Federated Webrings

erlend_sh@lemmy.world to Fediverse@lemmy.world – 64 points – Federated Webrings
blog.commune.sh

In the glory days of web 1.0, social websites would prominently link out to their digital neighbors via lists known as webrings; magical doorways to an expansive hinterland of digital villages.

Let's envision what a truly federated chat like Matrix could do to improve the cross-connectivity of chat channels. Most of these features are already possible, they just haven't been implemented yet in a community-oriented client experience.

6

forget all that we should just bring back web 1.0 webrings and domain cliques

Yeah, it's weird that they talk about federated webrings, without actually suggesting federated webrings. I discuss it in passing here (and early in passing), calling it FedRing. It definitely seems doable as kind of plug-in to other services that is also a federated service - so you could jump from the sidebar in a Lemmy community or instance to a Mastodon account or channel.

We can bring back the cozy vibes of the old web neighborhoods. Not by regressing to a bygone era, but by building the web one-and-a-half that should have been; a Web of the People.

Weirdly, a while back I wrote:

It is increasingly clear to me that a lot of directions Web 1.0 was evolving in were diverted or just killed off by Big Tech’s landgrab which built walled gardens. I see the Fediverse as a return to the idea of blogs (micro and macro), forums, etc but in a more natural progression to interoperability. This still isn’t perfect and there may be other early web ideas, like webrings, that improve discoverablity.

It's a pity they don't really talk about federated webrings and largely ignore the opportunities for webrings in the wider Fediverse instead focusing on Matrix and Discord.

And I was thinking we needed Web 2.0b, they are suggesting an early "fork" Web 1.5.