Remembering The Internet of 2005 in 2025
Hello, my name is Dan Lerch and in 2025 I'm choosing to maintain an independent blog. There are two reasons I'm doing this:
- To escape the limitations of algorithmic and character restricted social media. It's my independently created blog, I own it, and I make the rules.
- To bask in a little internet nostalgia, remembering a time where most aspects of the web weren't entirely polluted by big tech oligarchs.
Personal Reflections of Internet 2005
2005 was an amazing year for the internet. YouTube had just been founded, Web 2.0 was in the works, and podcasts were just starting to hit their stride. Having just moved to Chicago my new roommate had a desktop PC she graciously let me use whenever I needed it. Her only rule was that I use this obscure browser called Firefox instead of Microsoft's Internet Explorer. Whatever misgivings I may have had quickly gave way to my love for its speed and innovative user design. Only later did I learn about the open source philosophy of founding company Mozilla. A few years later the open source ecosystem would help shape the trajectory of my career.
Shortly after discovering Firefox I received an invite to Google's new email platform - something called Gmail? YES - You needed an invite, you couldn't just sign up! It had a full 1 GB of storage and sported a super slick, minimalist design that felt years ahead of its competitors.
Social Media
With the exception of email, expressing yourself on the Internet wasn't entirely straightforward. Some of us "cool kids" had just left Friendster for MySpace (remember Tom?), but social media hadn't reached critical mass yet, unless you were a millennial listening to emo. Having your own website was probably considered the most professional way to present your digital self.
2005-ish Website Builder Toil and Reward
Being young and living in a big city often meant finding work wherever you could. Staffing agencies were often your best way to get your foot in the door. I had this idea that if my resume included a home-made professional website, that when I emailed my resume to jane@staffteamsolutions.com, shortly thereafter I'd practically feel the distant keystrokes as she gleefully wrote back to offer me a temporary, part-time Administration Assistant position at Dodco Insurance (one of Staff Team Solutions premier clients!). Not a bad feeling for an under-employed Bachelor of Arts in Communications graduate who'd been sulking in the consequences of poor educational life choices. The catch, making a website was often a nightmare.
If you were a mere mortal and couldn't afford to pay someone to make a website for you, you'd be left either coding a site in HTML or using Macromedia's Dream Weaver, using the 'Design View' features. The user would then struggle to float various content to the left or right of the page. After chomping at the bit and making yourself crazy with such ditties as:
- <div style="float: right;">
- <tr> <td colspan="2">Hobbies</td><td colspan="2">Experience</td></tr>
After the masterpiece was created, you'd upload the files via FTP and hope that the slop on the server looked like the slop on your computer. Sometimes a simple edit would go horribly wrong and you'd find the grid you spent hours trying to get right looked more like spaghetti thrown at the wall than a solid HTML foundation. It was awful - enough to even wish GeoCities would return. It was also simultaneously beautiful.
Whichever way you chose to get your work done, the sense of accomplishment you received by posting static text to the web was electric. If there’s anything lost from the spirit of the internet in 2005, it’s the DIY ethos—the idea that with just a few lines of code, you could create something truly cool and authentic to yourself. Not unlike a punk band creating a killer song with just a few chords. Ever an optimist, I still believe a young kid in their bedroom can find a way to profoundly change the culture of the internet, but in 2025 all the incentives seem to be directed towards fraternity bros hocking AI.
(* a friend of mine just reminded me Live Journal was a thing, and technically still is)
2005, Experiencing The Digital Divide
2005 was the year the Chicago White Sox baseball team won the world series for the first time in 88 years. I've been a baseball fan ever since, and its left an indelible mark on me. This was also the year my Apple G3 ibook gave up the ghost. It had all my pirated music software like Peak Audio and Native Instrument's Logic Audio. With a salary of $7.00 an hour not only was I without a laptop, but also a key creative outlet. When I moved out of the aforementioned apartment with the communal computer, I also lost my last link to the internet. I had to use the public library to email with friends and apply for jobs. I also started borrowing DVDs and other materials as I couldn't afford to purchase media. This experience helped shape my worldview, and is a key reason I became a librarian. While completing my Master's degree in Library Science I learned this phenomenon I was experiencing is called the digital divide, and remains a key reason why I believe libraries are so important.
So What's This Blog Gonna Be About?
On this blog I intend to write about technology, especially especially sharing some of the nerdy things I learn during extensive meditation (ADHD hyper focus) sessions. I have a lot of fun messing around with python, JavaScript, and Linux. I also intend to write about project management, because the truth is technology doesn't usually solve problems, great teams do. Scattered here and there I will post about my various hobbies including cooking, bread making, cycling, video games, music, urban planning, language, vacation and of course ... many pictures of my cats! While I don't promise much, I'll always make this site ad free, with perhaps a Patreon account.
About Me
I grew up in Bayport, New York, a small, mostly flat suburban town sandwiched in between many other small suburban towns for miles in every direction (also known as Long Island). Every important skill, coping mechanism, and deleterious mistake I've made can be traced back to my mostly banal, but sometimes traumatic existence. Despite completing multiple degrees, living in many cities across the US, Canada, and Europe - and having a very rewarding career in IT and libraries, part of me still feels like that lost teenager who learned every Nirvana song on guitar while simultaneously flunking math. I currently work for a public library in the interior of British Columbia and live with my partner Alice. We have three lovely cats, Serge, Maisah, and Nala.
Coda
If you've stumbled onto this site, I'd like to welcome you! I'm not sure how you got here without the magic of Google SEO, but I'm glad you did. Happy New Year!