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And the web fixed these issues, one by one, on one end by being simplified by generations and generations of technologists, and on the other end by adding actua

And the web fixed these issues, one by one, on one end by being simplified by generations and generations of technologists, and on the other end by adding actual real world uses like making shopping easy. Most importantly, it did not have a full blown competitor that everyone was already using that it had to contend with. The past is a foreign country. Web of the ‘90s has almost no likeness to the web we have today. Had it stayed like that, we’d still be faxing things around.

h2odragon 7y ago
The web of the early 90s had little resemblance to the web of the late 90s, for that matter. Aether looks cool (I want to dig in deeper); the continual revivals and evolution of the Usenet-like ideas keep me hoping that something like it will catch and get big again. The latest wave of the eternal September is using terminals that make it damn hard to enter text, and I wonder if that is a killer stumbling block, or a critical and necessary filter.
weinzierl 7y ago
> And the web fixed these issues, one by one, on one end by being simplified by generations and generations of technologists, and on the other end by adding actual real world uses like making shopping easy. All of this can happen with "Indie" Social Media too. > Most importantly, it did not have a full blown competitor that everyone was already using that it had to contend with. We had telephones and fax machines, which many people were happy with. Just as an example: Things like Internet Chat were seen as toys by the grown-ups and few people had the foresight that 25 years later people will spend more time sending messages than they spend on the phone. The so called "Indie" Social Media could have benefits that will kill traditional Social Media one day - or maybe there are good reasons this will never happen. Not practical, hard to use and not having a real use case are no good reasons. They just apply to any new technology in the early stages. > The past is a foreign country. Web of the ‘90s has almost no likeness to the web we have today. Had it stayed like that, we’d still be faxing things around. Agreed. Same applies for "Indie" Social Media.
wolfgke 7y ago
> And the web fixed these issues, one by one, on one end by being simplified by generations and generations of technologists Creating a website today is much more complicated than it was in the 90s, where the web standards (e.g. HTML) were comparatively simple.
- krapp 7y ago
  No, it isn't. You can literally create a website exactly the same way and it will work, excepting maybe some deprecated tags like <marquee> and <blink>. The only thing that's become more complicated is enterprise web design, for professional sites.

h2odragon 7y ago

The web of the early 90s had little resemblance to the web of the late 90s, for that matter. Aether looks cool (I want to dig in deeper); the continual revivals and evolution of the Usenet-like ideas keep me hoping that something like it will catch and get big again. The latest wave of the eternal September is using terminals that make it damn hard to enter text, and I wonder if that is a killer stumbling block, or a critical and necessary filter.

weinzierl 7y ago

> And the web fixed these issues, one by one, on one end by being simplified by generations and generations of technologists, and on the other end by adding actual real world uses like making shopping easy. All of this can happen with "Indie" Social Media too. > Most importantly, it did not have a full blown competitor that everyone was already using that it had to contend with. We had telephones and fax machines, which many people were happy with. Just as an example: Things like Internet Chat were seen as toys by the grown-ups and few people had the foresight that 25 years later people will spend more time sending messages than they spend on the phone. The so called "Indie" Social Media could have benefits that will kill traditional Social Media one day - or maybe there are good reasons this will never happen. Not practical, hard to use and not having a real use case are no good reasons. They just apply to any new technology in the early stages. > The past is a foreign country. Web of the ‘90s has almost no likeness to the web we have today. Had it stayed like that, we’d still be faxing things around. Agreed. Same applies for "Indie" Social Media.

wolfgke 7y ago

> And the web fixed these issues, one by one, on one end by being simplified by generations and generations of technologists Creating a website today is much more complicated than it was in the 90s, where the web standards (e.g. HTML) were comparatively simple.

krapp 7y ago
No, it isn't. You can literally create a website exactly the same way and it will work, excepting maybe some deprecated tags like <marquee> and <blink>. The only thing that's become more complicated is enterprise web design, for professional sites.