[John Whitehouse's personal site] is like a home in that it’s a collection of many things which are unified only by the person who collected them. I feel as if someone is giving me a tour of their apartment: I’m looking at the papers on his desk, the notes stuck to his fridge, an album of butterfly photos taken by his brother, and so on. Sure, he probably tidied up before I arrived, and he’s choosing what to show me. But nonetheless, entering the space has given me a rich portrait of its occupant. As far as I could find, John doesn’t have a formal “about” page, but he doesn’t need one: I see him far more clearly through the relationships and activities he’s chosen to share.

...I’m talking about this, of course, because I’d like to use “home” as the operative analogy for my own website.

I’ve built this little backyard to my website, because every website should have a garden, a backyard, a basement, or any other wild space. Treated with lovely care it grows various experiments in a natural, playful, hypertext way.

(An article)

A website is a poem that is already in everyone's pocket, a house built from photos of other houses, a book where every chapter is another book where every chapter is another book. In this class we will be studying the poetics of the web: the raw material of HTML, the systemic visuals of CSS, the endless interactive possibilities of Javascript and the browsers, servers, protocols, and infrastructure that holds it all together. Each week we will make websites. We will make small websites that only convey a single, tiny idea. We will make large websites whose clutter and convoluted interlocking pages feel like exploring an abandoned mansion. We will make websites that speak, websites with secrets, and websites that tell one perfectly executed joke. And as we build the web we will also learn its history from the early geocities days to the ways we tried to be fully present over the pandemic, and all the wonderful and useless websites artists have made in between.

(A book)

There was a time when owning digital space seemed thrilling, and our personal sites motivated us to express ourselves. There are signs of a resurgence, but too few wish to make their digital house a home.

Getting pigeon-holed as one particular thing often made me uncomfortable because I didn’t feel seen. My skill set is much broader and being called “just” anything felt constricting. Shifting my focus publicly reflected my different personal interests while ensuring an expanding broader audience (and maybe bring some people along for the ride, too).

...I’ve always enjoyed being more of a generalist while having a deep understanding of a number of topics—something I referred to as being U shaped instead of T shaped.

I came to this conclusion sometime during quarantine when I realized that certain websites give me a sense of shelter and rest more than others.

These spaces that particularly stood out to me all had some quality of

slowness,quiet,and/or gathering.

We ought to carefully examine the qualities of the living environment that each web space provides for us.

Truth be told, I don’t remember who gave me my first worry stone. I do remember I was quite young, my hand holding theirs as we walked alongside a creek…or maybe we were near the small freshwater spring near my grandparents’ farm? I’m not sure any more. But I do remember I was asked to hold out my hand, and then the person I was walking with — I have a sneaking suspicion it was my grandmother, but I’m not sure — placed a flat little stone in my palm. It had a comfortable, warm, calming weight in my hand as I turned it over and over, gray and white and gray again.

It was a few years before I realized that worry stones had a name, that they were borrowed from cultures other and older than mine. Heck, it’s been more than a few years since I’ve even held one. But in the last few weeks, before and after launching the redesign, I’ve kept working away at this website, much as I’d distractedly run my fingers over a smooth, flat stone.

a cursor is a kite is a cursora string is a link is a stringa user is a flyer is a user