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I invented the web. Here are three things we need to change to save it

theguardian.com

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Re: I invented the web. Here are three things we need to change to save it

#81

Post by pmontra »

unicornporn wrote: post #58
crystalPalace wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I recommend NoScript(Firefox plugin) for blanket or selective JS removal from web pages.

Browsing with NoScript is fine if you just visit the same websites over and over. If you actually like to _surf_ the web, the experience is reduced to a never ending configuration nightmare. At least that's my experience. Nice in theory, but a terrible UX.

I do that. One discovers that some sites include a dozen of third party js. Often enabling the first party one is enough. Sometimes I have to enable some obvious js for displaying videos or comments. Many sites work well enough and display their content without all the related links, advertising, trackers etc. Some sites insist using js to display content that is already inside the main html file. Others break because their main script cannot handle the failure to load some other file. That used to happen when blocking Google analytics. The popularity of adblockers fixed that.

All considered it's an interesting developer experience and the sites I work on keep working even if some scripts don't load.

Re: I invented the web. Here are three things we need to change to save it

#82

Post by themihai »

Andrenid wrote: post #2

I would truly love a new "web" which is effectively style-free. I think the existing one is fine to continue for the general public, online shopping, social networks, etc.. but a parallel information-dense system that uses ultra light weight browsers that work on every device and platform, accessing machine-readable data with some standard stylesheet that concentrates in readability, and the "good" bits of the modern…

We already have it. It's called HTML. Disable CSS and JS and you've got it! Standard UI only.

Re: I invented the web. Here are three things we need to change to save it

#83

Post by bostik »

fiatjaf wrote: post #68

> "Political advertising online needs transparency and understanding" As if that wasn't a problem outside the web. Defenders of democracies like to dream about "transparency and understanding".

It's not a new thing either, web or not.

Chomsky has been warning about the dangers of mass media turned propaganda machine since 1980's. Hell, George Orwell bitterly quipped that history ended in 1936 and everything since then has been propaganda. [0]

0: https://blogs.commons.georgetown.edu/engl-246-fall2011/2011/...

Re: I invented the web. Here are three things we need to change to save it

#84

Post by keypress »

perseusprime11 wrote: post #72

Isn't Facebook the biggest culprit of web? Their walled garden approach and lack of social network portability is what I feel is killing web more than anything.

Facebook got a foothold, because authoring tools sucked so bad. That's ignoring the magic of some of their social tooling. But sharing digital content with your own intended audience could be achieved in a distributed manner. I know the W3C are trying to tackle that problem. We still need intuitive and easy publishing and aggregation tools that beat the Facebooks.

Re: I invented the web. Here are three things we need to change to save it

#85

Post by _yosefk »

fiatjaf wrote: post #68

> "Political advertising online needs transparency and understanding" As if that wasn't a problem outside the web. Defenders of democracies like to dream about "transparency and understanding".

"Defenders of democracies" live in democracies. Defenders of dictatorships and monarchies, from Jeremy Corbyn (who had kind words for Castro) to neoreactionaries, also live in democracies, presumably because they're not actually stupid enough to believe what they say.

Democracy is a lesser evil, which many people born into it fail to appreciate because their imagination does not render the greater evils realistically.

Re: I invented the web. Here are three things we need to change to save it

#86

Post by sweeneyrod »

holografix wrote: post #65
marcus_holmes wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those aren't beautiful pages. We geeks, who can understand the code, decry the complexity of a beautiful page and prefer not to go there. But we're 1% of the audience. The other 99% are used to equating beauty and style with quality. More style == more quality. Less style == less quality. The pages we love because of their simplicity don't do well in the mass market because of their simplicity. I have taken to callin…

I know what you mean. Frankly I think the Kardashians are a force for evil. Promoting selfishness, superficiality and female independence through hyper sexual objectification. Why are they so popular? Total mystery to me.

"selfishness, superficiality and female independence" One of these things is not like the others.

Re: I invented the web. Here are three things we need to change to save it

#87

Post by Sir_Substance »

keypress wrote: post #76
fiatjaf wrote: post #70

Does anyone else see as problem that web browsers are getting so feature-rich? That means that if anyone wants to write a new web browser he won't be able to.

I don't think that's a browser issue. More an authoring issue. You could serve up pages as text files, with as little html as a link.

There is a special circle of hell for people who write documentation on pages so javascript heavy that a lynx browser on a computer with broken graphics drivers can't load it.

Re: I invented the web. Here are three things we need to change to save it

#88

Post by K0nserv »

> Today marks 28 years since I submitted my original proposal for the worldwide web. I imagined the web as an open platform that would allow everyone, everywhere to share information, access opportunities, and collaborate across geographic and cultural boundaries.

Seems to me that the above and the points raised in point 2 sit on opposite sides of the spectrum. Either you get a free and open internet where everyone can publish content as they like or you police who and want can be published. The spread of misinformation seems to be a direct result of the democratic nature of the internet.

Re: I invented the web. Here are three things we need to change to save it

#89

Post by zigzigzag »

_yosefk wrote: post #85
fiatjaf wrote: post #68

> "Political advertising online needs transparency and understanding" As if that wasn't a problem outside the web. Defenders of democracies like to dream about "transparency and understanding".

"Defenders of democracies" live in democracies. Defenders of dictatorships and monarchies, from Jeremy Corbyn (who had kind words for Castro) to neoreactionaries, also live in democracies, presumably because they're not actually stupid enough to believe what they say. Democracy is a lesser evil, which many people born into it fail to appreciate because their imagination does not render the greater evils realistically…

Excellent comment, especially the last part.

Re: I invented the web. Here are three things we need to change to save it

#90

Post by icebraining »

Qantourisc wrote: post #75
icebraining wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's Freenet. It's just that nobody uses it.

Took a quick read, there is no way to publicly publish something without using other means to communicate the key and content ?

You can communicate the link over one of the multiple networks that work over Freenet, like FMS (Freenet Message System).
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