One more year passes and once again WordPress reminds me that I still own this website and that they still collect money from my bank account. It came out only a couple of days ago, spurring the thought that I really ought to either contribute something or let the whole thing go. Oddly enough, I also came across this video essay by Sarah Davis Baker that touches on themes of digital decay.

I mentioned in an earlier post that I lamented the loss of internet directories and the thousands of individual websites that used to populate the early internet. I continue to yearn for an internet that more resembled that era, even knowing full well that era is never coming back. As rudimentary as it was, I think it has aged much better than our current commercial, algorithm-driven and AI-saturated era will. I can see the post-2020 internet aging like sour milk if we don’t somehow turn this shit around.

Alongside discussions of both real-life and digital decay, Sarah draws from the themes explored in Jeff Vandermeer’s novel Annihillation, which maintains a solid spot on my need-to-read list (I have seen the film adaptation but from what I hear the novel is very different).

I suppose she’s inspired me to keep this little corner of the internet alive, in a sense. And maybe I feel as though I have nothing to write because the insidious perfectionism of today’s internet culture has gotten its hooks into me – the idea that we cannot and should not share an endeavor, activity or creative work online unless it’s been executed at the highest level. To do otherwise is to be cringe. Okay. So let’s all be cringe. It’s better than the alternative, sanitized and mind-numbingly dull internet we’re careening towards.