If you can’t achieve the same levels of joy and curiosity with the Internet of 2021 as you could 10 or 20 years ago, that’s on you. The moment I fell in love wi

If you can’t achieve the same levels of joy and curiosity with the Internet of 2021 as you could 10 or 20 years ago, that’s on you. The moment I fell in love with the web in the early 90s was looking at weather satellite images, and realising I could see stars in the background. I was sat at my dad’s computer, talking to a satellite in space, beholding the universe. And yet the internet’s immeasurably more powerful and magical now. I know people mourn the ‘decentralised’ web of the blogosphere but I really think people forget some of the failure modes of that world. Much of the conversation was driven by ‘A-listers’ who in many cases were garbage human beings. It was hard to get eyeballs and interactions on your stuff without them though. Most of the time you were writing for half a dozen friends. Hint: that’s what you miss! You can still do it though. You used to have your corner of the Internet and now most people hang out in a busy mall, but there’s nothing stopping you going back. There are all sorts of niche sites or corners of other platforms out there (many of which still have RSS if that’s your actual problem). But I think if most people are honest, deep down they find these venues a bit parochial now and avoid them while simultaneously lamenting their loss. Many of them are also run by young people you no longer have much in common with. I’m as much of a curmudgeon as anyone but I find these increasingly regular articles about how the Internet is rubbish now absolutely baffling. The pie got much bigger, it’s flavours more diverse. Yes you maybe have to work harder to find your place in it. In exchange, everyone now has a place in it. That’s good.