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by gerbilly 2719 days ago
Well, when I got on the internet in 1988, we were all 'smart, high-agency people who have time to spare'

Supposing we manage to solve this problem, what's to say average people can't participate in 10 years or so or so when the tech has been made easier to use?
1 comments
flixic 2719 days ago
Early web was quite decentralized already. Many separate Bulletin Boards, later forums. Many people writing there had an idea how to create their own.

It didn't start centralized. Centralization happened. I might be more cynical than I should be but as a designer I struggle to see the future in which we have social dynamics that favor decentralization instead of convergence into a less self-managed system (i.e. all current centralized networks).

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repolfx 2719 days ago
No it wasn't. Vast reams of content were hosted exclusively on GeoCities. In fact almost all "home pages" were on GeoCities or AOL back then. There has never really been a time in the history of the internet when a few small providers or companies didn't have outsized dominance - DARPA early on, then Netscape, AOL and GeoCities, then Microsoft, Blogger, WordPress.

This sort of discussion looks often like rose tinted spectacles. The past wasn't so different to today.

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