Oldnets and Altnets: A Guide to Building a Low-Spec Daily Internet Out of Gemini, Gopher, and Terminal Tools

With news of DigitalOcean deciding to give $3 million dollars to Omarchy and DHH, I thought it would be fitting to once again take a look at alternative visions of what our Internet can be. For after writing about the Internet on the Internet for almost an entire year straight, I think I need a change. The IndieWeb is wonderful, and I'm so thankful for the viable, well-populated people-oriented alternatives that exist to replace nearly all facets of corporate social media—but I would be lying if I said this version of the Internet wasn't without its own flaws, too. Our Internet is cluttered, bloated with complex systems and scripts for the sake of visual interest, interactivity, and social engagement. I am no better myself, for even my own website, Brennan.day, which could be pared down to only a list of plain-text essays, is full of unnecessary additional functionality and styles which would cause it to load slowly on older or lower-powered devices. With this complexity comes…