I'm afraid HN is getting the way Slashdot went: sarcastic über-negativity on each and every post, often by people with little or no skin in the game and no experience as real developer/entrepreneur. After all, if you have time to post early on a high-traffic site like this, you're probably not very busy building new things. I say this while being fully conscious that I'm exactly one of these time-wasting untalented hacks.

The first few months I was reading HN comments (which wasn't that long ago, just about two years, but feels like ages), I was actually feeling pumped-up and motivated to start my own biz (although I now know I'm pretty hopeless at it). These days, it feels like HN is just full of well-spoken and highly-educated stop energy.

It's a shame you're being downvoted, hopefully constructive feed back will eventually bubble to the top. There was a similar submission yesterday where this occurred.

Clearly there are a group of elite web designers, UI and UX specialists that parade this site, who, unsurprisingly, have empty profiles. How else are we supposed to see their portfolio of exceptional work so we know what to aspire to?

Art/Creative Directors often have some of the worst, if existent at all, portfolios. Execution has nothing to do with having an eye for it.

This layout might look more modern than the 1998 frames we were expecting, but from a usability standpoint, it's still weak. If your average government site has a lefthand sidebar that contains all of the navigation, that in itself is better than making your user move their eyes all over the page, forcing them to click on a button to even see the rest of the options available. On top of that, they don't look like links (they don't even have a hover state), which is frustrating enough for me, but could be entirely too confusing for average users.

Additionally, that large image is useless; the "View more services" should be visible without needing to click into it.

This is a fallacy. If you need to show something to prove or give an opinion or a reason about 2+2=4 then we will have troubles to discuss on anything.

You cannot use argumentum ad hominem to this point. If people has to shown their portfolios or other stuff to prove their skillmanship you're only wasting time and finding on the wrong place to prove your points, since those designs may not apply or be used as a good example to counterattack the main point here.

We do have troubles discussing things.

Unfortunately, the world is so complicated that we can't make an informed decision based on speech/writing alone, and verification of achievements is one of the easiest and most accurate ways to judge credibility.

We should give opinions based on evidence, proven evidence. The rest are just, personal viewpoints who doesn't care what you prove. I try always to avoid these discussions, but sometimes i feel is a bit unfair to bring up the "show me your X card, sir" to talk about something.

Well, it is actually an interesting idea. I personally am not a designer yet I feel ok offering my criticism of a design.

Since designers are supposed to design for non designers, your criticism is vital to the process.

On a recent story about AngularJS, one of the top comments was someone noting that they think poorly of AngularJS because the website for the project "looks like a Bootstrap site".

To which I say: Who gives a shit.

I say the same here. The site looks fantastic, and I would love if my local municipality had something as clean and functional, whether or not it looks like a wordpress theme.

Too many want to be world weary. They want to announce that they can see under the covers and thus are above it. I don't get it.

To agree with you I have to agree that this site is "leaps and bounds ahead of any other government site we can think of", and that it is "truly useful and delightful for citizens" over and above previous sites and or designs.

I'm very sorry, but I don't agree with either.

Is that OK with you? Am I allowed to have my own opinion and express it? Am I some sort of idiot because I don't agree? Am I expected to say nothing?

I would say why, but clearly you would find it predictable and all :(

Whole heartedly agree. So dissapointed to see people picking holes in the design, when actually the site's functionality works extremely well and is far ahead of almost any other comparable local authority website.