Some thoughts about the small web

tl;dr: It is perfectly OK that people sometimes have conflicting objectives when pursuing alternative tech

In response to pandion's articles:

Some thoughts about the small web

Some thoughts about indyweb

which ask the following question:

But what is the small web?

I mean is there a definition that we have come to?

I'd say that we look at the wider situation: there are lots of overlapping and conflicting terms used to denote the intersecting networks and systems that people are building:

• small web
• small net (often, "smolnet")
• indy web
• permacomputing
• retrocomputing

Mostly, these are not the same thing, but overlap. Similarly, people have sometimes overlapping, sometimes conflicting goals:

• individual agency and control
• privacy
• decentralisation
• support for lean or minimalist or simplified computing technologies
• support for open source, open protocols, etc
• opposition to advertising
• opposition to the mainstream
• opposition to monopolies or the extent of intellectual property
• opposition to Big Tech
• opposition to capitalism (or, indeed, some kind of socialism)
• opposition to planned obsolescence

Sometimes these goals are mutually reinforcing, but sometimes they conflict with each other. Which is fine. But it can cause misunderstandings - for instance, Gemini looks good for low-powered and older hardware, because it has lower resource requirements. But not low enough to be run on a ZX80 with no SSL support, and accordingly, Gemini has been criticised by supporters of retrocomputing. But Gemini was designed with different trade-offs in mind.

None of these desirable goals is sacred, so it's appropriate to accept trade-offs between them. We just need to recognise that trade-offs are what we're doing.