Thanks for the trip down memory lane, randomdrake. I'm the same age as you, and just found my own 15-year-old page (in my case, a Discworld info compendium with

Thanks for the trip down memory lane, randomdrake. I'm the same age as you, and just found my own 15-year-old page (in my case, a Discworld info compendium with game mods I'd built, and walkthroughs I'd written). Hurrah for Geocities mirrors, and embarrassing teenage selves. Funnily enough, a HN thread the other day made me revisit my first ever web app as well. 'Tis the season? It feels like today it's pretty easy to get started building things, certainly a lot easier than the PHP mess I ended up in 10+ years ago. On the other hand I think it can get overwhelming, and the complexity of today's web apps and sites make it hard for a beginner to grok how to replicate them. Plus, the design bar is a lot higher, even though there are plenty of off-the-shelf kits to help. The era of self-expression through hand-tweaked HTML is gone, for the most part; cover photos have replaced MySpace layouts, and who needs a personal domain when you have your @-handle?