Shaking the Plum Tree

There’s a new series on Netflix (well, new is probably a stretch) called A Very Secret Service. And you’ve got to check it out.

A few episodes into the first season, you’ll come across the phrase “shaking the plum tree.” You’ll never know what will fall out.

Lately, I’ve been applying this theory to design. I’ve applied it even to the type of services I’d consider for my hosting or CMS — hence my use of Squarespace on the myriad.is website now. I was recently turned on to the service from a colleague who had been using it to build sites for his clients. I’d only heard bad things, really — though, the usual bad things (cue “Oh, Squarespace, huh?”).

So far, I’ve got to say I’m not mad about it. But I’m not incredibly impressed. There are a lot of things that are great about Squarespace from the developer-side: use of JSON, git, and a worry-free commerce system. But there are also a number of things that are unfortunate: being locked with Squarespace as your host, having the entire backend of the CMS locked down by Squarespace, having certain features locked from customization. If there’s a common theme here, it’s that a lot of Squarespace is locked off from customization.

I get it, though. For most people, this won’t be an issue. And it’s even helpful sometimes when it prevents users from being able to mess up anything on the backend (though, double-edged as said before — we can’t work on the backend either).

All in all, it’s a fairly interesting platform to develop on for quicker, lower load clients. I wouldn’t have known or believed this, though, had I not been willing to try it out.

Shake the plum tree; see what falls out.