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A website to destroy all websites

henry.codes

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Re: A website to destroy all websites

#191

Post by gmd63 »

krapp wrote: post #187
gmd63 wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think I misinterpreted the condescension you dished out by blanket labeling a trend of mostly valid critique as psychological compulsion and performative misanthropy.

You certainly did, because I wasn't referring to valid critique.

Mainly I wanted to suggest that the folks you're diagnosing might have valid reason to complain. I could have done it more tactfully, but that's what came out.

Your post reads to me as a complaint that people who complain too much have a problem.

Re: A website to destroy all websites

#192

Post by rapidfl »

arjie wrote: post #165
esseph wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Beware of trapping yourself in a manufactured social bubble of emotional comfortable

If it happens it happens. I can only hope that the result is boredom rather than increased engagement.

that's an interesting point. A echo chamber could lead to fatigue and boredom.

Reels is able to keep me engaged because it is able to surface similar content I would like but from different users. And they have such a breadth of producers these days.

The X home feed algo is not so good apart from it being text only, even for infotainment content. YT shorts also does not work as good as the Insta algo

Re: A website to destroy all websites

#193

Post by rchaud »

apublicfrog wrote: post #126
kristianc wrote: post #18

Lovely design - but also shows the inherent problem. Not everyone can create a design like this. Medium and Substack mean that not everyone needs to. When everyone is able to publish, you invariably end up with a lot more crap, and it has to hosted by someone else.

People who were not technical then and are not now made it work with Myspace, Neopets and Geocities. There are a number of free microhosts out there. And the big social media sites also allow you to post a lot more crap. I think bringing back websites like hawkee etc and providing an easy way to host is the right way forward, but it needs a catalyst (like most things) to become a trend.

There's a line from a 2009 episode of The Office that sums it up:

Jim: "Pam texted back saying we could give them all iPods".

Phyllis: Oh, if they don't have an iPod by now they really don't want one."

Website creation has reached its equilibrium rate of growth. Those who want a website will make one, and the rest won't. Personal websites are one of many media for public self-expression today; in 2004, the options were far more limited. Those who are on Neocities or mmmm.page or Bearblog etc., are the spiritual successors of that MySpace HTML template generation. They are a trickle relative to the number of people who'll start a Tiktok, Bluesky or Youtube account. It's not going to grow any faster than what it is, regardless of whichever points of friction in creating one can be eliminated.

Re: A website to destroy all websites

#194

Post by camgunz »

These are collective action problems. The number of people who would have to maintain personal websites full time in order to replace Reddit is boggling and unachievable. These articles all reduce down to "I don't love ads". Call your congressperson.

Re: A website to destroy all websites

#195

Post by D-Coder »

lazzlazzlazz wrote: post #34
Aurornis wrote: post #25

I think the comments here are a great example of why this idea always sounds better in nostalgic reminiscence than in practice: As I write this, nearly half of the comments here are complaining about this website. There are complaints about requiring JavaScript, the font size, the design, the color choices, the animations. Complaints about everything the designer did to make this site unique and personal, which was t…

[flagged]

You should definitely demand your money back.

Re: A website to destroy all websites

#196

Post by eleventen »

garganzol wrote: post #179

To give it a different light: by using an indie web approach (i.e. self host), there is an intrinsic guarantee that a publisher has put at least some effort and resources to make their materials public. This ensures that the published materials have certain authenticity and inherent amount of quality. Publishing them "the indie way" functions as a kind of proof of work: not a guarantee of excellence, but evidence tha…

IME, this is just about the opposite of true.

I recently did a deep dive of an (allegedly) human-curated selection of 40K blogs containing 600K posts. I got the list from Kagi’s Small Web Index [1]. I haven’t published anything about it yet, but the takeaway is that nostalgia for the IndieWeb is largely misplaced.

The overwhelming majority of was 2010s era “content marketing” SEO slop.

The next largest slice was esoteric nostalgia content. Like, “Look at these antique toys/books/movies/etc!”. You’d be shocked at the volume of this still being written by retirees on Blogger (no shade, it’s good to have a hobby, but goddamn there are a lot of you).

The slice of “things an average person might plausibly care to look at” was vanishingly small.

There are no spam filters, mods, or ways to report abuse when you run your content mill on your own domain.

Like you, I was somewhat surprised by this result. I have to assume this is little more than a marketing ploy by Kagi to turn content producers who want clicks into Kagi customers. That list is not suited for any other purpose I can discern.

[1] https://github.com/kagisearch/smallweb

Re: A website to destroy all websites

#197

Post by dredmorbius »

roughly wrote: post #143
IvanK_net wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You chose to do it, so it means it was better to you than all other choices. Why would you still do it otherwise? If your goal is to suffer as much as possible, it does not matter. You are still making choices that lead you to your goal as fast as possible.

I chose to give that nice man my wallet instead of taking a bullet, but that doesn’t actually reveal as much about my preferences as you seem to think it does.

This is absolute gold, thank you.

Re: A website to destroy all websites

#198

Post by rchaud »

strokirk wrote: post #31
abetusk wrote: post #10

From what I can tell, their solution is to personalize the web by creating personal websites. Here are the 5 steps at the end that they list to construct a personal website: 1. Start small 2. Reduce friction to publishing 3. Don't worry about design 4. Use the IndieWeb 5. Join us in sharing what you've made

Yet no mention of the real friction: buying a domain and getting hosting set up. There are a number of free alternatives out there but they are not well known by the public.

There's certain level of friction to everything; that acts as a filter to separate those who choose to proceed anyway and those who don't. If you want to start painting, you have to buy a canvas, an easel, brushes, paint and set aside time to actually do it. Some people will abandon it because they like the concept of being someone who paints more than actually doing it. Some will proceed because they want to paint.

The same goes for website creation. You can post text, pictures and images on any social media site. The independent web is never going to be able to match that level of usability, and IMO it shouldn't try to. Part of the reason the indie web is interesting is because it's full of people who found their way towards wanting to build their own site.

Re: A website to destroy all websites

#199

Post by performative »

first off: this is a beautiful article! but, it got me thinking about how many times i found an interest that would then become a core part of my identity by having a really cool piece of media relating to said interest essentially force-fed to me by algorithmic feeds. i got into rhythm games by seeing a livestream of osu! pop up on twitch, got into archival fashion by seeing a really incredible outfit on reddit, got into experimental pop by having clarence clarity's "no now" come across my spotify feed.

as someone who grew up in a fairly insulated & isolated suburb, i think those types of experiences were really important in turning me from an unconfident, kinda angry kid into the aesthetically-engaged, witty, openly-gay man w/ a pretty big breadth of creative interests i ended up being. i'm truly not sure if i would've turned out this way if most of the internet remained as undiscoverable as it was ~20 years ago.

though i have more appreciation for the slow web nowadays, where my identity is a bit more solidified, i still feel a pretty strong pull towards "the platform", and my visions for a healthier internet include it. but, that's about as far as i've gotten.

Re: A website to destroy all websites

#200

Post by rchaud »

basscomm wrote: post #13
dinobones wrote: post #11

I used the early web. I miss forums, I miss the small webmaster, I miss making fun, small websites to share with friends. And while you could make the argument that these forms of media were superior to TikTok, I’d also argue that this is mostly just taste. While we have closed ecosystems now, they’re much easier to make and share content to than the web of the past. It’s much easier to get distribution and go viral.…

> I miss making fun, small websites to share with friends. You can still do that right now. I highly recommend it.

Precisely. I have made my own e-cards to send to friends to commemorate holidays and outings. All HTML + CSS, responsive and looks fine on all devices.
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