Like fuck all the proprietary junk and versioning, and just have a bare bones HTML ASCII extranet designed to be simple and without any bugs to patch? Obviously a naive question.
But seriously, the 56k dialup world with Napster GeoCities and AOL Instant Messenger was better. Add capacitive touch screens, current data throughput infra, and lithium batteries to 1999 and we are peak Matrix internet territory. Yahoo and net navigator were better than chrome stalkerware and google digislaver fascism.
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Like fuck all the proprietary junk and versioning, and just have a bare bones HTML ASCII extranet designed to be simple and without any bugs to patch? Obviously a naive question.
There are many ways to get that. There is the Gemini protocol, of which is plaintext, and there is also I2P, of which is a dark net (gee!) that feels somewhat like the old internet (at least, that’s what some oldies in the forums say). A way to browse through there without installing a client would be via looking at here.
Developers are dumb and/or burned out by leadership and can’t be arsed to use the right tool for the right job. New blog? React.j. Ecommerce? React.js. Wiki? React.js. A fucking landing page reading “Coming Soon!”? Believe it or not, React.js. And unless provided by whatever metaframework they’re using this week, forget about appropriately-sized images and videos. You will render a 2000x3000 pixel PNG of the letter A on your 720p smartphone, and you will like it.
Market demand. A “boring” static website isn’t going to attract VC funding and management approval.
I have one browser profile with js disabled and have been slowly migrating to it. It’s soooo fast. Barring any issues with the website, each click-and-render is waaay faster than any SPA, back button is instantaneous.
Lol. I never have enabled js. If the website is broken by that, I consider the thing a zombie monster and do not care in the slightest. If I really need something, I can usually find it quickly just by viewing the page source. I have no idea what the modern web looks like, and I feel no different. My life does not feel like there has been any loss. The things I have not been a part of, are all shit shows people complain about and are usually trying to escape.
I run a website where my community and I all contribute to a free shared database that houses settings for machines we can use. I don’t know how I’d really do that without managing every single submission manually. I think that like all things there’s a way to use js responsibly.
bla bla bla
Like I said in the op, I’m aware of the naivety. In other words, it is a stupid question intended to expand my understanding.
Why can’t you script the server with the same functions to do all of the required processing locally? Why do you need to move that script to the client machine? I’m not talking about conventions or languages or browsers or even infrastructure per say. Fundamentally, I do not understand why processing should ever happen on a client device.
Like I don’t care about marketing and styling aesthetics enough to sell myself into digital slavery. My device should take content and best display that content independent of outside sources. Things like the entire Unicode fonts library should be required in every device made. Any further fonts and styling I see are entirely up to me. For content you host, the website should have a selection of image sizes and frames configured and available where my device selects the best compromise according to my settings.
In my ideal internet, all Internet connections are a two way static IP address. Most of the web should be hosted on distributed local nodes. Everything I do and share should just be a thing on a single board computer hanging off my router that is as easy and simple as just plugging in, powering on, and using a couple of thumb drives to manually pass encryption keys between devices to setup the system securely without further understanding required. Then I can use the raw IP or create an account on a .publiccommons server that hosts the DNS table with an annual automated email cycle to continue the records.
I have shared a bunch of unique content on both YouTube and GitHub, and several forums before that. I never have tried to monetize any of it. I would prefer to self host that stuff, but I am not into the hobby of self hosting, and when I look into it, the subject seems ridiculously overcomplicated without a reasonable entry level minimum scope clearly defined. I assume this obfuscating complexity is because it is a profitable exploitation model to obscure this obvious democratic solution.
Like, if you are hosting a bunch of traffic from users that have a similar vested interest, hosting should not be entirely centralized. The users should have the ability to shoulder a part of that load as a remote cache if they choose.
No worries it wasn’t an attack on you or your totally fair question. I’m no where near knowledgeable enough to give any valid responses to the inquiry, I just thought I’d share why I feel like I (we?) need it. I wanted to do X for my community and I was told I need Y to do it, thus for me for this use case its necessary. That’s all I was sayin.
Back in my day, we created more complex html forms using bash on the server. None of this fancy pants modern stuff like Perl and fast-cgi. What’s js?
Now get off my lawn
😂
The why: because a lot of people have been conned into “needing” sites that can fry the client’s CPU, to the point where the con became the norm.
Another why: it’s easier to woo bosses/higher ups/clients when you show them pretty visuals. Doesn’t matter that the visuals are a fucking atrocity of spaghetti code, now they DEMAND pretty everything everywhere, fuck being practical or lightweight
I’ve been saying the same thing. I think you should check out Gopher and neocities.
You can get a blacklist of all the sites you hate off gitthub and put it in ublock. They have a massive ai and Javascript list I think.
I agree. Early 2000s was peak internet before corporate enshit. But you dont need to live in their world. You need webrings and rss.
https://marginalia-search.com/
“The need for discovery
Nothing you do to try to make the web a better place matters if nobody can find what you did. There are a lot of precious websites out there that deserve an audience, but instead are languishing in obscurity.
This makes alternative discovery mechanisms an urgent priority of the free and independent web, both document search as well as blog and RSS-feed discovery.”
⚜︎ arscyni.cc: modernity ∝ nature.
I honestly tend to think that instead of using search engines where you already have to know what you’re looking for, it might be better to use something like lemmy where you can advertise what you made with a post in an appropriate community.
I honestly tend to think that instead of using search engines where you already have to know what you’re looking for, it might be better to use something like lemmy where you can advertise what you made with a post in an appropriate community.
Obviously both have their place, but POSSE is the magic sauce:
“POSSE is an abbreviation for Publish (on your) Own Site, Syndicate Elsewhere, the practice of posting content on your own site first, then publishing copies or sharing links to third parties (like social media silos) with original post links to provide viewers a path to directly interacting with your content.” ―https://indieweb.org/POSSE
⚜︎ arscyni.cc: modernity ∝ nature.
thanks, that makes sense. i gotta bookmark that comment.
We can have static HTML websites, but that basically limits you to sharing static information (which, by the way, still have “bugs” in the form of typos). There’s already lots of great resources for that. Wikipedia, personal blogs, books (physical and electronic). That’s not usually what we’re on the internet for though. We’re here for interactivity. We want to connect with other people (e.g. Lemmy), and we want tools to help us with various problems we have (e.g. any portable software that just needs a browser to run). Avoiding JS would hinder that goal. If you just want to read, go to your local library, take out a book, and start reading. Or get an e-reader and download some e-books.
You also point out the problem of online privacy. While JS does empower the tracking, it also does way more than that. The solution shouldn’t be to throw out the baby with the bath water.
Static page reads from the webage serving folder and index file, you just ftp a new corrected version to the server. At least that’s how I updated mine way back.
Uhm, Gemini web?
I made a Gemini site once and then I was like “that was fun” and then it was over. 😅
Your framework? The hipster café that"s “temporarily closed” every time you need it.
Can’t easily verify on mobile, but iirc last time I inspected the html that site had a google tracker and there’s a commented line acknowledging the irony and challenges you to fight them. I could have it mistaken with another, similar site, though.
Edit: Sorry for the misinformation. The site was https://motherfuckingwebsite.com/ which contained the html:
<!-- yes, I know...wanna fight about it? --> <script async="" src="//www.google-analytics.com/analytics.js">Haha, there are other language versions links at the bottom. I just started Czech course at university, and I think I will send my group link some time, because it’s pretty funny (for a Polish person at least).
lemmy isn’t a static vintage web, and that’s a good thing, i guess.
You can open websites in lynx.
Mastodon required JavaScript
You can use a mastodon frontend that doesn’t require js.
For all y’all talking about the old private internet, it’s having a bit of a renaissance. Neocities is on of the big ones, but lots of people are straight up selfhosting them too. It’s not like you actually need anything more than a phone to run a static website for the tens of visitors you might get each month.
Here’s an example of one. Check the post dates. And the webrings. And the Glitter. And the, well, you get the point.
Because people who make websites want to get paid for them, payment is based on showing ads, ad companies want to maximize tracking via javascript, and if the only javascript is for ad bullshit it’s easy to block it so they force the content to load via javascript too.
It’s systemically fucked up in a way that goes beyond just the technology itself.
Tl;Dr: capitalism. Capitalism cannot allow nice things to exist.
I mean, the alternative is that all those people who want a way to offset server costs don’t find a way to do so, and therefore pack up and go home. And then we don’t get those websites.
Or, we solve the underlying problem
Youve never hosted before have you. What solution do you propose to handle the costs of hosting.
The people that want to make money are not de facto legitimate. Some people want analog slavery too. Some people want fascism. Some people are serial killers. Some people are Google. I see no value in those people. They do not create content I find interesting. The things they fund are opposed to my principals and democracy. Those people buy and sell a part of me to exploit and manipulate me. Those people are criminals. Those people are bad neighbors and have no place in our communities and neighborhoods. We have a right to open public commons free from piracy, pillaging, and slavery. That is the fundamental flaw. The internet is public commons, not a slave market.
Guy who wants to offset the costs of his diy fursuit forums by hosting banner ads in the sidebar.
Uuuuuuuuuhhh…
Are you denying the fact of capitalism existing on the internet? All you seem to say is idealistic non-statements that don’t engage with the answers you’re getting to the question you asked (or seemed to ask).
You do know that there’s a less intrusive way of advertising ? Right ?
You do know that advertisers want the ads to be as intrusive as they can make them? Right?
We are talking about us not them
