I have been using slow internet more often lately, because I'm traveling full-time again, and only using 3G/4G broadband. It is remarkable how large some sites have gotten since I was last in this situation. Despite mobile broadband being somewhat faster now than a few years ago, the time to load (to usability) for many sites is much higher. HN is notable for loading instantly in these circumstances, not because the server (I'm guessing it still runs on one server, plus CloudFlare, but I might be guessing wrong) is blazing fast, but because it is so small.