Haven Blog

There is a history to the web. When it started, this computer-to-computer network let people share web pages by running a program on their computer (a webserver) and someone else could run a program on their computer (a web browser) to see what the first person shared. If you wanted to publish something on the first generation of the web, you needed the following:

• A computer to run the webserver, connected to the internet
• Knowledge about how to setup the webserver
• Knowledge about how to write a web page and publish it on the webserver

Not very many people published web pages in this first version of the web. It was hard to do, which excluded a lot of people from participating.

Then came “Web 2.0”¹. The big difference between the first generation of the web and Web 2.0 was the ability for anyone with a web browser to post updates to someone else’s webserver. You didn’t need your own webserver or any special technical knowledge anymore: you could visit someone else’s website, and post your thoughts on their site!

This really seemed like a revolution–we were democratizing the web, right?

Web 2.0 was a paradigm shift in more than one way. Publishing on the web became as easy as typing words in a text box–you could go to Facebook or Twitter and post your updates on those platforms. You didn’t need your own webserver and you didn’t need to know how to use a webserver. With so many people publishing on Facebook or Twitter, everyone got in the habit of visiting their social media platform(s) of choice instead of visiting all the diverse websites that made up the first generation of the Web.

But this presented a new problem. By making it so easy to publish, more and more people started publishing; pretty soon these social media platforms were hosting unfathomable volumes of things people published. How could they make sure the right information went to the right people? Or maybe more importantly–why should they make sure the right information went to the right people? There was (and still is) a very important distinction between publishing your own website on your own server and publishing something on Facebook. (I’ll keep referring to Facebook, but the same is true for Instagram, or Twitter, or TikTok, etc). When you publish to Facebook, then Facebook gets to decide what to do with what you published. Facebook gets to decide who sees it.

In 2012², Facebook had a really inspiring way of thinking about this problem:

… massive opportunity lies in figuring out how to deliver this huge amount of new information to the right people in the right ways–giving people things they are interested in, in ways they can understand and consume quickly.

And historically, that’s what friends are for. There’s always been way more information in the world than time to consume it. Human networks evolved naturally as a way to help sort through it. That’s why we are drawn to friends with similar interests. Our friends are our news sources, as well as our filters. They bring us stories that interest us because our interests are similar.

As anyone who frequents Facebook knows, this isn’t what happened.

There is another dimension we haven’t touched on yet–these Web 2.0 platforms’ popularity also grew because they were free for everyone to use. Someone has to pay the bills, and the advertising business model that worked so well for search made its way into Web 2.0.

When you scroll on Facebook, how much of what you see is interesting or valuable to you? The Facebook feed is stuffed with click-bait titles, sponsored updates, and news from more distant connections that just isn’t important to you. Buried among these updates are the things you do care about–the friend’s promotion or the picture of your niece–but you have to scroll through all the cruft to find what you care about.

Why would Facebook do this?

Facebook decides how to use what you published to satisfy Facebook’s goals–not yours. Facebook sells ads to businesses and shows those ads to people scrolling on Facebook. The longer you scroll the more ads it can show you. Even worse than that, Facebook uses all of your messages and posts along with the very personal knowledge of who you follow and which groups you’re a part and everything else you do on Facebook (or any website with a Facebook ‘like’ button) to build a very detailed and very creepy model of who you are and which ads you’ll be more likely to click on. It is an invasion of privacy designed to steal your time and attention for profit.

Web 2.0 made it easy for anyone to publish online, but it did so at the cost of letting corporations control who sees what. All of the corporate incentives are to keep you scrolling for as long as possible–not to give you what you need quickly and let you go on with your day. That is why your feed is filled with cruft.

What can we do about it?

Imagine if you logged into your Facebook feed and it was organized to give you the most important things first: the post a friend of yours shared about their big promotion, and the cute picture of your niece taking her first steps, and the news article your Mom was excited to share about the possibility of auroras tonight. All of these, right at the top of your feed. This is the vision Facebook was talking about in 2012, and it is still an inspiring vision to me today.

We can do this! Imagine a world where you can publish online as easily as on Facebook but you keep control of the things you create. You get to decide who to share it with instead of handing it over to Facebook to decide. And you get to create your own personal feed that focuses on updates from your own friends, family, and public personalities/companies. A feed that doesn’t serve you ads, because you own it.

This is the vision of Haven. Your Haven lives on your own little webserver. Running and managing your own webserver in your house is easier than it has ever been, but it is still harder than it should be. Fortunately there are cloud hosting companies (like PikaPods) that will rent you a little webserver and manage it for you. Now you have full control over your data–but unlike the first generation of the web, publishing updates is still as simple as typing words in a text box. And it is private–you choose who to share with. No company can sell you (or your friends) ads because no company has access to your data! Your Haven even lets you build your own feed where you can follow your friends’ Havens and follow any of the public blogs on the internet. Imagine: a private feed without ads, sponsored updates, or viral clickbait. That’s Haven.

Remember the quote from Facebook in 2012?

Our friends are our news sources, as well as our filters. They bring us stories that interest us because our interests are similar.

Technology has improved. We can use it as a tool to better share and connect with our friends and families, where we get to decide what is important. Let’s change the world!

Special thanks to Tracy Durnell for reviewing an earlier version of this post and offering some input!