When I was little, my brother and I used to play Dragonfable for hours during our shared “computer time.” When we were bored, my friends and I used to visit Omegle to meet strangers. As a teenager, I’ve been a “listener” on an online therapist and counselling platform. Later, I found my first job on LinkedIn.
Growing up in the early 00’s meant that the internet would inevitably be a significant part of my life and I’m certainly not alone. One look at a reflective Reddit thread will show you hundreds of people from all over the world confessing to learning life skills, meeting friends and finding their soulmates on the internet.
It is almost a result of the hours I’ve spent scouring the internet that one of the blogs I started in my late teens and later deleted was called Internet Travels. I hosted it on Wix and designed a favicon of a girl sitting on the Internet Explorer logo. My sole motivation behind the blog was to write and post about the “places” I’ve visited on the internet—shops, knowledge bases, search engines, forums, social media networks—which is a concept that continues to fascinate me much more than the technical details of how it works.
That being said, here’s #7 of Cool Stuff I Found on The Internet, carrying on what Internet Travels was meant to be and showing you a collection of places and things on the internet that has recently caught my fancy and landed in my endless list of bookmarks.
The Internet History Calendar by Howie.ai The Internet History Calendar by Howie.ai
The internet is ancient, and it is about time that we made a calendar dedicated to it. Thankfully, Howie.ai got to it first.
Installing this Chrome Extension at the turn of the new year is the best decision I’ve made in a while. Everyday, I open up my browser to be greeted with a tidbit about an interesting thing that happened on that day on the internet—be it the first Macintosh, when Siri was first made into an app or when a photo of an egg surpassed Kylie Jenner as the most liked Instagram pic. An fun fact, quick links to my most visited sites, a list of trending posts on Hacker News. What more does a girl on the internet want?
Raptitude is an ad-free (unfortunately, this needs to be mentioned) website run by a David who’s dedicated to finding ways to be a better human. Experiments is a comprehensive collection of all the ways he’s done it so far. David shows us here how he’s made his life a fun game by taking on practices like meditation, veganism, working out with a kettlebell, abstaining from caffeine and alcohol and reporting back to us the results of his experiments, with total honesty. Some are surprisingly difficult for him, some simply don't work and some are unexpected successes. Apart from being an entertaining read, his recommendations are far more compelling than any other fitness influencer or wellness blogger who get paid to tell us to do things and buy things.
For all the excitement that comes with it, travel can be daunting especially for those who identify themselves as homebodies. From-to is a website that attempts to ease some of the unknown that comes with visiting a new place by simply comparing it to the place you’re living in. It is a paid application ($3 for lifetime access) but a wonderful way to find niche recommendations, unexpected spots in your next travel destination and even make an itinerary.
Maximilian Kiener 12 Questions For Life
12 questions for life is a quick introspection exercise among other things. Maximilian is a designer & prototyper from Austria and he has made a compelling case for this interactive booklet by promising to show every visitor the answer to the existential question that gnaws everyone’s stomachs at some point during their lives–”Why?”
The visuals are simple and the questions are engaging, at least more engaging (and meaningful) than a Buzzfeed quiz claiming to give you an answer to “Why?” I don’t want to spoil it, so I’d recommend anyone reading this to spend a minute going through it for a surprise at the end.