
Make Any Webpage Look Like It Was Made By A 13 Year-Old In 1996 - dutchbrit
http://wonder-tonic.com/geocitiesizer/
======
jiggy2011
It's funny, these geocities sites were horrible but they provided a way for
people to express themselves on the web.

MySpace tapped into this also , allowing people to change their page
background, have autoplaying music etc.

The facebook/Twitter came along and spoiled it by prioritizing usability. Now
basically everyone has an online presence that looks identical to the point of
being sterile. Hell even 90% of wordpress sites look exactly the same.

~~~
unalone
You know, this is a really interesting point to make. I always _loved_
Facebook because it cut back on the bullshit and emphasized data over
everything. I wanted to use these services keep in touch with people, not to
see them try and express themselves. But when you see too much data fly by it
all starts to blur and look the same. It's easy to get cynical about people
when all you see is the surface data they express about themselves – by
default the least interesting things they could possibly share.

The legendary architect Christopher Alexander has a theory on how life
flourishes: at its core is this idea that the world consists of overlapping
"centers" – basically places where living things gather. Centers can overlap,
so on Facebook your feed and your profile are each centers. By connecting
centers, you encourage movement between them and a newer, greater center
exists.

I feel that Facebook and Twitter are excellent at encouraging this movement
between centers of data. But they're not good at making that data matter.
MySpace and Geocities were _awful_ at communication (remember MySpace
bulletins?), but they were always about creating something unique for
yourself, not about connecting you to anybody else.

Is there a way to do both at once? I'm not sure, but this is something I've
been thinking about for a few years now. In high school I did some work for
<http://zoints.com>, which was trying to create a network of connected forums
to allow for both personal expression and information density, but their tool
was way too cerebral for anybody else to catch on. The closest I think I've
seen any site come to this is Tumblr, because it both allows for uniquely
designed blogs and a central aggregator, but Tumblr is so bad at conversation
that it makes holding lengthy conversations ugly and frustrating.

The theoretical solution to this would be to let users define their own
centers: give them controls for looking at information in a unique way of
their choosing. In a sense, this solution _is_ the Internet, and things like
email and RSS are how we connect disparate online entities, but those are very
crude tools. The subtler interactions you allow for, the more you'll let
people express themselves without getting in each others' ways – but it's hard
to define just what these interactions ought to be.

Looking back I'd say the pinnacle (for me) was Facebook's Graffiti Wall app,
back when apps were just starting to be a thing. People interacting through
pictures and illustrations lent to much more creative back-and-forth than text
ever did. But that wasn't ideal either. I love capturing and organizing
information, but I agree with you that something's been lost. Reclaiming it
without sacrificing the new will be an enormous challenge.

~~~
gojomo
See also Venkatesh Rao's piece on 'plazas vs. warrens':

[http://www.ribbonfarm.com/2010/10/27/warrens-plazas-and-
the-...](http://www.ribbonfarm.com/2010/10/27/warrens-plazas-and-the-edge-of-
legibility/)

------
TeMPOraL
[http://wonder-tonic.com/geocitiesizer/content.php?theme=1...](http://wonder-
tonic.com/geocitiesizer/content.php?theme=1&music=10&url=http://wonder-
tonic.com/geocitiesizer/content.php?theme=2&music=12&url=http://wonder-
tonic.com/geocitiesizer/content.php?theme=3&music=3&url=http://wonder-
tonic.com/geocitiesizer/content.php?theme=1&music=1&url=http://wonder-
tonic.com/geocitiesizer/)

Applied to itself 4 times. So meta, that we have to go deeper.

~~~
fl3tch
That is what Steve Jobs saw on acid.

------
theycallmemorty
As someone who was 13 in 1996, I wonder if in 2030 they'll have funny tools to
"Make any webpage look like it was made by a 28 year-old in 2012"

~~~
nosignal
Rounded corners, drop shadows, subtle palettes with contrasting call to action
buttons, several dozen social network sharing icons... Did I miss anything?

------
mhd
I think it actually made <http://yvettesbridalformal.com/> look better.

Hard to believe that not too long ago, frames and table-based layouts actually
were improvements over the status quo.

~~~
walrus
I urge everyone to click around that site a bit. It has everything: UFO
conspiracy theories, 3d modeling, recipes, MS Paint drawings, horror stories,
...

------
philjr
Hey, I was 13 years old in 1996! That made me nostalgic for a website I
designed around 1998 and I was surprised to find it was still online...

<http://homepage.eircom.net/~nopatec/>

Dreamweaver special :)

still can't find the geocities site I had in 1997 though...damn

~~~
LinaLauneBaer
_3) SuckingDiesel WebJex - 20 MB Space, 5 POP accounts. FTP access, cgi-bin._

I like this quote... :-)

------
baxter
As someone who was 13 years old in 1996, I take exception to this. It looks
like it was made by an 11 year old in 1996.

~~~
astral303
+1.

Back then at 13, I already knew the dancing baby was not cool.

------
corford
Ah memories :) Does anyone remember the javascript meme where you'd get people
to click a form button and then it would pretend to format your C:\ drive?? My
1996/7 site had that :D

And web rings! I miss the old internet :'(

~~~
hluska
Oh web rings!! And the format c:\ meme...what great memories!

Do you remember the "Through an incredible amount of programming, I wrote a
script that will show you what time my VCR is set to"? meme? The user would
click a link to a page that contained:

<blink>12:00</blink>

The good old days....

~~~
brk
One of my favorites:

"I found this collection of files posted on a cybercrime website. Check and
see if any of them are yours..."

Then there was a link that went to file://c:\ so the user would be browsing
their own hard drive...

------
Yhippa
I am sad: not a single rainbow <HR> in sight.

~~~
vibrunazo
Where I the 5 pixel 3d table borders? I had lot's of them and found them
really high tech.

------
jbigelow76
I saw this title and thought somebody must have found my posting on oDesk
looking for UI work.

------
sreyemhtes
Nope, I don't believe it. There aren't any Under Construction signs anywhere.

~~~
dutchbrit
[http://wonder-tonic.com/geocitiesizer/content.php?theme=8...](http://wonder-
tonic.com/geocitiesizer/content.php?theme=8&music=11&url=news.ycombinator.com)

^^ gave me an under construction page :)

------
finne
I actually found myself quite liking the MIDI files....

~~~
merryandrew
Yeah, I got to hear a really sweet Alanis Morissette tune. :) :/ :(

~~~
RegEx
I got some Sheryl Crow action <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1OfNKorIKA>

------
dutchbrit
HN: [http://wonder-
tonic.com/geocitiesizer/content.php?theme=2...](http://wonder-
tonic.com/geocitiesizer/content.php?theme=2&music=11&url=news.ycombinator.com)

~~~
vibrunazo
Even better, take a look at this post.

[http://wonder-tonic.com/geocitiesizer/content.php?theme=2...](http://wonder-
tonic.com/geocitiesizer/content.php?theme=2&music=2&url=http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3729243)

------
woogychuck
This is pretty fantastic, I now need to find a way to sneak some of those
animated gifs past our design team.

------
brudgers
I was not impressed with the conversion - until I scrolled down and saw
Billzebub.

[http://wonder-tonic.com/geocitiesizer/content.php?theme=2...](http://wonder-
tonic.com/geocitiesizer/content.php?theme=2&music=9&url=apple.com)

------
lucb1e
Hey isn't that my website?! (Joke)

Well, mine had #0F0 for the background color and some copy/pasted javascripts
(i.e. clock moving with the cursor). But yeah, pretty much the same style :)
Must say that I did improve over the years.

------
arturadib
Oh man, this is like seeing dusty old family pictures. So nostalgic!

------
spinchange
The wonder tonic guy gives great Internet. I love his shady URL redirection
service: <http://www.shadyurl.com/>

------
Andrenid
Just seeing the footer, with the browser buttons and counter, gave me one of
the craziest "chills up spine" nostalgia-flashbacks I've had in years.

That alone was worth the click.

------
kayoone
Hm, i was 13 in 1996, now i am a fulltime web developer ;)

~~~
bjornsteffanson
I was also 13 in 1996 and am now a front-end web developer.

This brings back fond memories.

------
jakubw
Well, mine had falling snowflakes even when it was summer.

------
InclinedPlane
Title is redundant. If anyone other than 13 year olds were designing websites
in 1996 there certainly wasn't any evidence of it back then.

------
randomdata
This thread made me want to look for the website I made in 1996 as a 14 year
old in the Wayback machine. Sadly, it was not available.

I did find my website made as a 16 year old. Unfortunately all of the images
were missing. From what I remember, it was actually a pretty nice design. I
think I'd still be proud of it if I had built it today.

------
bicknergseng
I don't know that it takes anything special to make nytimes.com look like it's
from yesteryear. The only thing it's missing really is some <blink> elements
and that dancing baby.

Seriously though if they're going to stick with that column layout, they
should look at how pinterest is presenting information.

------
duck
A better title would be: _Make Any Webpage Look Like It Was Made In 1996_

------
powertower
google.com [http://wonder-
tonic.com/geocitiesizer/content.php?theme=2...](http://wonder-
tonic.com/geocitiesizer/content.php?theme=2&music=3&url=google.com)

~~~
drpancake
I thought it would come out the same.

------
rtp
A while ago I made this bookmarklet to easily geocitize a webpage:

<https://gist.github.com/2141034>

The code is quite dumb but it works rather well.

------
pepijndevos
I tried it on a website, but it did not change much...

------
dexen
In related news: <http://www.alcowebizer.com/news.ycombinator.com>

~~~
zalew
doesn't work for me

------
NanoWar
The other way round would be a lot better: Make any Webpage from 1996 look
like it was made in 2012! :)

------
mistercow
It doesn't notice and remove border-radius tags, which made the experience
particularly weird.

~~~
dutchbrit
I think you'll find it offers ultimate browsing experience in Netscape
Navigator :)

------
bretthardin
Why is it when I type in drudgereport.com it looks the same.

------
krausejj
is someone going to be making this in ten years to show what websites looked
like in 2012???

also - comic sans is classic. i predict a comeback.

~~~
groovy2shoes
Comic Sans didn't disappear. It's just been hanging out at Microsoft Research.

------
crisnoble
best badge: "made with notepad, the right way!"

------
kapitalx
the Chip background acts as a 3d stereograms which was a good reminder of the
90s.

------
rachelbaker
No <blink> tag?

------
instakill
Oh the nostalgia.

------
hcarvalhoalves
Sad but true.

------
OliverD
that was an awesome time :D

------
yakko
indecent :D

------
monsterix
While it might sound funny, people out there really do design their pages like
this only:

<http://govindtiwari.blogspot.in/>

Yeah, even today! [edited]

~~~
Maro
That's one awesome site =)

I keep looking at it finding new WTFs...

~~~
monsterix
haha, don't blink your eyes!

------
necenzurat
i really love Reposts: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2805452>

