my personal indie web project ˆˆ i think ai;dr should be dc;dr Generative AI Nightmare Rhizomatic Technological Utopianism
Additional Refs
- A Web Revival: the Internet didn’t die, you’re just not on it
- base web
- Melon’s Manifesto v1.1
- YOU are the Dead Internet.
- The uselessness of social media
- Free Web
- An Ideal Web
- Small Web Projec
Instead of writing ineffectual manifestos whining about how the Internet and “freeze peach” are “dying”, why not take direct action and set up a Reticulum node?\
from An Ideal Web
Social media not only disincentivizes posts from being thoughtful or in-depth, but it also prevents them from doing so. The ephemeral and short-form nature of social media reinforces this.
Because of how short form modern social media posts are, everything published on social media is, by default, out of context. It distorts the messages of its publishers, as complex ideas have to be oversimplified into few bite-sized sentences, it subtly overemphasis and exaggerates particular parts, losing context. The brevity only leaves room for blanket statements.
Because of how addictive and stimulating social media is by design, it’s very easy for social media to alienate people from their own real life communities and place them in an unnatural over-socialized state
Their social media is now the over-socialized “chronically/terminally online” (as they themselves call it) type’s ego, they’ve become one with their internet image. Nothing is real until it’s on their internet profile.
Virtues the old web had that could inspire a better internet today:
- People actually browsed the internet and didn’t just look at the ~5 social media sites or mainstream media all day
- Articles were written by humans
- Lack of monopolies, surveillance, and over-socializing
- Unintentional minimalism and lack of web bloat because of limitations of the time
- Good and user-centric technology
An Ideal Web should be…
- Antisocial by design, with minimum socializing.
- Written by real people.
- Focused on the exchange of ideas, meaningful discussions, and creation. (i.e., Art, Software)
- Decentralized, minimal, free as in freedom, and open-source.
The internet should shift from being a fast-paced, shallow and centralized artificial space to a slower, more sustainable, thoughtful, and decentralized hub for genuine information exchange, discussion of interests, creativity (as in pursuit of edifying and useful projects), and real-life enhancement, something to enhance the real world and the human experience, rather than a unfit replacement for it.
Stop using social media, but not just social media, distance yourself from using all over-socializing, overstimulating, addicting, and alienating “media” you can.
