Since about 1998, whenever I need a rickroll-style URL placeholder for whatever reason, I use zombocom.
This is my favorite website ever, because, quite simply, you can do anything at Zombocom.
For those who don't get it, in the late 90's there was a distinct sense that internet websites might just solve all of the world's problems, and we just hadn't imagined yet how it was going to happen, and most people hadn't really been online yet.
Looking back I think the optimism for the internet in the 90s and early 2000s wasn't nearly as inaccurate as everyone says it was. There was certainly a lot of nonsense but I think most of what people thought would happen did end up happening, it just took decades instead of a few years.
It is true, if you know where to look. Twitter has many interesting creators I follow, both in tech and in other fields. Instagram similarly has many good photographers and artists I follow in many different styles as well.
>For those who don't get it, in the late 90's there was a distinct sense that internet websites might just solve all of the world's problems, and we just hadn't imagined yet how it was going to happen, and most people hadn't really been online yet.
wasn't it more of a parody of those long and elaborate flash intros that websites used to have?
Definitely, but it also addressed something I'm trying to tease-out here.
For people who had never really used computers, and had not been online, the buzz about how the Information Superhighway was going to change everyone's life was enigmatic at best.
This led to all manner of fantasy, and a yearning to make the connection and discover what was going to happen - to be a part of it, to converge - with, or without, a good technical understanding. There's something of this irony in Zombocom.
There's a great 80's Neue Deuetsche Welle song by Paso Doble with which I am practically obsessed, which captures some of the very weird fantastical dream-con-fusion of human and machine, love and logic, flesh and silicon. For the non-tech artists, it was (is?) a rich place to play:
This is my favorite website ever, because, quite simply, you can do anything at Zombocom.
For those who don't get it, in the late 90's there was a distinct sense that internet websites might just solve all of the world's problems, and we just hadn't imagined yet how it was going to happen, and most people hadn't really been online yet.