The Smallweb Subway is an experimental project that seeks to connect communities online using webrings.
The subway system theme is my attempt at making the internet feel more like a place where you can have neighbors. If a webring looks like a subway line, then it's easier to imagine a friend only a few stops away!
I think a personal website is an online page (or more) created to share interests without marketing at people. Usually, its a simple site. Almost something I could build myself (at first glance anyway) limited as I am with plain HTML skills and a dash of CSS, maybe some javascript. Well not really, but I'm not 100% clueless about javascript.
There are less personal websites, or are they just so much harder to find? It could be either way. I tend to find ideas, links, and groups for personal site makers in clusters. Start somewhere and follow the trail with all sorts of interesting and unique stops along the way. So, here are the latest I have found. Some are more for people with knowledge beyond mine: developers and programmers who do not make cookie cutter stuff for WordPress. I don't make stuff for WordPress, but it seems phony (to me) when people call themselves web designers and only know how to deal with WordPress (not always well). I may as well call myself a web designer if that was all there is to it.
Octothorpes are hashtags and backlinks that can be used on regular websites, connecting pages across the open internet regardless of where they're hosted.
Octothorp is redeveloping/ bringing back the blogroll and webring idea. I think its improved a little. People shouldn't need to update every link in the ring, there should be some automation (as far as I have understood it) that would stop showing a link if it disappears. This was one problem with the old blogrolls/ webrings.
Do you know, the original webring is still online? You may never have heard of it, even if you are as old as I am.
Expanding Unidirectional Ring Of Pages
EUROPa is a different way to connect up and explore the World-Wide Web. It was started at Imperial College, London, UK on 1994-12-22 by Denis Howe just to see how far it would spread.
blag is a blog-aware, static site generator -- it uses Markdown and is written in Python.
Blag might be even simpler than Chryp Lite, which I'm using now. But, I don't think it is simple enough for me to work with. You need to open up terminals in your OS. I used to do that when I had Ubuntu Linux. But, its been years since I was able to get Ubuntu to work on any computer I have bought (retail) in a long time. I'd go back to Ubuntu, if I could save everything (kind of a big job). Then remove MS Windows, which the PC is not keen on allowing. Installing Ubuntu was not hard, or difficult. Using it was easier than Windows really. Plus, I could laugh at sites claiming I've been attacked by MS Windows in some way. If you are running Linux, you might like to try Blag.
11ty - Eleventy is a static site generator. Requires javascript and being able to run things in your computer terminal. It looks nice and clean but... not so simple as I would like these days.
Bukmark Club - "To be eligible for a listing in this directory, a website must have a curated collection of bookmarks and/or links to other websites".
I have had so many collections of links for assorted topics. It comes from all the years of editing at The Open Directory Project, now Curlie.org. Unless you just have a handful of links, its is a LOT of work to keep a collection of links updated. You need something to help you go through and find any which are broken. But, I'd still like to update some of my pages of links and add them to this directory. :)
Places to list your personal website:
Description of a personal website which I thought was a bit rough around the edges but worked:
The entries on this website were written to be written and not necessarily to be read. While they have been made public, the same could be said of garbage bags discarded in the woods or stomach contents expelled against a wall. The author expects nothing from the reader and asks only to be accorded the same courtesy.
Rationale More from the same person, on another of his sites.
There is something inherently suspect about publicly volunteering information without being asked or provoked. Anyone who engages in such behavior bears the burden of explaining why they chose to do so rather than remain silent. In the absence of a satisfying justification, silence must appear far preferable.
Starting a personal website such as this one may come across as presumptuous or arrogant, provided there is no evidence of prior interest in one’s person. The author of such a website appears to be making an implicit claim that it will be useful, interesting, or relevant to someone else. It is only natural to expect them to defend this claim.
I regret to say that any justification I can provide will likely be insufficient and disappointing. At the time of writing, I have no reason to believe there exists any general interest in myself. Moreover, I most emphatically do not believe that such interest ought to exist. I do not particularly wish to be known. I have nothing particularly important to say. I am not even particularly interested in the general concept of communication with others.
The truth is that I created this website for purely personal reasons. I view it as an experiment in proving to myself that I, in fact, do exist, and that there is something that could be said about myself. I needed this because I tend to consistently doubt these two points.
It could be argued that I could have achieved the same result by writing some facts about myself on a loose piece of paper or by digging a hole in the ground and shouting the facts into it, rather than publishing them on the web for the whole world to see. This is a sound argument. In response, I can only offer a vague intuition that proving one’s existence must have something to do with establishing an objectively verifiable presence in the external world.
I assume you have visited this website of your own volition. I am afraid you will have to furnish your own reasons for reading its contents, and if none can be found, you have only yourself to blame. Whatever your motivation, by being here you are contributing to the success of my experiment. Thank you.
I've reposted all of this because some of the best stuff I find disappears without notice. Very likely this site (mine, all of them) will disappear without much notice or fanfare too. If someone does continue to pay the web host, it doesn't last forever. I'm glad for the Wayback Machine and Internet Archives. Now and then I give them a few dollars I can spare, thinking of the future and hoping I won't entirely disappear from it. I'm silly that way. I think its a sign of age.
Weird Web October is a challenge to try and make a website every day of October, based on the theme for each day, inspired by Inktober. It’s open to you and everyone! #weirdweboctober
My name is Jay Zuerndorfer and I decided to organize Weird Web October after talking about the idea with fellow attendees of the 2024 XOXO festival.
Jake Parker created Inktober in 2009 as a challenge to improve his inking skills and develop positive drawing habits. It has since grown into a worldwide endeavor with thousands of artists taking on the challenge every year.
Inktober now has merchandise. Kind of ruins the idea for me. But, I understand wanting to market it and make money from the point of view of Jake Parker and whoever else has become involved.
Today I was fired from writing for the Sims Community site. Fired is not the right word because it wasn't so much employment as getting paid a little for writing posts for the website, more like contract work (there's probably another word for it). Anyway, that's not so important.
Here is the note I was left on discord:
Hope you're doing well. I was emailed last night by one of our readers about your Twitter profile containing several negative and harmful remarks about the trans community. While I fully support the free exchange of viewpoints and opinions, I can't in good concience continue to work with someone who actively talks negative about the marginalized community that makes up our reader base, and our team of authors who are a part of the LGBTQ+ community.
This decision is effective immediately. Any finished content that you've completed for Sims Community that hasn't been paid for yet will be paid when / if you provide the filled spreadsheets.
Wishing you well in your future endeavours, Jovan
Cancel culture strikes again. I was fired for personal posts on a different social media account (I only posted about The Sims 4 on the bluesky social media account I used for my writer profile) by someone anonymous. They must have put in time to dig into my social media accounts. I haven't posted often or lately about women's rights. I guess the anonymous reader felt it was worth their time. Of course, I had no say in the firing. No information about what I actually posted that was so upsetting. But, who am I? Just one of the people who used to "make up the reader base" and thought I would enjoy contributing to the site.
Funny, because I only made 5 posts to the site. How many people actually read or knew about me there, not many I'm sure.
What I've thought about since, after being surprised and disappointed in society in general, is that most people who play The Sims 4 are women. Real, biological women. Also, most of the readers at the site are likely real, biological women. Like myself.
I'm not going to get into posting about the issue of women's rights now. I'm just making note of the facts. Cancel culture is very strong, determined and does not care about facts, understanding, or discussion. (In spite of what they claim).
I don't really care who made a point of digging into my social media and sending it to the site owner at Sims Community. It could have been one of the other writers who strongly supports trans people over biological women. The writing was on the wall really, when I attempted to write about the DEI mod and was denied because I did not write strongly against it and turn the post into a strongly worded advocate for trans political beliefs, bashing all those who disagree, or feel otherwise and don't say much.
Sims Community is just one site, about a game. In the grand scheme of things it doesn't matter a lot. I won't miss writing for it. I'd begun to lose heart in it after the DEI thing. If you want, you can read the very strong trans positive post they did post instead of mine. I'm not going to link it. (Comments were not allowed with the post).
I think its rubbish really, very slanted and biased. Its not what journalism should be and, I guess, its fair enough for them to post as they like. Its not a site with journalism standards. I'm not intending to backlash or put the site down. There are plenty of sites out to make money by getting people to click on ads, more of them are running AI instead of having people write any more. AI is cheaper and can spew out posts much faster with all the right keywords. I don't think a website, or a game, can have integrity if they push their own agenda so belligerently.
Back to the point about The Sims players mainly being women, biological women. What do we think about the game these days? I'm a player myself. I've bought far too many of the packs, etc. I've spent more money than I even want to admit. It bothers me, as a player, that the game is focused on gender issues far more than I am. If some players want it that way okay. But, there is no option to turn it off, to run the game your way. Why not? The Sims is a virtual dollhouse, run by one person, one player. Why can't I have the dollhouse my way?
Are we being brainwashed by EA, or whoever has recently bought out the franchise now?
What will the new owners bring? I'm curious. If they are of the Middle East culture they may not go with the trans culture and beliefs currently pushed in the game. I've read some people posting about this already, concerned about it, one way or another. I'm not so much concerned as I am interested. I'd feel better about spending more money on more packs and such for the game if the gender politics were removed, or became optional at least. I'm tired of feeling like a biological woman in a trans/man's world.
The most recent pack about imaginary friends for children, I am not buying. It gave me a sick, icky feeling in a game with so much focus on gender control and stereotypes. Of course, its being heavily plugged on the Sims Community site. I won't miss that part of writing there.
This is what I posted to the site owner. It may not have gone through because I deleted his account and the site from my discord account. No point in keeping them around, "effective immediately".
OK. But, I will post that I was fired for posting for women's rights on social media. I have nothing against you or the site, but it makes me angry that people are not allowed to discuss or disagree at all regarding trans issues. Anyway, no point in talking about it, as per usual. You can remove my author profile (if you haven't already) and show my posts as written by an unknown author or whatever you like. I won't send in for payment, that wasn't so important for me.
Is there some social rule about not commenting on social media posts of people who don't follow you? I'm finding this exchange on bluesky kind of weird. It started when I commented on a post she made to bluesky which was a video post from someone else. I'm not going to hash over that, because it isn't relevant to what came along next.
Her
Hmm. Sure, it says nothing to you and that’s okay. I don’t follow you, so perhaps you commented without realizing that, or thought I needed to know that. Not sure why. But it’s possible you followed me by mistake. Also okay. No need to comment, I was posting for me & my mutuals. I’ll be doing that.
Me - I don't follow people by mistake. This kind of post/ video annoys me. It assumes to say everything needed for both sides of an issue. Plus, it name calls people, which isn't useful. I think people posting something like this are judgemental and misleading. I wouldn't usually comment my thoughts.
Her
Again, I’ll point out that I don’t follow you, so the post wasn’t meant for you. That’s why I ask why you’d comment. If a friend of yours posted, sure - discuss. But I’m an internet stranger who’s never interacted with you. If it annoys you, move on? Unfollow? It doesn’t have anything to do with me.
Me - OK. You only accept comments from people you follow. If bluesky has an option for private accounts you might look into that. Or let people who come across your profile know you don't want to hear from them. Meanwhile I'll unfollow you since it seems to be upsetting for you.
I think it must be that she only wants to chat with people who agree with her completely, 'yes' people. I like to hear from those who have different opinions from mine. How else do you learn something new? Anyway, I did unfollow her. Partly because I won't remember who she is enough to not comment on something she posts again. But, I think she is not understanding what social media is, that it is public, not private.
If she has last words I'll post them. Otherwise its done for me.