Discovering the Indieweb with Calm Tech

Summary

Blog HomeWhen social media first entered my life, it came with a promise of connection. Facebook connected college-aged adults in a way that was previously impossible, helping to shape our digital generation. Social media was our super-power and we wielded it to great effect.Yet social media today is a noisy, needy, mental health hazard. They push distracting notifications, constantly begging us to “like and subscribe”, and trying to trap us in endless scrolling. They have become sirens that lure us into their ad-infested shores with their saccharine promise of dopamine.Beware the siren's callHow can we defeat these monsters that have invaded deep into our world, while still staying connected?StreetPass for MastodonA couple weeks ago I stumbled into a great browser extension, StreetPass for Mastodon. The creator, tvler, built it to help people find each other on Mastodon. StreetPass autodiscovers Mastodon verification links as you browse the web, building a collection of Mastodon accounts from the blogs and personal websites you’ve encountered.StreetPass is a beautiful example of calm technology . When StreetPass finds Mastodon profiles it doesn’t draw your attention with a notification, it quietly adds the profile to a list, knowing you’ll check in when you’re ready.StreetPass recognizes that there’s no need for an immediate call to action. Instead it allows the user to focus on their browsing, enriching their experience in the background. The user engages with StreetPass when they are ready, and on their own terms.StreetPass is open source and available for Firefox, Chrome, and Safari.Inspired by StreetPass, I applied this technique to RSS feed discovery.Blog QuestBlog Quest is a web browser extension that helps you discover and subscribe to blogs. Blog Quest checks each page for auto-discoverable RSS and Atom feeds (using rel="alternate" links) and quietly collects them in the background. When you’re ready to explore the collected feeds, open the extension’s drop...