[bawolff]

Umm, it reminds me of all the websites when VRML was a hip fad in the 90s (but obviously higher resolution/better).

But still, this misses the authors point - that mainstream websites have become homogenous. Obviously its not about literally every last website, but bemoaning what is currently trendy.

[onion2k]

Umm, it reminds me of all the websites when VRML was a hip fad in the 90s (but obviously higher resolution/better).

I made a few experimental VRML websites in the late 90s (on a lovely SGI Irix..) and I can see why you'd say that, but it's only superficially similar in the 3D-in-a-browser sense. VRML experiences were usually terrible and never pretty.

[TheOtherHobbes]

It's the same idea updated with extra cycles.

It is pretty, and there are some nice aesthetic touches. But the overall look is still very blocky and VRML-ish.

I guess at some point we'll get photorealistic rendering - most likely in AR glasses rather than in the browser - and there will be a lot more experimentation for a while, some of it driven by AI.

But even this is in a tiny niche far, far outside the web mainstream, and if it hadn't been linked here hardly anyone would find it.

I remember the exact moment in the mid-90s when I realised the suits were moving in and the web was going to be transformed from a weird, colourful, mad eccentric thing into a generic mall.

From a corporate POV it has far exceeded my worst nightmares. Sites like this are a very small pushback, but they're not going to make a dent in the overall crapification and hustle-driven corporatisation of our biggest and most interesting planetary cultural resource.

[robertlagrant]

I did some VRML at uni. We thought it was the future :)

Having said that, I think what you're saying is some very superficial pattern-matching. I found it a fantastic experience, and I'm not a particularly arty person.