this post was submitted on 30 May 2025
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The Smol Web

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Community for the appreciation and sharing of links, resources, and culture of: the smol web / small web / ~(w)~ / the indie web / or even the non-www internet (gemini, gopher, etc).

Back of a napkin definition, subject to change: if it's internet accessible and is maintained by a person, especially for non-commercial aims, then I would consider it smol. There are, however, much stricter definitions.

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[–] owenfromcanada@lemmy.ca 7 points 3 weeks ago

This reminds me of a post I saw a week or two ago. Someone was trying to figure out the "perfect formula" for a multiplayer game, with near-infinite replayability and super fun gameplay, no microtransactions, etc. I told them to try anything made 15 to 20 years ago, because games back in that day had to have those things to sell.

Ah well, back to yelling at clouds for me.

[–] houseofleft@slrpnk.net 3 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Is gopherpunk a reference to gophernet? Wasn't that proprietary and lost out to the world wide web because it's less punk and open source? Maybe hypertext punks should rise up instead.

[–] pumpkin@slrpnk.net 4 points 3 weeks ago

There's a cool little project based on gopher but open source and much simpler to write content for.

Gemini

My favorite part of the whole thing is that it leaves all styling up to the browser settings. No CSS or funky fonts. Totally content focused and super light weight.

[–] Semi_Hemi_Demigod@lemmy.world 3 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

What wasn’t perfect about it?

[–] grue@lemmy.world 6 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

<marquee><blink>Downloading at 28kbps dial-up modem speeds, of course!</blink></marquee>

[–] refurbishedrefurbisher 6 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)
  • 10 FPS 160p streaming video if you were lucky enough to have blazing fast internet, usually requiring a RealPlayer or Quicktime browser plugin
  • Adobe/Shockwave/Macromedia Flash having its tenticles in basically the whole internet
  • Autoplaying MIDI in webpages
  • Animated backgrounds
  • Unencrypted communications being standard
  • Whatever AOL tried to do
  • Internet Explorer being standard due to its free inclusion in Windows

But even then, Web 2.0 (starting with YouTube) still ruined the internet since corporations were able to take basically full control.

[–] grrgyle@slrpnk.net 1 points 1 week ago

I remember seeing this on the don!

I say with nothing but admiration: Joan has mastered the art compressing a blog article, or larger thesis, down into a pithy post, perfect for propagation.