
NeoCities can now handle two million web sites - kyledrake
https://neocities.org/blog/neocities-can-now-handle-two-million-web-sites
======
steveklabnik
As much as there has been lots of trash talking here about Neocities due to it
being 'just' HTML and CSS, I teach high school kids on a semi-regular basis
(teaching summer camp right now) and that's the thing they're _most_ jazzed
about.

I told them all to sign up. They were super pumped.

~~~
da02
Why are they most jazzed about HTML and CSS?

Is it because they can create something immediate and show it to others
online?

~~~
steveklabnik
This is [http://codenow.org/](http://codenow.org/) in NYC, by the way. The
organization partners with my employer, Jumpstart Lab.

This particular iteration is six weeks, all the kids did a weekend with us
during the school year. Last week was reviewing very basic programming
concepts in Ruby, then this week, we did ruby-processing, and then Sinatra, so
the HTML came into play.

I think it's because it's a more graphical medium; many of them can see how
it's 'neat,' but when doing just textual stuff, they get bored easily. The
processing was kinda interesting, but I think the simplicity of making
something graphical was what really made them get pumped. Then, now they're
more excited to learn more Ruby so that they can build more complex sites, but
(at least with this group) it's a means to an end.

We haven't actually deployed anything public yet, so they haven't been able to
share, I bet that'll be another huge leap in interest.

~~~
da02
Thanks for the info. I wish I had this back in the 90s.

Did they try Ruby Shoes (or whatever replaced it) as a fun side GUI project?

~~~
steveklabnik
Yes! Their very first lessons were with Hackety Hack, actually. They did some
shoes-ing after that.

------
gamegod
Kyle, I died a little inside when I saw the preview of the new "beautiful
front page".

It's a great webdesign, but I thought the part of the appeal of your site was
the ghetto-fabulousness? The redesigned front page makes it look like a Wix
competitor. I thought you wanted something that looked plain and boring, but
accessible to everyone (like the blog).

With a super modern fancy web design, you make the site look like Tumblr,
Twitter, and all those sites that you're trying to rebel against. You might
risk losing your audience by sending the wrong message.

~~~
kyledrake
I don't know what "ghetto-fabulousness" means but NeoCities is not a revolt
against good web design, and it's not a ghetto. I like beautiful web sites. I
love the new site design. I think most people will appreciate the new site. I
have metrics, so if they don't, I'll know pretty quickly and make the
appropriate adjustments. Thank you for your concern though.

~~~
kyledrake
Just so everybody knows what we're talking about, this is the screenshot of
the new front page design we're working on:
[https://raw.github.com/kyledrake/neocities-
web/master/files/...](https://raw.github.com/kyledrake/neocities-
web/master/files/wireframes/homepage03x.png)

~~~
blitzo
Please don't implement this design.

Current one is thousand times better. Minimalistic is more natural for this
kind of sites.

~~~
kyledrake
This discussion is interesting, because I just recently listened to an
interview with Tegan And Sara on NPR regarding their new album that almost
perfectly emulates this (minimalism vs polish). They wanted to make their
music more approachable to a wider audience, and their hardcore fans revolted
because they just wanted to hear more of the same stuff. In the end, they were
right, and the new album was successful.

Musicians (and artists in general) have to evolve, and there is a risk of
alienating people with that evolution. I certainly don't want to make people
not like NeoCities because the design changes.

However, having a good design makes the site more approachable and accessible
for more people, which is the goal of NeoCities: to get people to start making
web sites again, even if they aren't a member of the skilled web design crowd.
HN has an appreciation for minimalism (that I almost always share), but I want
to involve and inspire all users, and not just make it for our demographic, if
that makes any sense.

If you had any suggestions specific to the design to improve it, I would love
to hear your thoughts, but I do think it's a good design. It has site
screenshots on the front page, a great top backdrop, good colors, and an
awesome site mascot.

~~~
bluthru
While the current page is lacking design rigor, it has a wonderfully
approachable, no-frills, light-weight, utilitarian aspect to it. I don't think
the new design represents the NeoCities mission.

Lead by example! By having a minimal home page identity, you're saying "Hey
people! It's ok to have a simple web site without knowing how to do all of
these visual enhancements. Dive in and get publishing!"

------
ErikAugust
"Domain Names

yourname.neocities.org is pretty good, but there's nothing more powerful than
owning your own domain. When you own your own domain, you are in control. I
want to make it easy for people to add their domain name to NeoCities, and
just as easy to move their content elsewhere if they decide they don't want to
use us (or want to step to something more powerful like their own server).

I will be implementing domain support eventually. I'm not sure what the
timeline on this is yet, it's a more difficult thing to implement, but I think
it's important. So we're going to do it. Domains themselves cost money, but we
will not be charging for linking domains to NeoCities sites because I feel
that having your own identity that you control is important."

...but what about my page?
[http://ns1.neocities.org/](http://ns1.neocities.org/)

~~~
kyledrake
We're not using any subdomains and we never will. Even www just gets
redirected to the [https://neocities.org](https://neocities.org) version.

If I did need to use subdomains for provisioning, I would probably just get
another domain exclusively for it. You can run a nameserver without having to
attach it to ns1.neocities.org. Enjoy your new site. :-)

~~~
ErikAugust
"You can run a nameserver without having to attach it to ns1.neocities.org."

Haha. You most certainly can.

Thanks for creating the project, should be fun.

------
toomuchtodo
Kyle, Can we talk about making sure your sites get pulled into the Internet
Archive? Or does that not fit the vision for your site?

~~~
CyberDroiD
Why the snark troll?

~~~
toomuchtodo
Please forgive my original post if it sounded like there was any snark.

Some people may not want all of their sites stored forever. Some people are
cool with it. It was really just an honest question, and no snark was
intended.

~~~
jiggy2011
I think he misinterpreted what you said.

"Can we talk about making sure your sites get pulled into the Internet
Archive" could mean "make sure your site is indexed and archived properly" or
could mean "make sure that your site dies and is relegated to the archives".

~~~
toomuchtodo
I meant the first one. Definitely the first one.

------
graue
FYI kyledrake: The blog uses an [http://](http://) link for its CSS, which
makes the SSL version of the page insecure. Such insecure mixed content is
blocked by default in Firefox 23+ (now in beta), so the page loses its styling
for Firefox beta/alpha users, and soon for all Firefox users. (Edit: The CSS
seems to also be blocked in recent Chrome and IE9, thanks thejosh.)

One fix is to remove the protocol from CSS links, i.e. change this:

    
    
        <link href="http://blog.neocities.org/bootstrap.min.css" rel="stylesheet" />
    

to this:

    
    
        <link href="//blog.neocities.org/bootstrap.min.css" rel="stylesheet" />
    

and likewise for any other CSS and JavaScript includes. This will use the same
protocol being used to serve the page.

Other than that, great work! Just wanted to point out this little issue.

~~~
thejosh
Chrome also blocks it as well.

------
dhekir
One thing I really miss from Geocities is the "structured browsing" that
allowed me to find sites from a given subject without using search by word.

Also, I miss letting the user decide what is the subject of his/her site and
where to put it in the hierarchy. It doesn't fit for some sites, but it did
give a sense of "organization" that textual search cannot really match...
especially when you don't know what you're looking for exactly, or just
randomly browsing.

I also liked the naming. I didn't even know what "Cape Canaveral" meant at the
time, but I do remember there were lots of interesting (for me) sites that
ended up under this directory.

~~~
kyledrake
There are tags implemented, it's just a matter of me getting them into the
browse. I probably should have mentioned this in the blog post.. oops. :-)

~~~
mhd
I don't know what kind of tags you're talking about, but in my experience they
tend to create tighter groupings than "neighborhoods" like Geocities. You'll
get a "whovian" tag instead of a general sci-fi group, most likely (and even
"sci-fi" seems a bit limited/boring).

Speaking of ages gone by, I wonder whether you could do something new with the
good old webring format...

------
daturkel
Woo, thanks for the shoutout to Ten Megabyte Manifesto [0] again. 20 megabytes
is likely a good thing (and I guess I have to update my manifesto a little
bit! though I maintain that you can still build quality stuff in under 10MB of
html/css/js), and the promise of a better upload interface is great too. I'm
hoping you'll choose to/be able to implement directory support but any
improvement in the meantime is great. Keep up the good work.

[0] [http://10mbmanifesto.neocities.org/](http://10mbmanifesto.neocities.org/)

~~~
kyledrake
Directories are not impossible, I'm just not sure how to make the interface
for them look good and work well. It's more a UX problem than a coding one. I
would love some suggestions/sketches/wireframes to improve the editing
dashboard to enable this. Please send me an e-mail if you have any ideas here.

~~~
daturkel
Yeah I agree it's not a simple suggestion on my part. I'm by no means an
expert on UI/UX and so I'm a bit out of my depth here, but I'm hoping that
someone can suggest a design that lends itself well to this. In the meantime,
while it's way more complicated than what you're going for, dropbox's upload
interface might be worth looking at.

------
cabalamat
> The initial file upload interface is.. not so great. I'm going to be working
> to improve it. First with things like drag-and-drop file uploading, and then
> with an API to allow developers to write tools to upload files

Regarding this API, do you intend re-inventing the wheel, or are you going to
use something like ssh that people already have written tools around (e.g.
rsync)?

~~~
kaoD
How about (S)FTP? That was my first try and actually what made me dismiss
NeoCities as a host.

I wanted to upload a simple static (Jekyll) blog, but uploading manually put
me off.

------
salimmadjd
I just donated [1] $10 to the project and I haven't even setup an account yet.
I just think providing an anonymous account on the internet is very important,
especially in today's world of constant monitoring and eavesdropping.

I hoped others on HN donate what little they see fit.

[1] > Confirmation number: 1PC46364PK792033N

------
HarrietJones
I'm glad to hear you're up and running and funded Kyle. I was a bit wary to
donate (though I did), as I feared that the idea wouldn't get going. But it's
an important thing. There needs to be a place where people (youngsters) can
just play with HTML.

I hope that the focus continues to be on providing a space for people to
create their first website. I think there's pressure to make this more about
providing a safe uncensored haven for free speech, but geocities was great
because it gave people a way into website design. You don't need SSL. You just
need a place for uploading and creating web pages.

You don't need a Terms of Service.

Anyway - personal visions vary, and it's probably best not to focus on the
tiny areas where we may disagree. Good luck with this. I really mean that.

------
derekp7
I just tried signing up for a page, and at the bottom of the signup form is
instructions for entering two words. But no two words show up, and there is no
place to enter them. Is this due to load issues?

Edit: The re-captcha works in Firefox and Internet Explorer, but not in
Chrome.

~~~
ph0rque
Just came here to say this. I think the issue is with this (seen in the
console):

[blocked] The page at [https://neocities.org/new](https://neocities.org/new)
ran insecure content from
[http://www.google.com/recaptcha/api/challenge?k=6Lfa6eISAAAA...](http://www.google.com/recaptcha/api/challenge?k=6Lfa6eISAAAAAGJIt1N9lMIK1owOXkgT0yswUZJk).

[blocked] The page at [https://neocities.org/new](https://neocities.org/new)
ran insecure content from
[http://fonts.googleapis.com/css?family=Lato:400,700,900,400i...](http://fonts.googleapis.com/css?family=Lato:400,700,900,400italic).

[blocked] The page at [https://neocities.org/new](https://neocities.org/new)
ran insecure content from
[http://www.google.com/recaptcha/api/challenge?k=6Lfa6eISAAAA...](http://www.google.com/recaptcha/api/challenge?k=6Lfa6eISAAAAAGJIt1N9lMIK1owOXkgT0yswUZJk).

------
semiprivate
NeoCities desperately needs a terms of service.

~~~
kyledrake
Agreed. I'll try to get to this ASAP.

------
epsylon
Kyle, I have a few gripes concerning the sign-up page:

1\. It would be pretty cool if the availability of the name could be checked
instantly

2\. When there's an error on the signup page, for whatever reason: _please_
don't RE-SEND a captcha if the previous one was validated, and _please_ don't
ask me to retype my password. Those two UX mistakes are very common, but as a
user they are kind of infuriating.

A quick suggestion as well: it would be cool if there was a way to manage
several sites while logging on a single email / pw.

Thanks a lot anyway!

------
dhawalhs
I had created a simple resume framework [1] which can used to create a online
resume[2] from a json file using angular.js with exactly this kind of hosting
infrastructure in mind. The goal was to reduce the entry barrier by not
relying on any server side technology. Maybe I should finish off some of the
outstanding issues.

Links:

[1] [https://github.com/dhawalhshah/modern-
resume](https://github.com/dhawalhshah/modern-resume)

[2] [http://dhawal.me](http://dhawal.me)

------
ChrisNorstrom
This is quickly becoming the HN community's favorite little project. It's
nothing new yet I just like seeing it flourish and get excited about it.
Because there's no PHP code allowed it forces you to keep it simple. The
anonymity just lets people really vent their frustrations or ideas without
fear of messing up or having their credit card or name associated with it. And
static CSS & HTML sites is where so many of us got started. I love it. Keep up
the good work.

------
jggonz
This looks like a really powerful platform for people that just want to throw
up information on the web with minimal effort. I felt motivated, and just put
together a post on using one of our products on neocities.org

[http://georgeinenglish.com/easily-add-trending-data-
neocitie...](http://georgeinenglish.com/easily-add-trending-data-neocities-
org-homepage/)

Enjoy!

------
HiFaraz
How I've missed these:
[http://penguins.neocities.org/](http://penguins.neocities.org/)

------
qw
Have you considered supporting compressed files or compressing them
automatically after uploads? HttpGzipModule and ngx_http_gunzip_module will
handle these files automatically. A server can handle more pages and probably
also decrease the disk load because of the smaller files.

------
jstsch
Just some warm words. I love the concept and I think sites like this are very
important to get fresh blood actively participating online (to be _really_
online versus having a fixed flow tumblr blog). Keep the barrier of entry as
low as possible... thanks a lot! :)

~~~
jstsch
PS: the text editor has some quirks in Safari 7 where the caret is a few
characters off sometimes (so when you type the characters appear in the wrong
place). Might want to switch to a default <textarea> for Safari 7 for now...

------
ExpiredLink
It's amazing that he doesn't mention the legal aspects of his site. People
will of course publish illegal content there. How is he going to handle this?
One illegal picture may take the whole site down.

------
ljd
You own a .org so if the US Government wanted to seize your assets it would be
difficult but if they wanted to paste their ugly MS paint logo up when people
hit neocities.org they are more than welcome to.

------
PavlovsCat
I enjoy neocities so much. All those people making silly things or taking
their first HTML steps makes me grin from ear to ear every time I hit /browse.
Big kudos, may neocities be here to stay!

------
ferdo
kyledrake, you are the spirit of old school geeks that made computing cool.

Gracias.

------
king_magic
Can I recommend a simple link from NeoCities blog posts directly to the main
page of NeoCities? Somewhere visible and easily accessible - would be awfully
convenient.

------
schrodingersCat
Finally, a place for code minimalists to shine. This is great

------
tripplethrendo
I can't create a page. The captcha doesn't appear and then I get an error when
trying to create. I'm using Chrome if that helps.

------
kbojody
Just a heads up, the "Discussion on Hacker News" link points right back to the
article and not Hacker News.

------
Kiro
What's the point of this? Is it the new MySpace or are people supposed to host
real projects on there?

~~~
shawabawa3
It's the new GeoCities, which is for very simple "my first webpage" type
things

------
Fuzzwah
Folders? Pretty please....

------
jtchang
So many haters with the new design. I personally like the new look.

------
thevert
The recaptcha is not https so I can't register in chrome

------
kin
ever thought of using
[https://www.inkfilepicker.com/](https://www.inkfilepicker.com/)? or is it too
expensive?

------
Simple1234
I love NeoCities, I'm glad it exists.

------
gpxl
Web Scale FTW!

------
autodidakto
No rss feed for the blog?

------
mehrzad
If only it were a .is domain, other than that it's perfect.

------
scottohara
that's awesome!

------
exgeocitiesuser
my site got pulled(erased)after the first day WTF?

~~~
dave809
I'm pretty sure there was some name collisions or something the first day. I
think it's been fixed since then

~~~
exgeocitiesuser
/ name collisions? whatever -i had a whole page i put up there i also donated
14 bucks in bitcoins to this guy and he just destroyed my site

~~~
Fuzzwah
He didn't destroy it, someone found a bug and used it to destroy your site.

~~~
RobertHoudin
My sites are gone too! WTF?

