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by paulojreis 4341 days ago
Distraction-free and minimalistic, with background photography? I mean... not even the text area has a solid background, as it blends with the photography! It's noisy as hell, quite the opposite of what you are selling.

I'm sorry for the criticism, and I do support the initiative, but please try to align your product with your conceptual premises. Validate it, empirically. You claim it to be distraction-free? Try to get some metrics and subjective reviews, test with users. Also, you can stand on the shoulder of giants. There's literature about attention, even about typing.

1 comments

backgrounds do not distract, at least me, but they do help to dive deeply into story, you just have to find one. And in case you really want to have a blank white paper with black ink - just set it via preferences.
I'm sorry, but the background (behind the text) is essentially noise. It will impact your reading which will, of course, impact typing.

And about the "at least me" argument... I'm all for personal inspiration and taste in personal projects, and applaud you for following what you like. But you're trying to provide distraction-free writing for others, so you have to consider their characteristics, you have to consider what science knows about attention, reading and typing - not your taste.

I've noticed that you replied elsewhere that your typographic choice was also motivated by personal taste. Both noisy backgrounds and typography will deeply impact how your product performs in providing distraction-free writing. I think you can balance your personal touch with improvements in the fundamental dimensions of your product.

that is why there's a variety of customization options present - feel free to customize it as you wish. Also, there are two "blank" inspirational presets already build in, much inspired by blank black old terminals.
Why not stick to your tagline and make it blank/minimal by default and allow people to add silly backgrounds like trees if they really want it?
because there are tonns of 'minimal/blank' projects exists already, why create another one? )
Your own title says it's yet another "minimalistic" one. Maybe you should answer your own question then.