journals
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thinking noises

J.R Carpenter, The Handmade Web

My entire internet experience has been at the hands of a corporation. I made a project last spring that was designed to make the internet more consumer friendly. I looked at my earlier memories on the internet, and particularly my early experiences on YouTube. In the mid 2000’s, Youtube wasn’t algorithm dependent. You largely had to manually type in what you were looking for or look at statistic-based ranking pages to see what other people were watching. YouTube videos were predominantly uploaded by regular people who wanted to create something. I have little conception of what the internet pre-YouTube even felt like. I was born at the dawn of the internet commercialization era. It’s difficult, even as someone who has experienced an earlier internet, to conceive a digital world that’s experience isn’t tethered to a big name hub. Debilitating people, limiting choice. If you want to make and upload videos, you have little choice but to use YouTube if you want to actually reach anyone. While Youtube was once a healthier place, it has always exploited the voices and talents of everyday people. It’s now more evident than ever the power that platforms like Youtube, who claim to be harborers of self-expression, have. Huge one-stop shop websites like YouTube are attractive because they’re familiar and it minimizes effort on the consumer's end.

Becca Abbe, The Internet's Back To Land Movement

When we think about moving towards a sustainable future, we think about switching to alternatives. For instance, the movement towards “going paperless” has been a means of replacing physical resources with digital ones with the goal of being less wasteful. We have been taught to believe that the resources we use digitally, via the internet or by using a computer, are inconsequential to the physical world. We are increasingly abandoning non-digital forms of technology for more complex, handheld forms. How much space on the earth will be dedicated to hosting our digital lives? Will towns of data centers become the new norm?

Taeyoon Choi, The Handmade Web

A city would look more like a jungle if it were without its instructions, patterns, and “codes” that make them comprehensible to human travelers. Once upon a time, cities were dominated by “private servers” in the way that resembles the personal web. There was more space for family businesses, small vendors, and brick-and-mortar spots that were unique and dedicated to enhancing its community. Today chains and global-scale conglomerates dominate both the virtual and physical worlds.

Frank Chimero, The Good Room

Everytime I go to a library, I feel an undercurrent of discomfort. It's strange to enter a space and have nothing demanded of you. I’ve grown accustomed to doubt the intentions of a facility that encourages exploration and discovery while seemingly expecting nothing else in return. A space where you can just be, or even learn, grow and become a better person – what’s the catch? I like how Chimero put it: the escalating commercialization of the internet is attempting to turn public commons into private property. Resistance to this kind of life is so difficult because it rejects all the principles that make the internet as addicting as it is. Deep, focused, immersion in offline spaces; TikTok’s antithesis in every form.