I really love the term handmade web. I think the connections made between these early websites and physical media like zines really make a lot of sense. When the internet first became a thing it was such a weird and wacky place. People were just making websites aboutt things they were interested in or wanted to share. Even just making a site about themselves, like Joyce's World. Stuff like this just has a different feel to it. These little sites seem like they have so much love and care built into them, like something you'd make for a friend (a zine, a gift, something personal :]). Additionally, I also appreciate this idea of no dead artifacts. It's sort of peaceful to think that these projects that people put so much time and effort on are stillout there, though links or pages may not be able to be accessed. With earlier versions or resources like the wayback machine, these places are still available to be visited and these stories are able to be told again.
I find the comparison between high tech and low tech very interesting. The idea that anything considered "high tech" has to be this incredible complex machine and something "low tech" is something less than in that sense. It's a little sad
really. Smaller handmade sites being compared to the ai operated homepages for whatever tech conglomerate doesn't seem like a fair fight. The world has become so desensitized to real meaningful technology.
"As if linen were the same thing as
flax — as if paper, ink, wheels, knives, clocks, chairs, aspirin pills, were natural objects, born with us like our teeth and fingers -- as if steel saucepans with copper bottoms and fleece vests spun from recycled glass grew on trees, and we
just picked them when they were ripe..."
I love that. Today, unfortunately, it seems that handmade web is taken for granted.
It's reassuring to see all the different things a website can be, metaphorically or realistically. Reading this sort of helped me understand what the web is and what this class could be. It took the pressure off a bit. As you read it's just fun to think about all these connections. For example, the web being a puddle. Sometimes sites can pop up in an instant, unrefined yet still meaningful. They dont have to last long. They can be a small little page or a much larger and more reflective. Regardless, over time they will discipate and not too long after there will be another storm and a new puddle will appear. Viewing a website as a plant also helped me a lot. A plants growth cannot be rushed. It needs time to fully bloom. These sites that we make don't need to be completely finished on polished in a week or two. It's natural to experiment and take your time to fully refine what you want your site to be, and that's okay.
There are a lot of connections to be made between drawing and videogames in relation to coding and the handmade web in terms of boundaries. Scudder talk about how he started off Links Awakening having the time of his life in the beginning stages of the game. he just kept exploring the little beach neighborhood without any sense of the world around him. I feel like we start off with handmade web appeciating all the little things we can do on the index page. Then once we get the hang of it we take a deep dive into the internet and finally understand just what we can really do when coding. I also appreciate when he brings up how there are only so many pixels on a gameboy screen, or how we can only make so many points on a piece of paper with a pencil. There is a finite nu,ber of pixels on our sceens, but within those there are infinite possibilities.