Meet Wander, a StumbleUpon-inspired tool for discovering the “microweb”

As AI briefs and commercial content increasingly dominate search, people are experimenting and inventing ways to make the web seem more human like it used to, building everything from “Small Web” search engines. to Decentralized social networks.

One of the latest efforts in this direction Touring consolean open source, self-hosted web console that provides website visitors with a way to explore other interesting websites and web pages recommended by the community of independent website owners.

Sosam Pal, the project’s London-based developer, says he was inspired to build the small decentralized tool after he saw… Kaji “Little Web” Search tool Which limits searches to specific types of content, such as blogs, webcomics, and YouTube channels.

But this still doesn’t show the kind of small websites run by independent developers like Pal himself, nor web projects, widgets, or games. This led Pal to create Wander, which puts website recommendations back into the hands of users.

“Not everyone is aware of this beautiful part of the Internet, which is a weird part, where we have all kinds of weird sites, where people express their personalities, etc.,” he said.

Wander has its roots in ancient ideas, e.g Webisodes Which once linked independent websites and blogs, or website discovery tools such as StumbleUponwhich coincidentally provided recommendations when I clicked “Tumble!” button to discover new locations. It also has elements Blog listswhere website owners can recommend other websites.

To use Wander, simply upload two files to your website: a Index.html The file that points to the Wander console, and Wander.js (a plain JavaScript file) that you use to link to other Wander controllers you recommend. There’s no server-side code or database involved, and the console can even be hosted on GitHub or Codeberg Pages, Pal said.

Once downloaded, you can add a “Wander” link to your website that allows visitors to jump into the discovery experience. (For example, here pal View the Wander console.)

The console has a “Wander” button at the top of the page which you can click to load a random website. You can also click the Controller button to see information about that person’s Wander setup, including a list of other people’s Wander controllers they recommend. Wander calls the recommended controllers “neighbors.”

Some of these Wander controllers are very clever and funny. One guy named Josh has Making a Wander Controller Which recommends all the other sites created by people named Josh. Someone else customized their controller To turn the cursor into a small creature; last It takes you through different pages on Neocitysa web hosting platform focused on reinventing the web, like what Geocities used to do (hence the name). Many others have change the a companytoor a plan From their console to match or give their own location nostalgia He looks.

Pal said it’s easy to customize the console with CSS or JavaScript without changing the original Wander Console. (If you don’t know how, you can probably enlist AI to help you with this part.) That way, when Wander ships a new version, that part of the file can be updated with a simple copy and paste.

Pal submitted the project to Hacker News Community This spring, and I recently shared it on Reddit and elsewhereand received a lot of positive feedback and support. Since those early introductions, Wander has been adopted by More than 60 people Who now use it to recommend over 1,500 websites.

“I don’t think everyone needs to know about the Small Web — some people use the Web as a utility, and I think that’s totally fine for them. But people who are creative, they might want to learn about the Small Web,” Pal explained.

He said that many Internet users seem to miss StumbleUpon and think of it with a sense of nostalgia. “It’s the element of surprise, you never know what you’re going to find when you click the button,” he added.