Blogs

12 Posts

Small Web Randomizers

This week saw the launch of two services that randomly serve up servings of the Small Web / Indie Web. What is the Small or Indie Web? You’re soaking in it!

A Tiny Bell and other personal blogs are part of it. If you like this kind of content, you may want to check out:

IndieBlog.Page which has an Open Random Blog Post button that you can click or add to your browser as an extension. Hit it when you need a fix.

The second such service is by Kagi, a Google competitor you may wish to check out. Theirs is called Kagi Small Web Randomizer. Simply click that link to be taken to a random part of the Small Web. It’s sourced from a curated list.


Hearing Things

Hearing Things is a new worker-owned music site with a roster of founders that have worked at Pitchfork, The Fader, Vibe, Spin, Gawker, and Jezebel.

I stopped reading music journalism altogether in 2003 when Pitchfork gave my favorite album that year, Bobby Birdman's Born Free Forever, a terrible review. Obviously I know "different strokes for different folks," but I still remember the eye-roll I did while reading it and it was sorta just the final straw for me on seeking the opinions of "experts". However, I know a lot of people do like reading music sites, and I've been happy with some of the other sites that are the creations of "supergroups" of ex-employees of other sites, most notably 404 Media, which hits it out of the park daily.

I wish Hearing Things luck! And here's that Bobby Birdman album:


MetaFilter turns 25

Today, Metafilter turned 25.

It's the only website I check at least once a day (in reality, it's probably closer to 20, especially if you include ask.metafilter). I've been a member since 2002, which means, at an minimum, I've loaded its front page more than 8000 times.

I've visited it more often than Gmail (MF has been around longer) and Google.com — in fact, I was an early user of gmail because Jessamyn West (MetaFilter's current owner) sent me an invite before it was opened to all users.

To my mind, MetaFilter is unquestionably one of best things ever about the Internet.

Much of the press it's getting in honor of being around a quarter of a century is identifying it as "the good internet." Absolutely true.

HBD, MF!


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