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You need a webring

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Re: You need a webring

#31

Post by scrame »

galaxyLogic wrote: post #9

Not sure I get it. Why a "ring"? Why not just have a list of web-site URLs on a page and share that page with your friends and ask them to put that page somewhere on their site? "Ring" means you are navigating linearly and circularly. Isn't it better to provide a list of links so users can choose where they want to go "next"? And why should I have to go around the whole "ring" to get back to where I started from? The…

It's a web 1.0 thing. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Webring

this was a popular one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ate_my_balls

Webrings kinda went away when "blogging" became the new thing, and then there were blogrolls and pingbacks and delicio.us and whathaveyou. That got supplanted by the larger glurge into social media with friendster, then myspaces top 8, and now everyone is just on facebook saying "what's the point?".

Indeed. As mentioned, its for personal sites as a lightweight way to share a link to a friends site that may or may not be related, rather than a list of affiliates or sponsors or whatever.

Re: You need a webring

#32

Post by verandaguy »

jimjimjim wrote: post #27
galaxyLogic wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So part of it seems to be working together: I link to your site with the expectation that you link back to mine. Not a bad idea, also letting the site-creators coordinate who focuses on which sub-topic. But are there many examples of this in the real web?

uh, the webring idea is OLD. Not quite "And some things that should not have been forgotten were lost. History became legend. Legend became myth. And for two and a half thousand years, the ring passed out of all knowledge" old but close.

Importantly, webrings are not known to allow their users to live unnaturally long lives, and webring-wraiths have never been observed hunting them.

Re: You need a webring

#35

Post by whynotisay »

galaxyLogic wrote: post #9

Not sure I get it. Why a "ring"? Why not just have a list of web-site URLs on a page and share that page with your friends and ask them to put that page somewhere on their site? "Ring" means you are navigating linearly and circularly. Isn't it better to provide a list of links so users can choose where they want to go "next"? And why should I have to go around the whole "ring" to get back to where I started from? The…

Think more like "boxing ring" in that everything inside the circle is "in the ring".

The weird one is actually "rink" as in "skating rink" – because it derives from the word for "line".

So what you're talking about might actually be called a "web rink" if it existed, in that links flow in a linear fashion.

Re: You need a webring

#36

Post by dwd »

antonvs wrote: post #16
galaxyLogic wrote: post #9

Not sure I get it. Why a "ring"? Why not just have a list of web-site URLs on a page and share that page with your friends and ask them to put that page somewhere on their site? "Ring" means you are navigating linearly and circularly. Isn't it better to provide a list of links so users can choose where they want to go "next"? And why should I have to go around the whole "ring" to get back to where I started from? The…

I think it's purely nostalgia from the early days of the web, from before search engines existed. The first webring came out in 1995! Over 30 years ago. I think there was some sense of creating something to explore, where you didn't get to choose where to go next, there was more serendipity involved due to someone else's curation. No, it doesn't really make sense from a usability or practicality perspective, which is…

yes, the early days when the web was mostly decentralised and members of a community had their own individual sites.

Re: You need a webring

#37

Post by chopete3 »

The what and how parts are good but "why webring?" needs to be explained more.

If the content is summarized and personalized for the user the search engine is already rendering similar pages.

Re: You need a webring

#38

Post by rhet0rica »

chopete3 wrote: post #37

The what and how parts are good but "why webring?" needs to be explained more. If the content is summarized and personalized for the user the search engine is already rendering similar pages.

This comment is such an elegant Rorschach test. Bravo.

Re: You need a webring

#40

Post by antonvs »

whynotisay wrote: post #35
galaxyLogic wrote: post #9

Not sure I get it. Why a "ring"? Why not just have a list of web-site URLs on a page and share that page with your friends and ask them to put that page somewhere on their site? "Ring" means you are navigating linearly and circularly. Isn't it better to provide a list of links so users can choose where they want to go "next"? And why should I have to go around the whole "ring" to get back to where I started from? The…

Think more like "boxing ring" in that everything inside the circle is "in the ring". The weird one is actually "rink" as in "skating rink" – because it derives from the word for "line". So what you're talking about might actually be called a "web rink" if it existed, in that links flow in a linear fashion.

No, the original webrings from 1995 were literally rings - each site linked to one other site in the ring, and eventually one of them would link back to the “first” site, making an actual ring.
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