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What I want from the internet

chrbutler.com

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Re: What I want from the internet

#11

Post by chrbutler »

uneekname wrote: post #10

Hi Christopher, I really liked this article. > It is hard, though, to build and maintain the structures of the old, “smaller” internet. I agree. Even just setting up an RSS reader and finding a little community of blogs to follow can take a lot of work. Interact with those blogs, whether that's by submitting comments to individual posts, posting responses on your own blog, or doing something fancier with IndieWeb pro…

Yes to all of this. And thanks for the links! I hadn't heard of Gemini before. I'll check them out asap.

Re: What I want from the internet

#12

Post by htag »

JKCalhoun wrote: post #3

> And the internet used to be more work to experience. Today, it’s more work to avoid. Since the author likes analogies, I'll add mine: the internet now has become roads, bridges, towns. The internet used to be forests, rivers to ford, camps. There used to be an exploration-aspect to the internet, not sure what you would find if you took this trail or that one. Now we all seem to travel the few, well-worn roads to th…

I'm also fond of the internet-as-public-square paradigm. All news worthy events are posted in it. There's sections of the square dedicated to classifieds and vendors. There's a spot with chess sets.

Yes, there's also some people on soap boxes yelling into the crowd. I can usually ignore them just fine.

Re: What I want from the internet

#14

Post by BKirkpatrick »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #7

I'm pretty darn sure I'm not the only independent content creator being largely ignored, attacked for "self promotion" if they post their own work while no one else ever posts it etc and then listening to people whine about the internet and how they wish this, that or the other while you roll your eyes and think to yourself again "This is the internet you helped create. If you don't like it, make other choices."

[dead]

Re: What I want from the internet

#15

Post by paulcole »

chrbutler wrote: post #6
paulcole wrote: post #2

[flagged]

That's fair! Would love to hear (sincerely) how you would answer this question.

Personally, I prefer the internet of today to the internet of the past. There's so much more to do and I just don't have any nostalgia for 1997-2002 (the first 5 years I used the internet) or any other time period in the past. The internet has gotten consistently better and more useful over time.

The one thing I would like (but will never get) is the way to pay directly for more things rather than pay indirectly with ads.

Re: What I want from the internet

#16

Post by jasode »

>It is hard, though, to build and maintain the structures of the old, “smaller” internet. You can, today, still go back to the can-to-can structure that a personal website, an RSS feed, and a browser provide.

I think the author ignores another reason that people (especially us techies) don't like to admit: The majority of people don't care about following a list of personal websites. Instead, websurfers just get whatever snippets of information they want (e.g. food recipe, medical trivia) from whatever website happens to have it and then move on.

The disinterest in personal websites comes from both the websurfers and many content authors themselves.

Some examples from the content creators...

Clay Shirky's essay "A Group Is Its Own Worst Enemy" happens to be on the HN front page right now. But he doesn't maintain his personal website anymore. He gave reasons for it[1] and even said he regrets letting it rot. But even today, his personal website remains empty and previous links all return 404 errors. But he does stay active on Twitter: https://twitter.com/cshirky

John Carmack's old personal website "altdevblogaday.com" is gone now.[2] But he does stay active on Twitter: https://twitter.com/id_aa_carmack

Those 2 guys are obviously internet-savvy and need no lectures on personal websites -- and yet they chose to abandon them.

As to examples for websurfers, if you ask normal people if they sometimes search the internet for a cooking recipe, they'll say "yes". But if then followup with "Can you name a cooking website you got a recipe from?", most will say "no". The average websurfer cared more about the recipe and not the particular website. Sure, some will make a mental note of the domain url and maybe even bookmark it but many won't.

The lack of interest for following "little websites" continues to be reinforced with tools like ChatGPT. Most people would rather get some synthesized information instead of visiting a bunch of different websites they don't care about.

I think this past comment about RSS not being relevant to regular people is uncomfortable for some to read: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2060707

I bought this internet yellow pages book in 1995 when the consumer-accessible internet was new: https://www.google.com/search?q=The+Internet+Yellow+Pages+1s...

That book represents a different time when indie websites were a purposeful destination to visit. I notice that a lot of people don't bother doing that anymore. Me included.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31041194

[2] requires Wayback Machine: http://www.altdevblogaday.com/2012/04/26/functional-programm...

Re: What I want from the internet

#17

Post by chrbutler »

paulcole wrote: post #15
chrbutler wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's fair! Would love to hear (sincerely) how you would answer this question.

Personally, I prefer the internet of today to the internet of the past. There's so much more to do and I just don't have any nostalgia for 1997-2002 (the first 5 years I used the internet) or any other time period in the past. The internet has gotten consistently better and more useful over time. The one thing I would like (but will never get) is the way to pay directly for more things rather than pay indirectly with…

I think that's a totally valid perspective – and I agree to some extent. There are absolutely things about the internet that are better today than the way they used to be.

As for the micropayments thing – I couldn't agree more. Jaron Lanier has had a lot to say about that, and I remain hopeful that someday we can find a functional model other than advertising.

Re: What I want from the internet

#18

Post by rektide »

By far the best article about where we are today that I've seen!

The idea of the internet as a body that has gone comatose, that isn't really reacting or changing, is a good metaphor for me, matches my feelings. There's still so much potential, but we aren't in an interactive phase; we are continuing along only with the inertia we had.

But we could collectively wake up at any point, could restart creating interwoven connected experiences of our own.

Re: What I want from the internet

#19

Post by throwuwu »

Just put down your phone. Or better yet, just use the smolnet sites that already exist. If you pine for the days of a small, nerdy and exclusive internet then just go there it’s just a few clicks away.

Re: What I want from the internet

#20

Post by fsflover »

JKCalhoun wrote: post #3

> And the internet used to be more work to experience. Today, it’s more work to avoid. Since the author likes analogies, I'll add mine: the internet now has become roads, bridges, towns. The internet used to be forests, rivers to ford, camps. There used to be an exploration-aspect to the internet, not sure what you would find if you took this trail or that one. Now we all seem to travel the few, well-worn roads to th…

> The internet used to be forests, rivers to ford, camps.

https://wiby.me

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