Webtiquity

It's hard to believe how far the internet has come since the mid-90s. Take a look at one commemoration of the web of yore: Jim's TOTAL animated GIF museum Hurts the eyes but warms the heart, doesn't it?

90s web pages are indeed antiques, relics that I think most of us look back at with a certain degree of smugness and nostalgia, but they were the forefathers of this blog-filled tweeting entity that we are so addicted to today. As historians we know to respect the past, but with such a shifting and often temporary medium it can be overwhelming to think of this constant loss of invaluable primary sources. Initiatives such as the Library of Congress' Twitter archive relieves a little of this anxiety. Unfortunately many of those mid-90s gems are gone forever, a loss that future historians of the rise of popular media will mourn dearly.

For this week's class we're designing our very own, very basic (ie. 1995 style), webpage. We're digging down to the web's roots, getting our hands dirty by writing some old school html pages. Though we had the option to use a more modern program I found the idea of writing from scratch more appealing. Having this dated skill is far from necessary given contemporary advancements; I have no delusions that I'm ever going to get hired for my dream job because I can design a page that looks like a 13 year old in 1996 made it. Instead I am drawn to it as, to use Rob MacDougall phrasing,  an "act of historical recreation". Much like learning handwriting in elementary school (do they even still do this? Has handwriting been replaced by iPhone typing?) the skill may not be all that practical but there is a satisfying art to both forms of writing. Both connect us to an imagined simpler time. Both can be incredibly frustrating (uppercase Gs? Who thought them up?).

Writing html is connecting me to a less intimidating internet, but it is also introducing me to how effective a learning environment the web can be. Writing code I have come across numerous issues and frustrations, but once I learned to use the web as an asset instead of dismissing it as some perverse test of my sanity, my "luck" changed. I have learned that the web is full of forums that help with everything from my most basic of roadblocks to tackling complex issues of advanced web design. In my experience so far, it seems like there are far more people out there wanting to help than I had expected.

By going old school writing this html page I feel like my relationship to the web is changing. I once felt like the web was some exclusive club where I could only go for walks around the outer grounds, but now I realize that it's my own self-limitations that keep me out of its inner sanctums. Right now my goals on the internet are still pretty basic, but its good to know that there is a lot of support out there should I wish to take on some bigger projects. Writing this 90s style page may have been an act of "historical recreation" but it has also connected me to a friendlier web, one which I feel more confident exploring.

*** Update: Here is the link to my 90s style Lion King webpage ***

And with that I leave you with that ambassador of the 90s web, the dancing baby: