read ai generated articles. the moment someone gets the vibes it’s ai writting, they will leave, and never visit again. but you do you i guess.
Audiences want clean, simple interfaces
Readers like consistency.
They like familiarity.
They like knowing where the buttons are.
A personal site forces them to learn your design quirks. A platform gives them a predictable experience.
i genuinely can’t understand what exactly are you getting from dickriding big ass corporations that don’t give a single shit abuut you? you say “Some freedom disappears. We surrender design control. We trust platforms. We risk platform changes.” this 👏🏻 is 👏🏻 a 👏🏻 fucking 👏🏻 problem 👏🏻. you SHOULDN’T surrender your freedoms. not now, not in the past and not in the future. own your shit. host your shit. it’d be much better that way. but that will never get through your thick skull.
“Publishing on a personal site is a very long game.” that’s the point?? what? i don’t understand why the fuck are you stating this as a negative when it isn’t. “Publishing on Substack is simpler. And quicker. Publishing on Medium even more.” it feels like the point of your whole fucking blogpost is to glaze and suckoff medium. how much are they paying you for this, huh? Is it fucking worth it?
well yes, but actually no.
Your Substack profile is a website.
Your Medium profile is a website.
Your Gumroad shop is a website.
Your Link-in-bio is a website.
“The idea of “my own URL” isn’t gone. But we’ve moved to other places.” correction: YOU have moved and made a fucking mistake, you’re too proud to admit, so now you’re stuck glazing over medium lol. you say in your blog to never depend on one platform, yet you clearly depend on medium... that’s actually cute. that you think you’re still independent. you’re not. you’re medium’s bitch. you’re their mutt. and if medium shits down, you’ll be SOL, unless you’ve kept backups.
also, you say “People follow personality”, that means someone would follow you even on a fully self-made website, if you actually belived in your word. but you really don’t and its apparant.
shit comparison. you’ve never needed a website to function. if you were a blogger back than, even back then it was because it was your hobby, bot because you “need” it. but then again i guess you see it differently. but you are wrong.
But for most creators, a personal website is becoming like a landline phone. It exists. Some people still use it. But nobody needs it to function.
ooooh “monetization” that’s the catch. i should’ve known from the start. but once you write for money, is it really a hobby anymroe? If you get money from it, you’d feel obligated to write more than you necessarily feel comfortable writting, and eventually you’ll just burn yourself out. but it’s not like you care, you’re only chasing after bag.
Publishing moved from handcrafted homepages to ecosystems with reach, community, monetization, and built-in attention.
“And this shift frees us from maintenance, boosts distribution, and lets our writing live where readers actually are.”
yeah it lives where you don’t control it, even at the slightest. but sure, personal websites are useless. let’s just give our shit to big ass corpos, that’s totally a great idea.
to conclude: personal web isn’t dead, this guy is just incredibly stupid.
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