I can't remember the last time I actually browsed the Web. You know, just sort of aimlessly following links in the hopes of encountering something unique or interesting. (I'm also glad that idea of calling it "surfing" seems to have become less popular.)
Between the few sites I visit daily to get things done, links that come in via e-mail, and the various weblogs and news feeds I guess I'm spending enough time in my browser already.
It's a far cry from 1998. Or even 2001.
Posted by jzawodn at July 09, 2004 02:37 PM
Oddly, I do more browsing now, but it's usually more directed. I'll go to sites like Linkdump, catch.com, or filepile which tend more for the odd and strange than the actually useful.
But then, with 50 trillion channels, there's always something on.
After I started organizing all my feeds with Bloglines, I used to think the same way, but lately, it's occurred to me that I may be missing on cool new stuff out there, simply because the spectrum of bloggers I subscribe to has missed out on it too.
Am I closing myself off too much?
Granted, I don't know if I had the time to immerse myself into another site/community/niche, but at least I could make a judgment call about what to drop if I found something new, cool and shiny.
"I can't remember the last time I actually browsed the Web. You know, just sort of aimlessly following links in the hopes of encountering something unique or interesting."
Geez man, you just described my work day :) Between that and aimlessly surfing of blogs and the various forums I hardly have time to work! Well, ok, maybe not that bad...
I often leave a browser window pointing at http://del.icio.us over lunch, something interesting normally scrolls past.
It's more like now instead of having to click links to find out what's on the web I've gotten to where I have a huge collection of sites in my head and they drive where I go instead of the suggestions offered by any given site. Somehow I feel like I'm not wasting time if I'm the one deciding on the next URL to visit.
Every now and then I stumble into something and think "man, I should get out more often."
If you want random in controlled doses, you might try setting your browser start page to Wikipedia's random page. I'm biased - I'm one of the admins there.
Yeah, I don't aimlessly surf the Web much anymore--there, "surf," I said it--but I do aimlessly surf Wikipedia. Wikipedia is the new Web!
I still surf sort of aimlessly. I start with a known site and click on something interesting, go back, click on something else. Pure curiosity.
I agree that this rarely goes several levels deep from the the site I started.
i tend to agree with jeremy - years ago i used to browse aimlessly - but now i have a core of sites i repeatedly visit every day - the register, slashdot, Jeremy's blog, kde-look, kde-apps, osnews.com, newsforge and freshmeat.
Yeah, thanks to the magic of RSS readers and blog communities... I can surf like a ninja.
