
The Whimsical Website Club - mxbck
https://whimsical.club/
======
simonsarris
LOL at the button after the submission form. I submitted
[https://simonsarris.com](https://simonsarris.com) because of my ridiculous
background (a town that builds with CSS animations, and birds that appear to
have no set path done with pure CSS).

The logic behind the little birds: they are DIVs with CSS animated on a cubic
path up-and-down, while their ::after is getting animated on a different cubic
path left-to-right. The result of 2 separate axis animations: They do a loose
figure-8 path that's different each pass.

That CSS code is here: [https://github.com/simonsarris/site-
simonsarris/blob/master/...](https://github.com/simonsarris/site-
simonsarris/blob/master/src/components/layout.css#L159)

I am currently trying to make my site background considerably more ridiculous
by re-implementing in canvas, with lots of interaction and a night/day
sequence, and custom buildings. The rebuild so far is open source here:
[https://simonsarris.github.io/simeville/](https://simonsarris.github.io/simeville/)

Click the button to build a town. Drag the sun down to see night time (and the
constellations). I need to spend a lot of time working on the art, but I'm not
a very good artist yet.

~~~
d33
I had to spam the website to find out, but if you want to try without
spamming, just go to this URL directly:

[https://whimsical.club/join/submitted](https://whimsical.club/join/submitted)

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athenot
This feels like I got off a well-travelled freeway and got on the beautiful
and quirky back-roads, seeing a whole different side of the web.

It's also making me realize how dependent† I've become on search engines.
Don't get me wrong, they are great at what they do, but seeing these curated
list of sites definitely reminds me of the late 90's where directories were
still a thing.

†: ie. lazy.

~~~
Jetroid
Max's previous post [1] touches on the some of the ideas from the early 90s
internet that we're starting to see return today.

I'm personally most excited to to watch the return and rise of niche self-run
communities that were greatly supressed during the early days of social media.

[1] [https://mxb.dev/blog/the-return-of-
the-90s-web/](https://mxb.dev/blog/the-return-of-the-90s-web/)

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gkoberger
I love this so much.

Software has gotten so boring. OSX used to have a ton of fun weird little
things (like the poof when you removed an app) that have all been removed.
Same with Google. I miss it.

One of our company values is "Err on the side of whimsy," and it's my far my
favorite one... life's too short to not make things a bit weird fun and
interesting.

(Also, for people who haven't seen it, also check out
[https://littlebigdetails.com/](https://littlebigdetails.com/) )

~~~
skytreader
Care to share your company then? Or your products/website that I can take a
look at?

~~~
gkoberger
Company is ReadMe.com :) Here's our handbook with the values:
[https://readme.com/handbook](https://readme.com/handbook)

~~~
skytreader
Nice! I see the whimsical part indeed. I like the owl character (especially
its prevalence in [https://blog.readme.com/](https://blog.readme.com/))! Has
way more personality than [Alegria]([https://eyeondesign.aiga.org/dont-worry-
these-gangley-armed-...](https://eyeondesign.aiga.org/dont-worry-these-
gangley-armed-cartoons-are-here-to-protect-you-from-big-tech/)).

Tell your designers for me to bank on that visual language and stay away from
"corporate clip-art". <smallrant>It's funny to me how even start-ups (who
claim "personal touch" as an edge in their service) utilize the blandness of
Alegria.</smallrant>

~~~
gkoberger
I'm the designer, so I hear ya! Definitely agree... we worked hard to make
sure Owlbert only pops up rarely. He's not on the homepage (other than a few
easter eggs), and barely in the product. He's mostly for swag and the blog!

------
whoisjuan
Doing a shameless plug, but if you like this, check my project
[https://www.waveguide.io/patterns/all](https://www.waveguide.io/patterns/all)
| I document a bunch of software (web, mobile and sometime real life) user
experience patterns.

I also document a bunch of other stuff like screenshots of different websites
and try to classify them in a meaningful way.

Still a long way to go for this to become what I want it to be but it might be
helpful for someone here. Here is the landing page to understand a little bit
better what I'm trying to do with this:
[https://www.waveguide.io/](https://www.waveguide.io/)

~~~
Jetroid
Whilst the work you're doing is commendable, it feels like the complete
opposite of the whimsical website.

The whimsical website club aims to "showcase how a more personal web could
look", and highlights the weird, unique, and non-traditional things about
these creative's websites. The whole idea is about moving away from corporate
boringness.

Waveguide, meanwhile, seems to be covering very 'corporate' UX patterns that
could (and should?) be used in the business world.

Those things seem completely different and at odds with each other, so I'm not
really sure why you think waveguide is related (other than wanting to self-
promote for it's own sake?).

~~~
whoisjuan
I have fun ones too: [https://www.waveguide.io/patterns/web/entry/thanos-
snap](https://www.waveguide.io/patterns/web/entry/thanos-snap)

Yeah. Self-promoting but I definitely think is related because it documents
this little details that increase the delightfulness of the website.

------
ryantgtg
Fun and inspiring.

I once made a site devoted to McGriddle fan fiction that has a cool McGriddle
gif, and each layer of the McGriddle image hides a surprise.
[http://blueskiesabove.us/mcgriddle/](http://blueskiesabove.us/mcgriddle/) Not
sure if that's whimsical or...

------
MindGods
You might also like the Weird Wide Webring

[https://weirdwidewebring.net](https://weirdwidewebring.net)

------
p4bl0
My friend Damien's homepage [1] should really go on this list. It embeds a
Nethack game on the home page.

[1] Check it out: [https://desfontain.es/](https://desfontain.es/)

------
nikisweeting
I nominate @benjojo's personal site which spawns a full on interactive linux
VM running in the background for each visitor.
[https://benjojo.co.uk/](https://benjojo.co.uk/)

------
syx
honestly it's quite exciting when things like this pop up in my news feed. I
could spend a couple of hours binge clicking links and discovering new sites.

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benatkin
My favorite is [https://www.11ty.dev/](https://www.11ty.dev/) \- not the first
time I've seen it but good to be reminded of it!

Here's the twitter thread about their logo:
[https://twitter.com/jameswillweb/status/999052022497316865](https://twitter.com/jameswillweb/status/999052022497316865)

~~~
lemonberry
11ty is a great little static site generator. I just started playing with it.
Fun to use and seems to have a lot of power behind it's apparent simplicity.

------
waprin
I love this, I also miss the more fun side of the internet that seems to be
dwindling.

The best whimsical site I've seen in a while is
[https://hannahblair.co.uk/](https://hannahblair.co.uk/) , she made a whole
Windows 95 Desktop remake as her personal site, including some remakes of some
classic software, it's really amazing!

~~~
Jetroid
You just reminded me of [https://poolside.fm/](https://poolside.fm/)

~~~
minkzilla
This is one of the coolest sites I’ve ever seen! I love every part of it!

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4lejandrito
It reminded me to [https://theuselessweb.com/](https://theuselessweb.com/).

Nice work!

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Landmarks
I love the idea of this site - we build sites for clients so we'll be sure to
submit them!

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rakic
When you drag a finger (or a clicked mouse cursor) on [https://xn--
bj8a.com/404/](https://ꑮ.com/404/) page, there is a burst of logos (144 per
second) coming underneath.

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graposaymaname
This is so very beautiful! Pure joy to click through each one of those
websites.

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theodric
Absolutely fuck this site for playing a loud noise when you click the "joy"
link. I don't associate jump scares with joy.

