I'm afraid that one day someone will discover I don't actually know how to write HTML or CSS and that I've been using Microsoft FrontPage 97 this whole time.

I grow ever weary of people telling me that the Facebook app is listening to them via the microphone. It doesn't need to. vale.rocks/micros/20260...

It has been a while, so I just wanted to resurface this gem. A brilliant and interactive bit of work. jgthms.com/web-design-i...

Personally extremely disappointed to see Mozilla proudly and cheerfully announcing that Firefox is active again on X (formerly Twitter).

Always confused by people/organisations who measure productivity or effort with Git commits. There are so many different approaches to commiting that it seems a completely meaningless metric. Certainly nothing to brag about.

Those tormented screams? Believe it or not, from the damned.

Amen brother. I get this a lot, too. “How do you make your animations?” HTML, CSS, JS. The web already has everything you need to make the most beautiful and engaging content in the world. No batteries needed.

I've been asked what framework I used to make the dashboard for my Stoat bot AutoMod so fast and snappy. It is genuinely just slick HTML/CSS/JS that communicates with an API layer I developed. The dashboard itself doesn't depend on even a single external library.

Squeezing code and prose out of myself like a toothpaste tube on its last legs.

A quick blog post explaining ULIDs at a very surface level. Specifically in the context of the Stoat chat platform, though most of the information is generally useful. automod.vale.rocks/blog/underst...

An obscure fact: Apple had an RSS reader designed for the iPhone available at reader.mac.com

Can't wait to see AI-driven dementia become a big thing with people offloading all their thinking and their brains thusly deteriorating.

A confession: sometimes I'm too lazy to type `</div>` so I just copy the closing tag from elsewhere.

One day Google will release the one hundred and eighty second version of Blink, and I'll be ready with the jokes.

A short little musing on the content presentation challenges presented by television's switch from 4:3 to 16:9, with a parallel drawn to progressive enhancement. vale.rocks/micros/20260...

honestly this might be the last year of HTML Day unless we can find sustainable funding HTML Day belongs to the community and I'd love to see it continue but organizing it takes a lot of <time> if you'd like to help support it we would love to talk

Currently voting on conference talks based entirely on which talk is less about AI.

The use of 'he/she' really annoys me. 'They' is much more inclusive than 'he/she' and is also quicker to both say and write. Anyone using 'he/she' today is either forced to by some obtuse requirements, or is purposefully being bigoted. '(s)he' is no better and is just as needlessly difficult.

I forewent mentioning some of the less glamorous (though satisfying) bits. I stripped out so many dependencies. Also made major improvements to stability, performance, and reliability, and many bug fixes. Some small new features like purging messages with bans, too

After much ado, I've finally shipped the swanky new dashboard for my Stoat bot AutoMod. So glad to finally have it out there and live. I must admit, back-end is far from my strength. All the deets and informative bits and bobs here: automod.vale.rocks/blog/a-web-d... #Stoat #StoatChat

It should be illegal to have hold music with an imperfect loop, such that it cuts off for a brief moment and fills you with a fleeting period of hope before throwing you back to the wait.

Was just reading this Web Platform Wishlist by @vale.rocks ... Love to see these kinds of posts really. Keep sharing them and help raise their visibility. vale.rocks/posts/web-pl...

I just saw a marketing page refer to a product as the 'final solution'. I didn't think it needed saying, but don't go around advertising the 'final solution'. There are some connotations there...

Y'know that scene at the end of [action blockbuster] where you see the guy walk out of the flames caused by the huge explosion? Well, I'm fairly sure Mat is that guy.

Information architecture? More like, 'Blimey, I'm 90% through organising this crap, and now I've just found a stupid edge case that means I've got to reorganise the entire hierarchy and structure.'

The sudden sinking feeling when you're given a codebase to work on, then you notice the HTML tags are all written in uppercase, that there is no document declaration, and that there are conditional comments for Internet Explorer.

With Xbox struggling and the PlayStation physical media fiasco, Sega has the chance to do the funniest thing.

Smashing ahead at Mach 5 presently. Can't wait to catapult the fruits of my labour at you all.

The 2026 State of Devs survey is now open. This survey's goal is to take the pulse of the developer community regarding things like career, workplace issues, and mental and physical health, and I think it's more important than ever right now! survey.devographics.com/en-US/survey...

Stumbled across this. A Blink-based (not WebKit-based!) browser running natively on iOS. Wild. github.com/Nodesclock/B...

Okay folks. People are interested in this idea – it has legs and I want to make it happen. If you're a digital professional and interested in being part of such a freelancer collective, send me a message. Nothing set in stone yet, but I've got concepts of a plan and would like to establish this.

✨ New post “Masonry aka waterfall aka collapse aka pack aka Pinterest-style layout — display grid-lanes cheatsheet for my future self” pawelgrzybek.com/masonry-aka-... #css #masonry

You can say 'the industry is fucked and we're all doomed' and people don't even dispute it. They just look at you like:

New on the blog: bell.bz/youll-miss-t...

A thread, because things are feeling rough at present. 🧵👇 I'm not quite sure where to go or what to do. I'm watching my peers slowly burn out, go quiet, quit the industry, or struggle on hoping it'll get better in time. Even if the storm is weathered, what comes out the other side?

There is working going ahead at present to allow permissioned data on the AT Protocol. This is great in a lot of ways. Being able to have private data will open up a lot of doors. My fear is that this will bring an end to the open environment of the Atmosphere. The openness is what makes it great.

I suppose Google Search's full pivot to AI explains why Google dropped support for non-JavaScript usage at the end of 2025.

Coming up on thirteen years of running a design studio! Doing a massive rebranding and repositioning this summer. Not the first time, but far and away the biggest. Would love to do another annual Q&A blog post about running the studio. Send me your questions! I'll share my answers next month.

They should do a show like Air Crash Investigations, but instead of investigating aeroplanes, they investigate what went wrong at last Tuesday's all-hands.

I'm glad people have enjoyed my posts about web browsers on game consoles and virtual reality devices, but I've heard enough anecdotes from people about using the Dreamcast/Wii/Xbox/Vita/Quest/etc to watch porn. Please no more.

AutoMod used to have a red accent, but the logo was rainbow-ified for pride month a few years ago and it stuck. Sometimes people are critical of it which weeds them out, and sometimes people message me because they appreciate the representation and it makes them feel safe.

Reddit is slowly winding down Old Reddit. Functionality is being removed and features are discreetly disappearing. They're quite obviously eroding its functionality so that when they finally kill it there is less outrage. Sucks as someone who makes money from Old Reddit stylesheets...

I love CSS, but it isn't perfect. Even the CSSWG admits so, with a published list of design mistakes. FixCSS is a little library that tackles these mistakes and presents the CSS syntax that could have been. A fun little look at an alternate universe. tangled.org/vale.rocks/F...

Seeing lots of discussion of smart glasses as of late. Especially a petition to the UK Government regarding banning them. A few thoughts: vale.rocks/micros/20260...

I don't actually understand why everyone keeps talking about using AI for coding. I simply can't see how artificial insemination helps with building software.

I play a fun game when checking domains that have expired called 'Is it now a porn site, a gambling site, or did they fail a pivot into crypto/NFTs?'

Just thinking a little bit about theming apps and websites. vale.rocks/micros/20260...

Hey y'all, putting out the bat signal: I'm looking for full-time, part-time, or contract work in product design or frontend development. ("Design engineering" if you're trendy.) Over a decade of experience building design systems for startups, healthcare, civic tech + more. ky.fyi

There are plenty of things I'd love to see added to the web platform or improved in browsers. Especially things I want in CSS. While we've already got so much great stuff and a lot more on the way, there are still some assorted little bits I'd love. Here is my wishlist: vale.rocks/posts/web-pl...

Seeing a sudden increase in followers. To those who've just started following me, where did you come from?