Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Where did the old web go? We followed 657,607 links to find out

0.mk

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

111–120 of 231 posts

Re: Where did the old web go? We followed 657,607 links to find out

#111

Post by inigyou »

twotwigs wrote: post #78

Fun experiment: Have an LLM “guess” random URLs seeded with words from a dictionary, iterating over each word and guessing a URL. It guesses a lot of correct URLs. This is one method of “URL hunting” that doesn’t involve a 3rd party list or index. Then just scan those pages for other URLs, visit them, and add a tally every time you come across a URL (for page rank). Then search anything, see what the results are. You…

> dark web

Guessing random words and .onion at the end probably won't get you anywhere, although onion is also quite a random word...

Re: Where did the old web go? We followed 657,607 links to find out

#112

Post by throwaway5233 »

Razengan wrote: post #90
MetaWhirledPeas wrote: post #80

Here's a contrarian timeline: maybe the old web will return? My reasoning: when the "old web" was great, most people thought the internet was for nerds. Sure even casual users would forward funny emails to their friends, but when it came time for news most people would read the paper or watch the nightly broadcast. When they paid for their Big Mac they'd lay down cash. There were plenty of people using the internet,…

Allow me to switch to asshole mode for a minute: "Things used to be so good" is mostly rose-tinted glasses: What exactly WAS the "old web" anyway? 100s of half-baked sites hosted on Geocities, Yahoo, about pointless stuff? Epilepsy simulator websites splattered with gif-vomit? Everyone and their grandmother asking you to install their 10 toolbars? Honest, serious question: What actually was of objective substance on…

[flagged]

Re: Where did the old web go? We followed 657,607 links to find out

#113

Post by inigyou »

Gormo wrote: post #52
ChadNauseam wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The technology is still in its infancy unfortunately, so there's no way the web could have been based on it, but I think content-addressing is the long-term play. If I click a link, there are some cases where I want the server to respond with a fresh response just for me (e.g. a website showing the weather). But often I just want whatever content was linked to (e.g. a webpage explaining a math content). In the latter…

That's pretty much how IPFS works.

Did they ever solve the problem where requesting a file took ten minutes

Re: Where did the old web go? We followed 657,607 links to find out

#114

Post by NopIdoN »

Razengan wrote: post #90
MetaWhirledPeas wrote: post #80

Here's a contrarian timeline: maybe the old web will return? My reasoning: when the "old web" was great, most people thought the internet was for nerds. Sure even casual users would forward funny emails to their friends, but when it came time for news most people would read the paper or watch the nightly broadcast. When they paid for their Big Mac they'd lay down cash. There were plenty of people using the internet,…

Allow me to switch to asshole mode for a minute: "Things used to be so good" is mostly rose-tinted glasses: What exactly WAS the "old web" anyway? 100s of half-baked sites hosted on Geocities, Yahoo, about pointless stuff? Epilepsy simulator websites splattered with gif-vomit? Everyone and their grandmother asking you to install their 10 toolbars? Honest, serious question: What actually was of objective substance on…

> ads, scams, anal mods, trolls, low-effort content

and don't forget Big Billy's "no more tears" guarantee on all anal mods purchased from the official BBAM shop!

Re: Where did the old web go? We followed 657,607 links to find out

#115

Post by inigyou »

prmoustache wrote: post #79
juleiie wrote: post #63

Old web was kind of dumb anyway. You can put on the rose tinted glasses and feel elite about browsing some shitty site 20 years ago or enjoy the fruits of modern design.

> or enjoy the fruits of modern design. Like web pages that load slower with high speed fiber than the old web did on 56k and ISDN connections?

Hey now. He probably thinks that tokens do something, too. Be easy on him.

Re: Where did the old web go? We followed 657,607 links to find out

#116

Post by ColdStream »

binarymax wrote: post #84
jperras wrote: post #57

I would posit that "old web" could be defined as the period before Google Search became public ( But maybe that's more a measure of my own age and perceptions rather than an accurate representation of the various eras of the internet/web...

That’s the Cretaceous web. I miss it fondly.

I'm not sure I miss the web as it was but miss the feeling of it all being novel and exciting. You can still get glimpses of it nowadays but it isn't often.

Re: Where did the old web go? We followed 657,607 links to find out

#117

Post by ColdStream »

clickety_clack wrote: post #62
Gormo wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I'd say "old web" is early '90s up through about mid-2000s or so. Geocities, Tripod, Angelfire, lots of standalone web forums, the early blogosphere, no social media, etc.

Pre-social media is probably the watermark. That’s what sucked all the content out of the web and into walled-garden platforms.

As they say, now it is five social media platforms posting copies of each others content.

Re: Where did the old web go? We followed 657,607 links to find out

#118

Post by ColdStream »

s0rce wrote: post #82
Gormo wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I'd say "old web" is early '90s up through about mid-2000s or so. Geocities, Tripod, Angelfire, lots of standalone web forums, the early blogosphere, no social media, etc.

I think there are a few eras. Pre-graphics, then pre-Google search, then pre-social media/public facebook.

There was the sub era of Flash based nonsense. Somewhere in the 2002-2005 period.

Re: Where did the old web go? We followed 657,607 links to find out

#119

Post by ButlerianJihad »

twotwigs wrote: post #78

Fun experiment: Have an LLM “guess” random URLs seeded with words from a dictionary, iterating over each word and guessing a URL. It guesses a lot of correct URLs. This is one method of “URL hunting” that doesn’t involve a 3rd party list or index. Then just scan those pages for other URLs, visit them, and add a tally every time you come across a URL (for page rank). Then search anything, see what the results are. You…

Deep Web https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_web

  The deep web,[1] also known as the invisible web[2] or the hidden web,[3] is the parts of the World Wide Web whose contents are not indexed by standard web search-engine programs.[4] This is in contrast to the surface web, which is accessible to anyone using the Internet.[5] Computer scientist Michael K. Bergman is credited with inventing the term in 2001 as a search-indexing term.[6]

Re: Where did the old web go? We followed 657,607 links to find out

#120

Post by Xorakios »

monk_grilla wrote: post #102
MetaWhirledPeas wrote: post #80

Here's a contrarian timeline: maybe the old web will return? My reasoning: when the "old web" was great, most people thought the internet was for nerds. Sure even casual users would forward funny emails to their friends, but when it came time for news most people would read the paper or watch the nightly broadcast. When they paid for their Big Mac they'd lay down cash. There were plenty of people using the internet,…

We're participating in it right now. HN is a living example of a simple website facilitating discussion between humans with a shared interest. That's why I come here more than any other news/social site now.

agreed
Post reply on HN