Why Isn’t the Internet More Fun and Weird?
Metadata
Highlights
- By mistake, MySpace inspired a generation of teenagers to learn how to code. From Stealing MySpace:But Nguyen forgot to block Web markup language in user submissions.
- MySpace profiles were a canvas for self-expression and code was the paint.MySpace showed the world that if you make powerful and complicated tools (like coding) accessible to anyone, people are smart enough to figure out how to use them.
- We — the programmers, designers, product people — collectively decided that users don’t deserve the right to code in everyday products. Users are too stupid. They’d break stuff. Coding is too complicated for ordinary people. Besides, we can just do the coding…so why does it matter?
- The everyday consumer products are converging. They ran out of good ideas for helping people express themselves, so all that’s left is to monopolize.
title: “Why Isn’t the Internet More Fun and Weird?”
author: “jarredsumner.com”
url: ”https://jarredsumner.com/codeblog/”
date: 2023-12-19
source: hypothesis
tags: media/articles
Why Isn’t the Internet More Fun and Weird?
Metadata
Highlights
- By mistake, MySpace inspired a generation of teenagers to learn how to code. From Stealing MySpace:But Nguyen forgot to block Web markup language in user submissions.
- MySpace profiles were a canvas for self-expression and code was the paint.MySpace showed the world that if you make powerful and complicated tools (like coding) accessible to anyone, people are smart enough to figure out how to use them.
- We — the programmers, designers, product people — collectively decided that users don’t deserve the right to code in everyday products. Users are too stupid. They’d break stuff. Coding is too complicated for ordinary people. Besides, we can just do the coding…so why does it matter?
- The everyday consumer products are converging. They ran out of good ideas for helping people express themselves, so all that’s left is to monopolize.