Developers moaning about Bootstrap have fallen into the common trap of seeing apps through developers' eyes.
Please consider that:
1. Almost no one in the world has heard of Bootstrap. Though it's captured our mindshare as developers, most of our users will not know nor care if the app is Bootstrap or not.
2. The vast majority of web apps still will not be Bootstrap apps.
Basically none of the general public will say "Hey, this is a Bootstrap'ed application, I'm not using it." They just do not know nor care what Bootstrap is. If it looks professional and works as they expect, they will be happy. If they're happy, I'm happy.
I regularly read HN, and I like to think I'm generally aware of web development stuff, and I hadn't even heard of Bootstrap until the for/against argument blew up on HN over the last few days.
If I haven't heard of it, none of my friends have. Out of the hundreds of people I know, I'd imagine possibly one of them has heard of Bootstrap.
Unless your startup target is web developers, nobody will have any clue what you're using as your UI kit, but they'll be pleased when things are where they normally are.
This is true. How many people use JQuery UI? Millions. How many regular folk complain that widgets looks similar? None. In fact they appreciate the standardization because there's less cognitive workload for them.
Agreed - I am a dev and a bit sick of seeing Bootstrap splashed across quickly designed sites. That said, I demoed a site I built using Bootstrap recently to some business users and was complimented on my design ability.
Please consider that: 1. Almost no one in the world has heard of Bootstrap. Though it's captured our mindshare as developers, most of our users will not know nor care if the app is Bootstrap or not. 2. The vast majority of web apps still will not be Bootstrap apps.
Basically none of the general public will say "Hey, this is a Bootstrap'ed application, I'm not using it." They just do not know nor care what Bootstrap is. If it looks professional and works as they expect, they will be happy. If they're happy, I'm happy.