[MyPasswordSucks]

Webrings were usually a centralized and automated entity. You'd add your site to the index (either through a webform or by emailing the maintainer), then link to http:// web-ring.tld /cgi-bin/ring?site=currentsitename&action=next or something similar, which would then redirect to the actual next site in the ring.

In their heyday, there'd also be "start your own webring" sites, so you didn't need cgi-bin access on your GeoShitties or AngelFucker or TriPoop or xoom [1] site in order to start up a webring.

[1] The dry and square history books will claim that the most exciting thing about xoom was its large storage allocation (10mb at launch! 25 soon after! You could upload an entire three minute mp3 at 128CBR "CD-Quality" bitrate and still have tons of space left over for two-frame .gifs!) or its simple members.xoom. com/username URL, but the true soldiers of those bygone battledays will know it was xoom's resiliency to childish renaming-mockery.