We all know how awful most modern websites are in terms of bloat, javascript and tracking. Not only that, but designing and maintaining web-browsers has become such a gigantic undertaking (almost the size of an operating system), that only a few companies have the resources to do it (google and mozilla, and mozilla might not hold on for much longer).

These alternative protocols offer a minimal set of features, and are trying to get back to what the web should’ve been: static content with images, text, and links, with local applications filling the void for anything more complicated than that.

Lets say I wanted a privacy-friendly way to view a page on a news site. I could:

  • Copy the URL of the page
  • Open some tool, (or website, anything), paste that url.
  • It converts the content in the url to the necessary privacy-friendly alternative format, and I can view it with my gopher/gemini browser (or even maybe a markdown viewer).

I know there are a few html -> markdown converters that can do the last step.

Does anyone know if this would work?

  • Steve@communick.news
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    3 months ago

    You’re basically describing the “Reader View” that most browsers have already. Then trying to force it through a more limited standard.

    There are some current attempts a making new browser engines. Servo and Ladybird are two I know of.