History of Web Design
April 15th, 2006My new colleague, Jacob Nadal, points out an important difference between the preservation and prservability of blogs and other objects.
Helping someone make their blog (or anything) preservable is a matter of using well-documented and doggedly implemented standards, and creating effective safety nets against catastrophe…
He then goes on to outline the requirements for truly preserving a digital object.
Nadal, who just came to NYPL from Indiana University, and I came up with a question/thought exercise that might help define some of the requirements for documenting and preserving (aspects of) the early web. If you were to create an exhibition about the history of web design, what objects would you want to include, and how would you want to display them?
I would start the show by talking about the introduction of internet protocols and hypertext languages. The show would begin in the 1960’s and quickly sweep through the70’s and 80’s. I am not sure if I could tell the story by presenting significant correspondences and articles on paper, or if I would need to find a way of presenting early digital work on forgotten-platform emulators.
Later, in a discussion of the professionalization of web design, I would want to display books by people like Linda Weinman and Roger Black. Digital representations of those books would not do; I would want to show the physical book.
So, in addition to web browsers and pages, my show would certainly contain paper and other pre-web technologies. It would be a hybrid show about a hybrid era.
What would you want to include in this exhibition, and what do your curatorial instincts tell us about the nature of the web?
It seems like such a challenge to preserve and collate something that’s as fluid and dynamic as the Web. Hat’s off!
I’d like to see someone keep a catalogue of actual HTML code itself for comparison’s sake - here is website X in 1995, website Y in 2000, and website Z today.
As a web developer (as opposed to designer), I know how much the backend side of things is (obviously) neglected by the general population - they only really see the design, after all.
For what that’s worth
by d April 15th, 2006 at 4:38 pmCheck out http://yafll.com/articles/computersandinternet/961.html
by kiankian89 May 6th, 2006 at 3:55 pmI’ve been considering this sort of thing recently, and what I’d really want is to collect remembrances and perspectives from people who were doing web design (and other standards work) throughout that time. Most of these would be tied to specific events (formation of the WSP; release of IE6; debut of CSS Zen Garden) or activities (first site design; first CSS design), and possibly be placed along a timeline. Preserving as many of those things as possible would be nice, but I think the words of the designers (and others) themselves would be more compelling. But then I love sites like folklore.org, so maybe that’s just me.
by Eric June 29th, 2006 at 9:41 pmWhile it predates the web by a while, there was a great deal of work with WAIS, Gopher, Usenet groups, the Well, etc. that hinted at what the web would or could become. Craig’s List took its inspiration from the Well, there was a great deal of activity among Deadheads trading tapes on the Well that hinted at what people are doing today on myspace and other social networking sites.
For me, a critical remembrance of this time was in 1983-84, when, as a student at UC Santa Cruz, a group of computer geeks hooked up via modems through the internet to organize anti-apartheid rallies on campuses across the country. I participated, although I didn’t organize these events - I was just a bit player - but seeing the technology work to actually jump-start a political movement was amazing, and everyone involved could see the possibilities.
by Chris van Hasselt August 29th, 2006 at 4:28 pm