If you want to read blogs and minor websites, maybe check out kagis “small web” index (this is free access I believe): https://kagi.com/smallweb
The real web is still there, and probably has as many users as it did 25 years ago, but the average person doesn’t use it. Remember the average person didn’t use the internet much at all 25 years ago.
One thing I want to do is try to create a space for family to hang out. Self-hosted. No concerns about data mining or trolls, just a personal space for us.
They don’t have to use it but starting from the right group, I think they will, many of them perhaps only because it will become the only place to see photos of our kids. Just need the right platform.
My plan is to have a self hosted, private site for the family. In the old days, people made their own sites and others could visit. I see this as a replacement for social media - instead of using facebook to catch up on family, this would be a self-hosted alternative. People could still use facebook for other things if they wanted, but this would be somewhere you would know you’d see all the posts people were making, with no ads or manipulative algorithms.
Despite all the options, it’s actually a hard thing to find a good solution. There there is promise in some so I haven’t given up hope yet.
In terms of public sharing, I see Lemmy as one form of that. Anyone can host their own instance but we all share with each other. No ads, algorithms are known and published. For things more like a personal site, it’s never been easier to self-host things.
Support federated content and sites. Self-host your own content using software that makes it compatible with federation. Continue to use democratized protocols (email, RSS, etc.)
We’ll never be able to go back to the way it was. But we can take the good parts and center around them going forward. Proprietary and silo’d content and platforms eat themselves alive by design. The open web just has to outlive it.
This might be the depressing answer, but: nothing.
Most people want a fun (=addictive), nice looking, free (=no cost to them), easy to use web.
And the current internet will always outperform the old one. Ads generate revenue and allow companies to fund development costs, hosting costs and optimize their page for search engines better than individuals.
You, personally, can use platforms that mimick the old web, just like you’re doing right now.
But if this is what most people wanted and cared about, Reddit and Twitter would long be dead and the Fediverse big and thriving.
I appreciate the insight, but I’m not asking most people, and most people aren’t asking. I’m asking for us.
What do we do and where do we go?
If they want to live in advertising hell, so be it. There was a time that people had to be convinced to pay for internet. We can do it again. I don’t have the skills to design it, but if I see it, I can absolutely propagate it.
I personally think a lot of it starts with search.
A search engine that discards the SEO generated stuff by default. That discards web stores unless you are specifically looking for products to buy.
It’s terrible to say, but most internet is curated now by search engines and social media.
Then realize most internet content does not require engagement. We don’t need comment sections on everything. We don’t need a button to share (because you can always just copy the URL)
Then social media needs massive regulation, but for most people that’s going to be like getting someone off crack. They’ve made it addictive. Social media should be private by default but that almost defeats the purpose.
In addition to the other suggestions, I also recommend marginalia-search.com as an excellent searchengine for finding sites that get lost in the usual SEO soup. It has labels for sites containing javascript, tracking, ads, etc. and can find older sites quite well, though you might have to scroll past the stackexchange and substack posts, which it also picks up. The old version also has a funky diagram to show the relevance of your search, which doesn’t have anything to do with anything but is kinda cool I think.
E: especially the explore page is a good way to just see some sites.
This might not be a question for you, but I’ll ask it anyway.
What do we do to get it back? I have computers, I have an internet connection. What can I and we do to make our space?
I still use email and RSS.
If you want to read blogs and minor websites, maybe check out kagis “small web” index (this is free access I believe): https://kagi.com/smallweb
The real web is still there, and probably has as many users as it did 25 years ago, but the average person doesn’t use it. Remember the average person didn’t use the internet much at all 25 years ago.
One thing I want to do is try to create a space for family to hang out. Self-hosted. No concerns about data mining or trolls, just a personal space for us.
They don’t have to use it but starting from the right group, I think they will, many of them perhaps only because it will become the only place to see photos of our kids. Just need the right platform.
Save my UN, if it’s old internet, somewhat accessible, I’ll do my best to multiply.
My plan is to have a self hosted, private site for the family. In the old days, people made their own sites and others could visit. I see this as a replacement for social media - instead of using facebook to catch up on family, this would be a self-hosted alternative. People could still use facebook for other things if they wanted, but this would be somewhere you would know you’d see all the posts people were making, with no ads or manipulative algorithms.
Despite all the options, it’s actually a hard thing to find a good solution. There there is promise in some so I haven’t given up hope yet.
In terms of public sharing, I see Lemmy as one form of that. Anyone can host their own instance but we all share with each other. No ads, algorithms are known and published. For things more like a personal site, it’s never been easier to self-host things.
Send me an invite and I’ll chat with folks seldomly.
Also, I do see Lemmy as exactly that, I just hope it becomes more wide spread.
Support federated content and sites. Self-host your own content using software that makes it compatible with federation. Continue to use democratized protocols (email, RSS, etc.)
We’ll never be able to go back to the way it was. But we can take the good parts and center around them going forward. Proprietary and silo’d content and platforms eat themselves alive by design. The open web just has to outlive it.
I like this outlook quite a bit
This might be the depressing answer, but: nothing.
Most people want a fun (=addictive), nice looking, free (=no cost to them), easy to use web.
And the current internet will always outperform the old one. Ads generate revenue and allow companies to fund development costs, hosting costs and optimize their page for search engines better than individuals.
You, personally, can use platforms that mimick the old web, just like you’re doing right now.
But if this is what most people wanted and cared about, Reddit and Twitter would long be dead and the Fediverse big and thriving.
I appreciate the insight, but I’m not asking most people, and most people aren’t asking. I’m asking for us.
What do we do and where do we go?
If they want to live in advertising hell, so be it. There was a time that people had to be convinced to pay for internet. We can do it again. I don’t have the skills to design it, but if I see it, I can absolutely propagate it.
So what do we do next?
I personally think a lot of it starts with search.
A search engine that discards the SEO generated stuff by default. That discards web stores unless you are specifically looking for products to buy.
It’s terrible to say, but most internet is curated now by search engines and social media.
Then realize most internet content does not require engagement. We don’t need comment sections on everything. We don’t need a button to share (because you can always just copy the URL)
Then social media needs massive regulation, but for most people that’s going to be like getting someone off crack. They’ve made it addictive. Social media should be private by default but that almost defeats the purpose.
In addition to the other suggestions, I also recommend marginalia-search.com as an excellent searchengine for finding sites that get lost in the usual SEO soup. It has labels for sites containing javascript, tracking, ads, etc. and can find older sites quite well, though you might have to scroll past the stackexchange and substack posts, which it also picks up. The old version also has a funky diagram to show the relevance of your search, which doesn’t have anything to do with anything but is kinda cool I think.
E: especially the explore page is a good way to just see some sites.
Neat, will look into it, thank you