I posted something along similar lines sometime ago and this pattern. Pretty successful sites with 'bare bones' interface/design but rather well planned from a usability perspective as you point out.

I was even thinking of accomplished or even legendary CS people that have minimalistic personal websites.

Knuth : http://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~uno/

Norvig: http://norvig.com/

Stallman: http://stallman.org/

Of course pg from the familiar people:

Graham: http://www.paulgraham.com/

I am really curious about this and I would be happy if more HNers could share their thoughts on that. Hopefully I did not deviate much from the spirit of your post