Remember sites like stumble-upon? I want the Internet that enabled THAT back.

I actually always thought there was a possibility that what happened to AOL might happen to Google / Facebook / etc. I.e. people inherently don’t like extreme walled gardens, and will splinter off into more open, more random, more innovative spaces. I think the pendulum had swung back over to an early AOL like very limited set of 5 or so big “platforms”, and the issues with that were seen again, just like in the late 90s when people were ditching AOL for “the real Internet” en masse.

There should be lots of different, human-scale alternative experiences on the internet that offer up home-cooked, locally-grown, ethically-sourced, code-to-table alternatives to the factory-farmed junk food of the internet. And they should be weird.

The junk food analogy is really good i think, There was already research showing people who read newspapers are more informed then facebook users iirc, Open source platforms should develop to give users higher content quality and eventually validate those design using scientific research (kinda like research on the Mediterranean diet). I think giving users better platforms that enable finding and prioritizing high quality content will lead to a better probability of achieving certain goals (better employment, better financial state, healthier eating, better mental health etc).

Bring back YTMND

Thanks for posting. I’m going to go down the rabbit hole and explore the numerous links provided by the article. And then probably share some of them with my friends. There’s neat stuff out there. Finding it is the challenge. Sending texts is one way to spread the joy.