Why are you not mobile-friendly - untapped nostalgia of mobile websites
Wondering around indie websites, it's easy to find warnings and popular buttons advising that this website is not mobile-friendly, best viewed on desktop, or even it's tailored for screens with specific dimensions in pixels. I usually browse indie web on desktop so I don't mind, but sometimes when the site have some particularly interesting stuff, I'm going back to it on my phone on the go (and almost always use Firefox on Android). The best sites are fully readable on phone, perfectly scrollable and navigating between pages is super smooth. Sites that doesn't have CSS rules for various screen sizes needs to be navigated vertically and horizontally which isn't all that bad if the layout tells its own story, like when images float around the text or content boxes are carefully crafted with fun gimmicks and such, that are not possible/looks lame on vertical screens.
There are a few reasons why many webmasters don't want to bother with mobile view of their sites which I think are closely intertwined.
Click the phone to experience of browsing my silly html files on Sony Ericsson C510
In case you wonder, the title of the website is Bandar which means 'harbour' in Indonesian and Persian ^^.
There are a few reasons why many webmasters don't want to bother with mobile view of their sites which I think are closely intertwined.
CSS is confusing and hard to learn properly
It's kinda baffling how staple navigation elements for touchscreens like hamburger menus are not packages as some default option in plain html/css.
Designs for mobile screens are boring
...and have less variety which the indie web is all about. You can't have fun background on the sides of the content grid when the margin is 5 pixels. Also smartphones are designed to be convenient so people don't wish to be surprised by some unorthodox way of navigating the site. Oh, and hover effects just don't work at all or your finger just hides it so another cool feature is lost.
Majority of webmasters/webmistresses are lazy
...myself included. Also many of us have a lot going on in the real life so the complicated at times set up of a personal website isn't a priority.
Nostalgia effect applies only to desktop websites
...yet, that's the part of the story I want to expand. I have visited a ton of sites on neocities with desktop only designs, but not a single one that was specifically design for mobile screens. It make sense that mobile apps don't evoke nostalgia, but rather fatigue and annoyance as nowadays they are constantly present in our lives and we basically have to use them to function in modern society. It seems however like not that many people feels any kind of nostalgia to the previous generations of 'mobile apps' like Java games and websites displayed on ridiculously tiny screens. And it's a bit weird, they were kinda cute!
During the blissful times of the year 2013, when smartphones were not nearly that ubiquitous, I still used my beloved brickphone Sony Ericsson C510. This phone was a significant technological leap for me, before that I used a flip phone Sagem MYC5-2, preety fun device with cool monochrome display on the back of the screen and multicolor blinking diode. Unfortunately it had no bluetooth, no memory card slot and only 16MBs of storage. C510 in comparison was a killer device, now I could upload directly from my computer via USB as much songs, wallpapers, games and whatnots as I wanted to inside spacious 1GB M2 card. The mobile internet however was still not a thing I could easily access, it was slow, expensive (any mobile data usage still felt scary) and the phone didn't have Wi-Fi on board. Regardless, the phone was super enjoyable to tinker even without the internet, soon I started to explore what kind of stuff I can upload and use on it, like .jar files with primitive apps or games like Worms, Asphalt or some 2D version of GTA, text files with cheat sheets and then I realize since it feature a basic internet browser, I can made my own html file and decorate it with some css too!
So in the spirit of bringing up nostalgia and to show off my unusual and unimpressive ability to make primitive websites on brickphones I dug up my cheat sheet with lists of cities ranked by the global significance. Back then I was so mesmerized that's possible and if I were not a perpetual sluggard, I might even add some JavaScript to it and make some kind of true app! In My Ideas page you can see what was my dream app at that time, but that would require the knowledge of Java without the 'script' part which was (and still kinda is) a rocket science for me.
Maybe some other nerds out there had made htmls for phones that were manufactured about 10 to 15(!) years ago and I'm looking forward to see how many will make those silly websites a new nostalgia trend :D