Does anyone remember when web rings were actually useful for finding niche stuff?

I was looking for old skate videos the other day and kept hitting random pages about 90s skate culture. Back then you could find a web ring on a fan site and jump between like 30 similar sites in a row. Now everyone just says "web rings were clunky" but I found some of my favorite bands that way. Anyone else miss just clicking through site after site without an algorithm deciding what you see?

2 comments

2 Comments

allen.amy24d ago

Yeah web rings were like a choose your own adventure... the algorithm ruins everything.

emma68424d ago

Oh, I remember those web rings. The thing nobody talks about is how they actually built community in a way algorithms never could. When you clicked through someone's handpicked links, you were basically trusting their taste. It was like getting book recommendations from a friend, not a cold machine that just wants to keep you clicking. Now the algorithm just throws the most popular or controversial stuff at us. It doesn't care if we actually like it, it just cares if we keep scrolling. That personal connection, that sense of discovery through someone else's curating, is completely gone.