Greenwich: an experiment in collaborative links

[pikseladam]

It looks like An IndieWeb Webring project. You can check it out here: https://xn--sr8hvo.ws/ "This proof-of-concept webring is a way for folks adding IndieWeb building blocks to their personal websites to find (and be found by) other folks with IndieWeb building blocks on their sites!"

[manbitesdog]

Don’t let the negative comments get to you. The idea is interesting, and there are plenty of ways to curb spammers (just look at Stack Overflow). Also, this isn't the same concept as webrings.

[saylisteins]

I think this is an interesting concept! Please don't let the negative comments get to you.

One suggestion is to maybe allow users/community to have a walled garden in regards to writing rights. This would help with moderation, and allow users to subscribe to the walled gardens/bubbles they are most interested in.

[onlyfootnotes]

Thanks! All good, I think some people are interpreting this as 1) me thinking this is some sort of groundbreaking novel idea and 2) that I am trying to scale this in a venture scale sort of way haha. Neither are true. The walled garden idea came up elsewhere too, really like it and considered it. Just have to think through details and add the user management side.

[namuol]

If this is interesting/novel to you, you might be surprised to learn there’s a W3C standard for annotating the web which never really caught on.

https://www.w3.org/TR/annotation-model/

It deserves more attention, particularly from browser vendors and social media platforms, but the incentives have never been in place.

One commercial application built on the standard is hypothes.is, but I’ve lost track of their efforts years ago.

[cxr]

This has been done a lot. Marc Andreessen was going to put it in Mosaic. Hypothes.is is the most semi-well-implemented modern incarnation I am aware of.

Recently, I came across this paper which describes an implementation called "Weblinks" (terrible name) that focuses on just the links. Haven't used it, but it's thoughtfully designed:

<https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3465336.3475123>

[onlyfootnotes]

Thanks! Yeah I recall Marc talking about related ideas with Mosaic actually now that you mention it.

[Multicomp]

I've wanted a distributed annotation system for a while, probably it will end up having some sort of advanced block list and follow list and follow me for my block list approach, potentially an activity pub-based system might work, but in the meantime I want to try this one because I've missed the sidewiki boat and want to try it.

Once it can be on Firefox at least, I can try it.

[onlyfootnotes]

Yeah definitely. Going to build out a first version of block lists / reporting this weekend. Someone else wants a firefox version too so might start there in terms of additional browser support. Thanks!

[jsnell]

The title feels pretty clickbaity. I might be missing something, but this feels like another distributed annotation system for the web, an idea that's been tried and retried for what feels like decades a this point. Why will this one work when the other attempts didn't? Is it just about this being more restricted than those past systems?

(The example that came to mind first was Google Sidewiki, but it looks like there's a bunch of these listed in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_annotation)

[dang]

Ok, let's switch to the subtitle instead.

[camtarn]

I guess the focus in this one is on adding links rather than discussion, which from a look at that Wikipedia page, seems unique.

But yes, it seems a bit like a small twist on an extremely old idea.

[saaaaaam]

To answer your question “why will this one work when the other attempts didn’t?” - from my perspective, this one got my attention enough that I’m going to try it. I’ve seen lots of ‘annotate the web’ things and none has piqued my interest.

So I guess “clickbaity title” maybe actually means “clear vision to attract people” and “good storytelling to engage users”.

[jerf]

It does seem a variant on annotation. I'd commend to the poster my analysis of the network utility of such systems I developed after pondering on them for quite a few years (I was interacting with them in the 1990s): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23576213

I commend that to the author in the spirit of learning about the space and thinking through the implications, because I believe people are more likely to solve problems when they understand what they are, and think through them, and don't just try to blunder past them with hope and moxie.

That post was written about generalized text annotation and I stand by it in that context.

However, as you deviate from the system being analyzed, the analysis becomes less appropriate. One of the problems generalized annotation systems have is that there are an arbitrary amount of textual comments that can be added to a page. That is what turns the popular pages into a unpleasant cacophony. The range of links is somewhat more restrained. Plus, links are just... links. Textual comments are arguing and flames and generally tiring on any popular page. (Though I'd watch out for people learning how to turn "links" into arguments.)

It is possible that a shared cross-linking system might work, but I'd strenuously suggest thinking very very hard before adding in any sort of inline "conversation" system. It is very, very obvious and very, very tempting... and it immediately puts you back into the generalized web annotation space, which is strewn with corpses, many of them very very well funded. You can have a "community forum" where people can talk, and perhaps even should, but putting it inline on the page is basically a known-fail. If you think you've got a solution to that I'd try to be very sure that you've got a very strong proposition on exactly how yours is different than the previous attempts.

Anyhow, I would just generally suggest to the author that this is one of those "obvious ideas" that hasn't happened because in general they flame out so quickly that you don't even find out they existed before they've already collapsed, not because nobody has ever tried it. Be sure to consider what has happened in the past.

Also, as a hint from previous efforts: It looks like you may be trying to bind links to specific text on the page. As you've probably already discovered, that's harder than it looks, and however much code you've written for it, I guarantee you it's even harder than that. I'd strongly suggest considering just binding links to pages and not trying to bind it to text at all.

[ay]

Reminds me of https://ruby-talk.ruby-lang.narkive.com/buiXXTZh/what-is-hoo... :-)

[onlyfootnotes]

Yes totally! The framing of "web graffiti" was something I played with, but didn't like the association with spam or purely artistic purpose.

[tingletech]

How is this different from the public annotations in https://web.hypothes.is ?

[photonthug]

Well, one difference I notice is there are no links inviting me to “contact the sales team” or “join our webinar training partners”.

[lkrubner]

"The way we discover interesting websites needs innovating, why not let anyone contribute to any webpage?"

I remember there was a website that did this in 1999, using frames to allow people to post comments on any website. The courts shot this down as an illegal infringement of trademark. Does anyone remember the name of that website that did this?

[ergl]

This is cool. One way of solving spam problems might to only show links of people you explicitly follow / trust in some way, although that means associating identity to the posts. You could have a setting to toggle between only showing links from people you trust or from everyone, to get around the bootstrapping problem at first.

[onlyfootnotes]

Thanks! Yeah I think this is likely the direction I will take things.

[eykanal]

This seems like a great idea designed for well-intentioned people. Unfortunately, the internet is running a bit short on well-intentioned people.

The potential for abuse here is enormous. I have a difficult time seeing this becoming anything other than a cesspool of ads, 4chan-style joke links, and general inanity.

[bee_rider]

This seems like maybe a good use for some federated social media or web of trust methods?

Like I don’t trust the internet in general to curate these links. But one could surely find networks where the average voter could be trustworthy…

[arkh]

> I have a difficult time seeing this becoming anything other than a cesspool of ads, 4chan-style joke links, and general inanity.

IMO this is the kind of content which made early 2000 internet fun. Not the bland, moderated to hell and back social media sites are. Just compare what happened with the million checkbox experience which got a secret ARG made by users having fun and reddit place which is... meh.

[onlyfootnotes]

Yeah this is definitely a fear.. hopefully we can attract the well-intentioned people and put some nice automations in place for keeping spam to a minimum. Let me know if you've seen any similar projects do this well.

[dcow]

Just let the community downvote inanity. Why does everything need moderators? Honestly moderators would kill an idea like this. Let people flag NSFW and downvote bad faith annotations.

[InsideOutSanta]

Yeah, this whole genre of products is an example of the Happy Path fallacy.

There are studies showing that comments on articles erode the trust readers have in these articles. Given the quality of the average comment, it's likely that comment systems on most sites make people both dumber and angrier.

So I think the idea of forcing comments (or user-contributed links) on sites that don't want comments is fundamentally problematic.

Personally, I don't want random people on the Internet putting links on my articles. If you want to discuss what I write, or provider additional context, or disagree, then do it on your own site, or in a public place like Hacker News, not on my site.

[bschmidt1]

[flagged]

[froh]

I love it :-)

However, would it be possible to come up with a UI that doesn't need to "Read and change all your data on all websites." ?

I feel uncomfortable with that.

[onlyfootnotes]

yeah almost certainly! let me think through updating that, thanks for the feedback!

[BugsJustFindMe]

Everything old is new. The poor child thinks he's invented webrings.

[bee_rider]

Webrings were an alternative discovery solution to search, right? They died because there weren’t needed when search got incredibly good. Now that search kind of is… not good, maybe they could be tried again.

[disturbed_devil]

Thanks for the condescending comment dad

[bargle0]

Client side webrings.

What is the plan for fighting bitrot and bad-faith actors?

[junto]

Strongly feels like decentralized trackbacks and pingbacks which died because they turned into spam monsters.

This turns it into a centralized problem, but a problem nevertheless?

[photonthug]

Honest question, is blog spam still a huge problem today if you’re not running a buggy old Wordpress stack, or better yet, not using Wordpress at all?

I would think scammers and spammers would just focus on lucrative targets like instafacetok and yelpazon reviews in 2024. And is seo hacking based on comment threads really still a viable business, or we are mainly worried about links to malware?

I get that new platforms of any kind are certainly likely to be targets of vandalism, but it’s surprising that everyone seems to be suggesting that every new/unpopular/niche platform will immediately be targeted by what amounts to organized crime. Even if I had evil intentions and an army of thousands to craft malware and scams, I wouldn’t task even one of them to poke around on platforms with less than like 10% of the market, because why bother?

[shark1]

Similar to https://web.hypothes.is/

[dcow]

Please add a mobile safari extension. I wouldn’t see myself using this in any other context.

[onlyfootnotes]

interesting, thanks for the suggestion!

[welcome_dragon]

So webrings?

[camtarn]

Sort of, but webrings needed the site owner's involvement and couldn't have new links added by people just viewing the website.

[tootie]

Exactly my thought. Maybe an idea worth dusting off. Web rings were a thing when search barely worked.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Webring

[jerf]

No, those have very different characteristics. This is a variant on annotation.

[surfingdino]

If it doesn't have a Cutty Sark pub it's not Greenwich.