Richard MacManus

Head of Editorial at Latent Space, a leading AI engineering publication · Internet historian at cybercultural.com · Founded ReadWriteWeb (2003–2012) · 🥝 in 🇬🇧

Public Key

npub1ty2frtnnk2rh765zl5p6j75l5waqz6yyex42f04ugk5c4g8ckc4q34u65n

NIP-05 Address

ricmac@mastodon-social.mostr.pub

Profile Code

nprofile1qqs9j9y34eem9pmld2p06qaf02068wspdzzvn24yh67yt2v25rutv2spz3mhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuerpd46hxtnfduqs6amnwvaz7tmwdaejumr0dshud25p

Publishing to

relay.damus.io

nos.lol

Author Public Key

npub1ty2frtnnk2rh765zl5p6j75l5waqz6yyex42f04ugk5c4g8ckc4q34u65n

Show more details

Last Notes

2026-08-26 23:32:41 UTC

I watched a generic YouTuber today, a handsome guy with all the right YouTuber moves and the right mic and the usual camera tics and jumpcuts…and it was fine, the content was relevant to my work. He had 700k followers, looked good on camera, said the right things, was useful info. But he didn’t have 1% of the personality of @nprofile…ew86’s website in 2006. That’s why I miss the open web and the blogging scene back then. https://indieweb.social/@classicweb/117163819328652793

2026-07-30 11:34:52 UTC

Some of you old webheads might enjoy my latest post on Latent Space. It turns out the Semantic Web is alive and well, in the form of ontologies being used to keep LLMs honest. https://www.latent.space/p/ontologies-agentic-systems

2026-07-14 21:59:45 UTC

Simon Reynolds, one of my favourite authors, on blogging in the 2000s. He still blogs to this day, unusually running multiple Blogspot sites, one for each book and/or genre he writes about. I subscribe to all of them in my Feedbin / NetNewsWire setup, and dip in from time to time. Also some other music bloggers, especially of the esoteric variety. Alas, tech bloggers aren’t as active these days…or as interesting, tbh. I like that early 2000s energy of the mp3 bloggers.
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/116/920/574/487/290/481/original/9dcc6fa05b6f65c2.jpeg
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/116/920/574/565/103/500/original/c6727f6dea0e0654.jpeg

2026-06-21 08:05:32 UTC

Tim Berners-Lee at a book event. I like his framing of how online advertising pre-Facebook dominance was actually a good thing for the web. Eg it allowed me to employ >20 people in my blogging business, & it wasn’t invading anyone’s privacy.
“In the beginning, he said “it wasn’t all bad”, describing how bloggers could have adverts on the sides of their posts and could make some earnings from their work. This was before the advent of targeted ads and marketing, he said.”
https://www.thejournal.ie/inventor-of-the-internet-tim-berners-lee-7076851-Jun2026/

2026-06-05 13:50:18 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…dey5 I agree it shouldn't be the whole trust story, but e.g. your domain infosec.exchange gives me a positive signal. Do you think there are other ways to do this?

2026-06-05 09:53:15 UTC

Who owns that AI agent?
In my latest Agentic Web News post, I look at DNSid, a project from Innovation Labs / Identity Digital that aims to provide a DNS-based accountability layer for AI agents.
The bigger question: will agent identity become part of the open web's shared infrastructure, or another layer controlled by the largest AI and cloud platforms?
https://agenticweb.news/who-owns-ai-agent-dnsid/ #AgenticWeb #Identity

2026-04-30 11:59:20 UTC

Happy Web Freedom Day to those who celebrate (i.e. everyone who uses the fediverse):
“Just over a week after Mosaic 1.0 was released, CERN gifted the Web to the world as open source software. As of 30 April 1993, the still relatively new Internet communications platform was suddenly free for anyone to use, with no strings attached.” https://cybercultural.com/p/1993-mosaic-launches-and-the-web-is-set-free/

2026-04-29 18:53:52 UTC

YES!!! In all honesty, I have struggled to post to Mastodon ever since I started my professional focus on the agentic web (after losing my journalism job in Feb, I am trying to get a one-man consulting biz off the ground, focused on Web x AI). I think there is a very healthy debate to be had here about how the open web can benefit from agentic tech…and tbh, can actually take the lead on this if folks get behind it. Controversial, I know. Glad #FediForum is discussing it. https://www.timothychambers.net/2026/04/29/a-conversation-spinning-out-of.html

2026-04-28 11:14:22 UTC

As part of my ongoing effort to bootstrap a one-man consulting business, I'm publishing more regularly on my personal website. Here's my latest -> Agentic web patterns: what Web 2.0 taught me
It connects a personal story from my early Web 2.0 days — when I was working on "design patterns for Web 2.0" — with the emerging patterns I’m now seeing for AI on websites. Hope you check it out, even if you're an AI skeptic.
https://ricmac.org/2026/04/28/agentic-web-patterns-what-web-2-0-taught-me/

2026-04-12 16:59:17 UTC

This weekend I began #blogging again like it was 2003. Leaflet, which is an AT Protocol product, reminds me a lot of Radio Userland in 2003 (when I started ReadWriteWeb). It has an informal quality and it encourages community inter-linking. I also like that it's integrated with Bluesky, so comments and even trackbacks are potentially much easier than e.g. using Webmentions with Mastodon. I want ActivityPub to go this direction, too. I expand on all this in my Leaflet: https://ricmac.leaflet.pub/3mjcsrphlnc25

2026-04-07 11:29:56 UTC

Most people think AI will reduce the importance of websites. I think the opposite is happening — but in a very different way. Here's how I'm looking at the emerging Agentic Web, including its opportunities for web publishers and developers...and the very real threats, too. https://ricmac.org/2026/04/07/the-agentic-web/

2026-03-22 19:22:21 UTC

Apparently it’s 20 years since Jack Dorsey sent the first tweet. On that same day, 21 March 2006, I was blathering on about “microcontent design” on ReadWriteWeb. This was the feeds world that web geeks like me wanted to become a reality: i.e. web standards-based feeds, using RSS/Atom, structured blogging, microformats, etc. Little did we know that Twitter would introduce the concept of proprietary feeds to the internet…and that would win out over web standards. https://web.archive.org/web/20060508071004/http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/microcontent_de.php

2026-03-02 19:48:15 UTC

I really enjoyed this video… HyperCard was so good, I remember using it in the early 90s, before the Web emerged. https://sigmoid.social/@Dreamwieber/116158184946426071

2026-03-02 19:14:28 UTC

Awesome! https://blog.joinmastodon.org/2026/03/a-new-share-button/

2026-01-28 15:23:09 UTC

Continuing Cybercultural's history of web design, we're still in 1993 but now we come to perhaps the world's first web designer: Jennifer Niederst Robbins. She designed O'Reilly's Global Network Navigator (GNN), which aimed to be an "online magazine". Not easy when you can't even control the colors on a web page! https://cybercultural.com/p/1993-global-network-navigator/ #WebDesignHistory

2026-01-21 14:36:54 UTC

In 1993, web design didn't really exist — you couldn't even change the background color of your web page from grey. But Mosaic launched the first era of visual web design with the IMG tag, and soon after an MTV VJ (@nprofile…7epg) improbably created one of the first commercial websites. https://cybercultural.com/p/1993-mtv-internet/ #WebDesignHistory

2026-01-15 12:25:44 UTC

If you're also a journalist on Mastodon, please help @nprofile…wgvm out and fill in this questionaire. I just did it and only took 5 or so minutes. I'm looking forward to seeing the results. #journalism
#nevent1q…3pfa

2026-01-13 14:44:41 UTC

Today I'm launching season 5 of Cybercultural: the history of web design from 1993 till 2012. It will be a celebration of the peak years of personal websites and blogs! My intro post explains the structure and a few of the main themes I'll be exploring (e.g. personal web design vs platform peer pressure). I invite you to subscribe now for weekly updates via email or RSS. https://cybercultural.com/p/history-of-web-design/ #WebDesignHistory

2026-01-08 10:53:35 UTC

To commemorate the 79th anniversary of David Bowie's birth & nearly the 10th anniversary of his passing, I've written a mini-history of Bowie's website from 2004 to 2016. BowieNet, his pioneering social network, had basically been discontinued. But when his website did reactivate in 2013, Bowie conspicuously shunned social media ("Dropped my cell phone down below"). We can learn a lot from him. https://cybercultural.com/p/bowienet-2004-2016/ #BowieForever 👨‍🎤

2025-12-22 16:23:38 UTC

I want to become more focused on my RSS Reader again next year. So I have been pondering if I should switch away from Feedly, which I have been using since...well *you know what* happened. It's browser-based always for me, but anyone have suggestions?
"While it's still traditional to bemoan the death of Google Reader all the way back in 2013 in any article about RSS, I'll skip the eulogy. The world of RSS apps has moved on..." https://zapier.com/blog/best-rss-feed-reader-apps/

2025-12-21 09:13:12 UTC

This is a very smart marketing ploy, to be the only non-AI browser. But it’s wise they have left the door open a little for if/when AI shrugs off the issues that currently dog it: “We will continue building a browser for curious minds, power users, researchers, and anyone who values autonomy. If AI contributes to that goal without stealing intellectual property, compromising privacy or the open web, we will use it. If it turns people into passive consumers, we will not.” https://vivaldi.com/blog/keep-exploring

2025-12-20 10:56:03 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…glz5 That’s partly why I decided to call my website an “online magazine”, although I’m not 100% convinced that’s the right term either. But let me know if you have any ideas :) https://cybercultural.com/p/indie-web-report-2025/

2025-12-17 15:53:22 UTC

How my independent website, Cybercultural, has fared during 2025 — a year when AI summaries whittled away search referral traffic and social media continued its war against hyperlinks. Also, I reflect on the state of the open web from a publishing pov, and the role of the fediverse within it. https://cybercultural.com/p/indie-web-report-2025/ #IndieWeb

2025-11-25 16:00:20 UTC

In the latest post in my history of blogging and RSS series, I look at the emergence of the blogosphere in 2002 — a thriving ecosystem of colourful personal sites that interconnected to each other via RSS, trackback and blogrolls. 2002 also saw the debut of RSS 2.0, Technorati and Google News. https://cybercultural.com/p/blogs-rss-2002/ #InternetHistory #Blogging

2025-11-18 16:07:09 UTC

This week on Cybercultural, more early-2000s Apple 🍎, including why Steve Jobs didn't want online music to go the streaming route (which of course it eventually did). https://cybercultural.com/p/ipod-2002/ #InternetHistory

2025-11-16 13:05:48 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…sxvw Yes, there is absolutely a disconnect here between the “copyleft” crowd and AI. I think the copyleft proponents, which btw is a massive and powerful faction on both Mastodon and Bluesky, tend to argue against AI on the grounds that it is slop. They ignore the potential value in AI. Whereas I am much more aligned with Ishiguro’s stance that creators of all kind have a right to own their content and seek some kind of permission and compensation structure from AI companies.

2025-11-16 10:03:57 UTC

Kazuo Ishiguro, one of my favourite writers, on AI:
“I think many of us are concerned about the fact that the copyrights were completely infringed.
Our work was being taken, all my books have been taken to train AI, but if the copyrights can be respected then it can be used in a way that, say, a traditional researcher would use somebody else’s book.
Just because it’s AI, it shouldn’t be an excuse to just raid people’s intellectual property.”
https://www.independent.co.uk/tech/kazuo-ishiguro-japanese-windsor-castle-the-king-charles-b2858339.html#

2025-11-11 15:18:05 UTC

What we now know as the “social web” — or Web 2.0 — didn’t arrive until around 2004. But the first inklings of it were emerging a couple of years before. As usual, music was the harbinger. In this week's Cybercultural, I look at the beginnings of Last.fm and Audioscrobbler. https://cybercultural.com/p/lastfm-audioscrobbler-2002/ #InternetHistory #OnlineMusic

2025-10-29 18:25:51 UTC

A bigco techie I was DMing with described the current state of the web as a “tragedy of the commons” (per Wikipedia: “…if many people enjoy unfettered access to a finite, valuable resource, such as a pasture, they will tend to overuse it and may end up destroying its value altogether”).
I think this is actually a better description of now than “enshittification”; because if creative people stop publishing to the web, that depletes the “pasture”. Human creativity & passion is no longer valued.

2025-10-29 15:05:45 UTC

- reply

I want to shout out the 2001 bloggers I mentioned in this post, some of whom are on Mastodon (albeit haven't necessarily visited for a while...come back to the open social web!): @nprofile…ns9h, @nprofile…hp04, @nprofile…kzty, @nprofile…pezm, @nprofile…xf8g, @nprofile…a0ng, @nprofile…jgwn, @nprofile…mmlq, @nprofile…azsk, @nprofile…5vrz, @nprofile…2ype, @nprofile…tyr9

2025-10-29 14:42:53 UTC

Continuing my history of blogging and RSS series, I look at 2001: the year of warblogs, Movable Type and Blogdex. I see '01 as a transition year for blogging, in which it shifts from personal journaling to a more journalistic approach (although many personal bloggers resented the influx of warbloggers). There are lots of great 2001 screenshots in this post, so I hope you enjoy it. https://cybercultural.com/p/blogs-rss-2001/ #InternetHistory #Blogging

2025-10-28 11:14:38 UTC

I know people will be piling on about Grokipedia, but hilariously its definition of Web 2.0 seems to be much better than Wikipedia's. On Grokipedia's page, there's a great description of misinformation on platforms like X and Facebook. Wikipedia does not mention any of that.
Refs:
1. https://grokipedia.com/page/Web_2.0#misinformation-propagation-and-echo-chambers
2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_2.0
(p.s. Grokipedia cites my internet history website Cybercultural.com twice, whereas Wikipedia ignores it! C'mon Wikipedia, get with it.)
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/115/451/499/403/593/915/original/3b857524ec219534.png

2025-10-24 15:16:32 UTC

A new project out of MIT is building open, decentralized infrastructure for AI agents as an alternative to proprietary platforms. As I note in the post, shades of the fediverse here! https://thenewstack.io/how-mits-project-nanda-aims-to-decentralize-ai-agents/

2025-10-21 13:52:41 UTC

Today, October 21, 2025, there is a rally in San Francisco in support of @nprofile…8vq4. Tomorrow, the Internet Archive is having a party to celebrate 1 trillion webpages archived. To show my appreciation for their most famous creation, the Wayback Machine, this week's Cybercultural post takes you back 24 years to its launch. Thank-you @nprofile…mwft and long live the Internet Archive! https://cybercultural.com/p/wayback-machine-launch-2001/ #InternetHistory

2025-10-17 16:16:32 UTC

In the latest issue of Web Technology News (WTN), I look at a trend I'm monitoring very closely: after a decade of smartphone apps dominance, the web is becoming the default interface layer again. Of course, this time it's for AI. Check out the newsletter for the latest news on this & other open web topics. https://webtechnology.news/the-web-is-becoming-ais-interface-layer/
Fedi folk mentioned: @nprofile…j9q6, @nprofile…73p6, @nprofile…x0l5, @nprofile…ywd9, @nprofile…ytt9
Subscribe to WTN via email or RSS, or on the fediverse @nprofile…v8s2. And please spread the word!

2025-10-17 09:35:32 UTC

TPM founder Josh Marshall: "Journalism has no network effects or lock in. But what we now call social media absolutely did. And it quickly grew large enough that it simply no longer needed journalism, found it superfluous and powered on to the world we know today. And here we are."
Great post. And this is another part of why I have cut loose X and now Threads — both products are ruled by opaque algorithms that down-value links and journalism. *I* don't need *them*.
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/tpm-25/the-original-sin-of-digital-media-was-the-belief-that-digital-journalists-were-part-of-the-tech-business

2025-10-14 13:27:58 UTC

This week on Cybercultural, I look back on Steve Jobs' January 2001 keynote at Macworld SF, when he announced iTunes and Apple's new "digital hub" concept. This was pre-iPod and of course pre-iPhone. The new strategy set the company up for a renaissance in the 21st century, when *everything* became digital. https://cybercultural.com/p/itunes-launch-2001/ #InternetHistory #ClassicApple

2025-10-10 14:11:40 UTC

The latest issue of Web Technology News (WTN) has just been published. This week I focus on the web-based ChatGPT Apps platform, but there's also #FediForum action, other open social web news, and web platform opportunities. https://webtechnology.news/openai-turns-chatgpt-into-a-web-app-platform/
Fedi folks mentioned: @nprofile…vugp, @nprofile…mpj6, @nprofile…fflq, @nprofile…4heg, @nprofile…r9xg, @nprofile…0thl
Subscribe to WTN via email or RSS, or on the fediverse @nprofile…wtgw

2025-10-09 18:51:58 UTC

Here’s my writeup of #FediForum (the openings at least). Loved the message of @nprofile…mpj6’s keynote — everything big starts small — and I was impressed by the fedi products showcased: @nprofile…803y ( @nprofile…perq), Bounce ( @nprofile…hx87, @nprofile…ny03), Frequency ( @nprofile…z8ge), CrowdBucks ( @nprofile…vwu2) & more. Let’s keep this energy going! Thanks @nprofile…vmmn & @nprofile…avtr for the great event again. https://thenewstack.io/everything-big-starts-small-building-open-social-web-apps/

2025-10-08 11:13:19 UTC

Let's take a trip back to the year 2000, 25 long internet years ago. A year in which Flash websites proliferate, blogging expands, social news sites like Slashdot gain influence — all of this while the dot-com bubble slowly deflates and Napster dominates headlines. https://cybercultural.com/p/internet-2000/ #InternetHistory
(special thanks to @nprofile…mxa4 & @nprofile…ts44 for suggesting Homestar Runner, the perfect Flash website suggestion for that year!)

2025-10-07 14:33:48 UTC

Starter packs coming to Mastodon 👀 https://blog.joinmastodon.org/2025/10/our-ideas-about-packs/

2025-10-03 18:18:13 UTC

The personal abuse being directed at Bluesky’s CEO is deeply uncomfortable to read. Call me old fashioned, but it is never acceptable. I especially hate seeing that stuff from anonymous accounts that have cartoon avatars. It’s ok to debate the technical merits or otherwise of moderation, but not ok to throw personal insults around. I always block that kind of thing, in part because I think personal insults are cowardly.

2025-10-03 07:04:04 UTC

I'm currently working on my next "What the Internet Was Like in..." post for Cybercultural, this time for the year 2000. Wondering if anyone has specific memories about Flash websites that year? Or blogging, or social news sites like MetaFilter and Kuro5hin. Do let me know what comes to mind for you re the web in 2000...

2025-10-02 10:08:20 UTC

Old articles and blog posts too often get removed from the web or neglected, left to rot on broken pages. Replanting lets you migrate legacy content to your current site so it can thrive again. Here's how I'm doing it... https://cybercultural.com/p/replanting/ #replanting #savetheweb

2025-10-01 15:58:23 UTC

I'm curious what the W3C means by "re-engage" and "new audiences" here: "We have refreshed our logo to reflect the new type of organization we have become — an organization that wants to re-engage with our community, and reach new audiences."
I *hope* they mean engage on truly open, web-loving platforms — like Mastodon and Bluesky. And of course audiences that may not be well-served by internet access right now (i.e. out in the real world).
ref: https://www.w3.org/press-releases/2025/new-logo/

2025-10-01 13:57:23 UTC

This week on Cybercultural, let's re-live the Year of Napster: Shawn Fanning wearing a Metallica shirt to the 2000 MTV Awards, Lars Ulrich testifying to Senate and whining to the media (but in retrospect, was he right after all?!), Judge Patel calling Napster a monster, the media dreaming of a "heavenly jukebox", and — amid it all — a new legal alternative quietly emerges: SoundJam (soon to be known as iTunes). https://cybercultural.com/p/napster-itunes-2000/ #InternetHistory #Napster #iTunes

2025-06-18 17:43:03 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…3wy7 @nprofile…zezf @nprofile…fflq @nprofile…007f @nprofile…jpfa @nprofile…qtlf @nprofile…9ync Great stuff, Tim! I know progress is being made eg on search, but I like when the community’s leaders (like yourself) give these issues some air and tough love.

2025-06-18 15:35:45 UTC

Looks like Threads has been hacked…
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/114/705/101/254/569/611/original/0bb0e88d66301609.png

2025-06-18 15:23:49 UTC

This week's Cybercultural article looks back on 1998, the year of the portal: Excite, Netscape Netcenter, Yahoo, AOL, MSN and others all competing for eyeballs and trying to be sticky. But with so many portals, some inevitably failed. https://cybercultural.com/p/portals-1998/ #InternetHistory

2025-06-17 17:29:18 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…hyrk I currently can’t even find this special freaking feed in their app…

2025-06-17 17:18:37 UTC

We are aliens from another planet. “This is certainly the most visible fediverse content has ever been inside of Threads, but the world of ActivityPub is still not a first-class citizen inside of Threads. You still have to opt-in to sharing your posts, you still have to have a separate account to connect to, and you’ll still have to go to the dedicated feed to see what’s new. (If you post something and get fediverse replies, those are still separate too.)” https://mastodon.social/@verge/114699692468491981

2025-06-17 10:14:16 UTC

This poll has gotten traction, with nearly 3/4 of people so far preferring "personal website". But if you are old school and still call it a home page, or you identify as a blogger, or if you've got actual design talent and call it a digital garden, there's still time to have your say. Final results later tonight my time :)
https://mastodon.social/@ricmac/114694609195949672

2025-06-15 09:11:47 UTC

This is a great point, and something I do think about at the same time as I find many great uses for AI tools: “…journalism’s first role is to report honestly, rigorously and relentlessly on the emergence of the AI companies and what they actually mean for society. We *completely* fumbled this with social media, 18 years ago.”
I actually didn’t find social media to be that useful in 2007, as I always preferred blogging. But society thought otherwise, and here we are now. https://masto.onemanandhisblog.com/@adders/114676718671595788

2025-06-13 21:40:34 UTC

Updated my Tumblr (velvetsfan.com) for the first time in months…was listening to some music and wanted to post about it somewhere. I miss soup.io, which was a smaller, quirkier version of Tumblr, and where I used to post artsy-fartsy stuff that didn’t fit into my tech blogging world. Tumblr was the one that survived, but now it’s owned by one of the self-important crazy Tech Lords and so I am not so keen on using it. Is there a fedi version of Tumblr with some traction? #AskingForAFriend

2025-06-12 19:03:48 UTC

This month marks the 30th anniversary of PHP being released to the world. To find out how PHP has evolved over the years, its technical improvements over the past decade, and the importance of PHP frameworks like Laravel and Symfony (and cool new tools like FrankenPHP), I spoke to PHP core developer Derick Rethans. https://thenewstack.io/the-herd-is-strong-php-and-its-developer-ecosystem-at-30/ #PHP

2025-06-11 20:56:08 UTC

So is there any update on Threads users being able to follow Mastodon users? Feels like it’s been months since an update. I am feeling like I want to stop posting on Threads, as I think I am effectively shadow-banned (i.e. the algo doesn’t show my posts to my followers). So I may as well ask any Threads users interested in my updates to just follow my Mastodon a/c. But of course that will never happen… #FakeFediverse

2025-06-11 18:44:07 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…7nxw No :( There are bit parts for women, but they are girlfriends, assistants, and one brief scene with a Sheryl Sandberg-like character. But it’s very much a sausage party…again, like the All-In Podcast.

2025-06-11 18:25:01 UTC

I watched Mountainhead over the past 2 nights (couldn’t get through it in one night, it made me too anxious!). It was ok entertainment in the end, but a bit too over-the-top for my liking. Of course you recognize the All-In Podcast crew, Musk, Altman and the rest of that lot in the 4 main characters. Maybe too close to the bone for many of us who work in tech? I enjoyed Succession a lot more, because it didn’t try so hard to be a parody. It kind of felt like sitting thru an All-In episode.
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/114/666/130/649/803/535/original/72e245be0cec2481.jpeg

2025-06-11 14:42:12 UTC

In 1997, the first browser war began amid new internet trends like 'push' and DHTML. Meanwhile, instant messaging apps like ICQ and AIM became popular and GeoCities achieved 1 million users. https://cybercultural.com/p/internet-1997/ #InternetHistory

2025-06-10 14:54:37 UTC

Here's my writeup of #FediForum, in which I ask the question: is the fediverse making meaningful progress vs. centralized platforms? The post includes @nprofile…74c4's excellent video and has discussion of @nprofile…zwgs's presentation, Bounce (by @nprofile…hx87 & @nprofile…ny03), Surf (by @nprofile…w8ra & @nprofile…wz37), Channels.org (by @nprofile…t5gc & @nprofile…gs0x team), & Bandwagon (by @nprofile…kzgj). Thx also @nprofile…vmmn & @nprofile…avtr for FediForum. The headline is via Christine: "we can’t succeed without joy." https://thenewstack.io/bringing-joy-back-to-the-web-fediverse-vs-centralized-apps/

2025-06-08 17:19:30 UTC

Happy 30th birthday to #PHP. I wrote a history of it several years ago: “If CGI scripts were the start of interactive programming on the web, then PHP was the natural next step — at least on the server-side. Just a month after Brendan Eich created the JavaScript scripting language at Netscape, an independent developer from Canada named Rasmus Lerdorf released the first version of a toolset he called Personal Home Page Tools (PHP Tools).” https://cybercultural.com/p/1995-php-quietly-launches-as-a-cgi-scripts-toolset/

2025-06-07 17:28:28 UTC

I’m sure we will hear a lot about Bill Atkinson (RIP) over the next few days, but I want to point out the huge influence of #HyperCard on the Web. @nprofile…rst7 himself mentioned it in his original WWW proposal (https://cybercultural.com/p/1990-programming-the-world-wide-web/), early web browsers like ViolaWWW were modeled on HyperCard (https://cybercultural.com/p/1992-web-vs-gopher/), and even JavaScript owed a debt to it (HyperCard included an object oriented scripting language called HyperTalk; https://cybercultural.com/p/1995-the-birth-of-javascript/).

2025-06-06 17:15:06 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…xt5t That’d be great, thanks. We have loads of birds on our bird feeder currently, including fledglings.

2025-06-06 17:05:11 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…xt5t Is this the product you have, Andy? https://mybirdbuddy.eu/shop/

2025-06-06 16:42:35 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…zwgs the joy message was spot on! It seems so simple, and yet it's so rare to find joy on any social media these days (and yes, that includes the fediverse). You're so right that it's how Twitter became popular back in Web 2.0, so *that* part of Twitter we need back. Looking forward to checking out Spritely and thanks again for the presentation at FediForum.

2025-06-05 16:37:09 UTC

If anyone has other ideas for #ClassicFedi screenshots, let me know! I figure it'd be good to show some of the history that eventually led to the #Fediverse and the #FediForum event this week.
https://indieweb.social/@classicweb/114631692107973241

2025-06-02 20:42:34 UTC

Now this is a detail I hadn’t known about the launch of Netscape Navigator in December 1994. From ‘Speeding the Net’, a 1998 book about Netscape by Quittner and Slatalla. #InternetHistory
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/114/615/710/764/836/606/original/dddd49042720d9fc.jpeg

2025-06-02 18:03:09 UTC

This is becoming a big problem for all web publishers. I’ve noticed large non-human spikes on Cybercultural and the same thing is happening (on a much larger scale) at my employer The New Stack. Seems like an under-reported SEO issue…kind of reminds me of when the likes of Mashable suddenly had hundreds of thousands more RSS subscribers overnight a few times back in Web 2.0 — ie this “engagement” is not human. https://mastodon.cloud/@slashdot/114614987765863790

2025-05-29 13:41:49 UTC

"My website is ugly because I made it" https://goodinternetmagazine.com/my-website-is-ugly-because-i-made-it/

2025-05-28 14:25:32 UTC

I look back on the 3 musketeers of web design in the 1990s: Jeffrey Zeldman, David Siegel, and Jakob Nielsen. Each had a distinct web design philosophy (and if you read till the end, you'll discover which one I believe 'won' in the long term). I focus in particular on 1997, which is when Flash and CSS emerged. But I also look back on the careers of the 3 gurus from our 2025 perspective. https://cybercultural.com/p/web-design-1997/ #InternetHistory #WebDesign

2025-05-25 21:28:23 UTC

I had forgotten the insane hype around the Segway in 2001/02: “…there is no denying that the Segway is an engineering marvel. Developed at a cost of more than $100 million, Kamen’s vehicle is a complex bundle of hardware and software that mimics the human body’s ability to maintain its balance.” https://mastodon.social/@pervognsen/114522563378719082

2025-05-23 13:52:58 UTC

It's pretty rare to find a tech publication/personality these days that doesn't still use, and by extension promote, X/Twitter. I'd wager that most of the indie web proponents whose names you know are still posting on X. So it was refreshing to discover today that @nprofile…cnpa is resolutely OFF X/Twitter and uses Mastodon & Bluesky. Frankly I think we need more of this 'walk the talk' behaviour. Kudos @nprofile…e8sw, @nprofile…zmt2 and team.
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/114/557/476/977/254/974/original/cbb551e264687a34.png
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/114/557/476/955/924/086/original/ea49ab18503f0414.png

2025-05-22 15:53:53 UTC

1) I’ve been looking into Microsoft’s NLWeb, announced at its Build event, and described as a “natural language interface for websites using the model of their choice and their own data.” The idea, I think, is you can have a custom chatbot on your website. In theory, it sounds promising, but I'm not sure WHY I'd want to add this e.g. to my humble little internet history website. https://news.microsoft.com/source/features/company-news/introducing-nlweb-bringing-conversational-interfaces-directly-to-the-web/

2025-05-22 14:12:51 UTC

- reply

Turns out there is a current movie called "Companion". I wonder if Sam has seen it: "The protagonist, Iris, initially believes she is human, but when she discovers she is a companion robot controlled by an app, the film shifts into an existential horror about identity and free will." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Companion_(film)

2025-05-22 14:06:31 UTC

There's that word again, regarding AI: "companion". Sam Altman is "laying out plans to ship 100 million AI “companions” that he hopes will become a part of everyday life." https://www.wsj.com/tech/ai/what-sam-altman-told-openai-about-the-secret-device-hes-making-with-jony-ive-f1384005?st=RUGPjK&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink
In my AI coding tools post this week, I noted that Google is referring to Gemini Code Assist as “a developer’s coding companion.” I mused that a “companion” is a word that can just as soon be applied to a dog as to a human. So which will Altman and Ive's AI device be closer to? https://thenewstack.io/inside-gemini-code-assist-googles-copilot-alternative/

2025-05-22 09:24:03 UTC

Greg has made the jump from Bluesky to Mastodon, and he wrote up his explanation here: https://notes.skillstopractice.com/updates/2025/05/20/bluesky-business-model-risk-factors/
https://mastodon.social/@skillstopractice/114536872611586536

2025-05-21 13:41:29 UTC

Back in 1997, the browser plugin RealPlayer became synonymous with "buffering" — which for 90s web users meant constant, annoying delays in streaming a video online (usually over dial-up). Funnily enough though, the buffering epidemic didn't dampen the HYPE for online video streaming that year. Wired magazine even declared that RealVideo was leading a “war with TV.” And you thought AI hype was bad... https://cybercultural.com/p/video-streaming-1997/ #InternetHistory #VideoStreaming

2025-05-20 18:19:16 UTC

Prior to #GoogleIO today, I talked to Ryan Salva from Google about the latest iteration of Gemini Code Assist — including its embrace of agents and how it differs from GitHub Copilot. https://thenewstack.io/inside-gemini-code-assist-googles-copilot-alternative/ #AIcoding

2025-05-15 12:19:33 UTC

Apparently 86% of websites have “Low Contrast Text”, making it the most common #accessibility issue (even more than missing alt text). I’m quite surprised by this, as I thought most websites still have white background with black type. Maybe it’s a font size thing in many cases…Anybody have more info on this issue? https://accessibility.day/

2025-05-14 15:18:15 UTC

This week's #InternetHistory post on Cybercultural was an excuse to revisit my favourite boyhood band, Duran Duran. Back in 1997, they became the first major label artist to offer an online single for sale. This was a couple of years before Napster and more than 5 years before the iTunes Store! It was all thanks to a couple of now mostly forgotten companies: N2K and Liquid Audio. Full story: https://cybercultural.com/p/digital-music-sales-1997/ #DuranDuran #90s

2025-05-14 11:32:13 UTC

Someone sent me their new website today, which at first glance looked like a Flash site — highly interactive, very snazzy. Turns out the site was built using Readymag (https://readymag.com/), which seems to be a modern take on Flash. The Readymag site itself uses a heck of a lot of JavaScript, and its homepage is over 12MB before first scroll. It's marketed as a "no code" site builder. I will look more into it...but it did strike me that *of course* the modern equivalent of Flash is JS-based.

2025-05-09 21:49:13 UTC

20 years ago…how time flies. Also, I was Bloglines’ biggest fan. https://indieweb.social/@classicweb/114480068009241767

2025-05-09 13:26:23 UTC

Wrapping up the 1996 series on Cybercultural, in this post I look at web portals, the continued rise of e-commerce, CSS and Flash arriving on the scene for web designers, and the emergence of web applications from Netscape. Starting next week, I'll be diving into 1997 internet history. https://cybercultural.com/p/internet-1996/ #InternetHistory

2025-05-08 14:11:13 UTC

This day 30 years ago, a new employee at Netscape named Brendan Eich was hard at work creating a web scripting language called Mocha. It would soon be re-named JavaScript, in a dubious attempt to co-brand it with another new web programming language from May 1995, Java. https://cybercultural.com/p/1995-the-birth-of-javascript/
p.s. according to @nprofile…6x22 and Eich: "There is no known record of the specific dates but Brendan Eich believes it was May 6–15." https://zenodo.org/records/3707008#.X6XOHVMzbDo
#InternetHistory #JavaScript

2025-05-07 15:22:40 UTC

After a travel hiatus, Cybercultural is back with another sack of online memories from the 1990s -> Online music retail was thriving by 1996, thanks to sites like Music Boulevard and CDnow. But music downloads and streaming was more of a challenge — as David Bowie discovered in September 1996. https://cybercultural.com/p/online-music-distribution-1996/ #InternetHistory #OnlineMusic #1990s #BowieForever

2025-04-17 10:23:16 UTC

I’m still on holiday in New Zealand, so please enjoy this North Island robin instead of my regular tech toots. #BirdsOfMastodon
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/114/352/809/289/170/151/original/c66b6565ee736cb8.jpeg

2025-04-02 20:34:24 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…xlhv I love Reality too, and of course Low. Can’t go wrong with anything he did in the 70’s, and I am a fan of the singles from Let’s Dance too. 90s output from Bowie very underrated.

2025-04-02 20:25:36 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…xlhv He really was. The older I get, the more I admire his genius for changing things up for each project — right up till Blackstar, which was an incredible album.

2025-04-02 19:03:21 UTC

New on Cybercultural: During the mid-1990s, David Bowie's website went from a storytelling structure for the Outside album, into a striking, grunge-inspired design for Earthling. At the same time, Bowie fan sites emerged. https://cybercultural.com/p/david-bowie-website-1995-1997/ #InternetHistory #WebDesign #BowieForever

2025-03-30 11:02:33 UTC

While I was writing my Web 2.0 memoir, I realised that I didn’t have nearly enough screenshots from that era. The ones I did have were usually done with Skitch. I wish I’d used it more though! https://indieweb.social/@classicweb/114248027432834035

2025-03-25 19:20:12 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…xlhv I’ve played with Canva, but graphic design isn’t really my forte :)

2025-03-25 19:15:26 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…xlhv Yep I use Unsplash and Flickr, but I’m more struggling with what kind of image to use for that feature. I need some go-to tactics, or maybe some kind of template for it…

2025-03-25 19:04:30 UTC

Looking for some ‘feature image’ advice from the fediverse: one of the things I spend way too much time on with Cybercultural (my internet history website) is finding a good image to use for a post’s feature image. Eg I have an upcoming 1996 internet post that I am struggling to source a feature image for. Screenshots of websites don’t work well for feature images, and I also have to make sure it can be made into a 1,280 x 720 image. Anyone have ideas or tactics to reduce my time spent on this?

2025-03-23 18:30:24 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…0ajr I interviewed Bill English in 2014 and he told me more about the invention of the mouse: https://cybercultural.com/p/the-first-web-developer/

2025-03-22 11:47:05 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…p8x9 Ha, just came across my first Radio Userland site, which I started almost exactly 23 years ago today.
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/114/205/918/809/658/502/original/fff5d78e6f8be0d4.gif

2025-03-22 11:44:31 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…xlhv Love it! It’s kind of like a “start page”, a home page that we used in Web 2.0 (Netvibes et al).

2025-03-22 11:25:54 UTC

Ah, the glory days of Plain Blue Links. Back when we knew how to link to each other. And of course, @nprofile…p8x9 improved that situation even more by building blogging tools and RSS. https://indieweb.social/@classicweb/114205823193887379

2025-03-22 10:34:12 UTC

I know things are bad on the open web…but it could get even worse. Imagine any of these scenarios:
1. What if the Internet Archive got shut down after all those lawsuits. Ref: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41482620
2. What if Google suddenly stopped high-ranking Wikipedia links. Ref: https://mastodon.social/@ricmac/114205578635297619
3. What if the next generation of internet users doesn’t read and so short looping videos *completely* take over. Ref: https://overcast.fm/+AA1Ledu9mbc
Scary times. All we can is continue to support #openweb.

2025-03-21 17:28:52 UTC

Wow, TechCrunch got acquired by a private equity firm that has also bought a bunch of other old tech pubs: "Regent is trying to pull together a portfolio of tech news sites and is eager to invest in news. Earlier this week, it acquired Foundry, which houses a slew of online tech publications, such as PCWorld, Macworld and TechAdvisor." https://www.axios.com/2025/03/21/yahoo-techcrunch-regent

2025-03-21 17:21:26 UTC

I've moved my Mastodon account that posts screenshots of old websites to a new handle: @nprofile…uy2j. It's a manually curated bot that posts memorable websites from the past, like this strange 2006 site that appeared out of nowhere (was it microblogging, was it a new form of txting? Nobody knew at that point...)
https://indieweb.social/@classicweb/114201528286279570