[at-fates-hands]

"Every beginner web designer and developer has done this one (myself included). They feel compelled to fill the page with interesting information and stuff for people to look at and click on."

Great point.

When you design a site, you should already have a solid idea of where you're trying to get a user to go and then use strategies to lead them there. Overdoing the front page with buttons and modals and shiny things that move doesn't help in that regard.

Probably the first and most valuable lesson in design.

[ereckers]

This works fine if you don't have a marketing team to answer to or a CEO who's sister has just got 3/4 of the way through her JQuery class at JC and "has some ideas".

Also, this blog post comes from the perspective of a single use website. Treehouse, build a website. AirBNB, rent a pad, etc.. There are corporate websites out there with multiples of sub-companies and 100s of different product offerings all competing for space.

Putting up a full screen image and a button that says "Get Started!" is the easy stuff and isn't what I would consider the definitive example of good web design.