I miss the internet

That is the title of a zine by Joan Westenberg that you can download here or directly from dropbox if you’re not comfortable providing some information to help an independent writer. Either way, I think it’s a nice, short piece of writing and I completely agree with the sentiment. I think it is worth giving it a read.

There was something special about the internet when it was new and not entirely focused on creating giant tech companies that try to do everything and try to monetise everything a person can possibly do online.

I think it genuinely felt more fun and inventive than the internet now. Joan’s timing with the zine lined up pretty well with the news that Apple has apparently killed their electric car project. I think it’s better if Apple just sticks to computers and try to keep being the best at computers. Not everything needs to be Apple branded.

There is hope that maybe, at least, a sizeable portion of internet users can swing back to something closer to the original internet ideas. Services like mastodon give me hope we might eventually get there.