Sara Joy: Everybody’s Free (To Write Websites)

Sara Joy’s adaptation of the song “Everybody’s Free (To Wear Sunscreen)” (YouTube) originally by Baz Luhrman with lyrics pulled directly from Mary Schmich‘s classic essay, “Wear Sunscreen”. Anyone who has graduated high school since 1999 doesn’t even have to look up the song since it’s become an unofficial-official commencement ceremony staple. If you graduated in ’99, then I’m sorry. You might still be receiving ongoing treatment for the earworm infection from that catchy tune spinning endlessly on radio (yes, radio). Then again, those of us from those late-90’s classes came down with more serious earworm cases from the “I Will Remember You” and “Time of Your Life” outbreaks.

Some choice pieces of Sara’s “web version”:

Don’t feel guilty if you don’t know what you want to do with your site. The most interesting websites don’t even have an introduction, never mind any blog posts. Some of the most interesting web sites I enjoy just are.

Add plenty of semantic HTML.

Clever play on words and selectors:

Enjoy your . Style it every way you can. Don’t be afraid of CSS, or what other people think of it. It’s the greatest design tool you’ll ever learn.

The time’s they are a-changin’:

Accept certain inalienable truths: connection speeds will rise, techbros will grift, you too will get old— and when you do, you’ll fantasize that when you were young websites were light-weight, tech founders were noble and fonts used to be bigger.

And, of course:

Respect the W3C.

Oh, and remember: Just build websites.


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