What should I add to my '90s website?

So I’m currently toying around with NeoCities, and decided to trial it by building your classic mid '90s Geocities/Tripod/Angelfire pastiche website.

Some of the most important elements are already in place.

Tile background? Large font? Heading in bright pink with a shadow? Unusual colour choices? Random cat gifs? Under construction gif? Check! Check! Check!

In the true spirit of the '90s DIY web, some more pages (including the links page) are coming soon.

(I’m thinking of adding a page dedicated to either Britney or a nu-metal band.)

You can see the page so far here: https://that90ssite.neocities.org/

There are a few things that I want to add to make it complete, and I’m looking for suggestions.

The first, is to embed a midi file that plays automatically. Any suggestions on the best way of doing this?

Second, it’s just not going to be complete without a guestbook.

Third, any webring suggestions?

Fourth, what’s the best way of adding a java chat room in 2024?

Finally, anything else that really needs to be a part of a great '90s website?

UPDATE: Thanks for all the feedback! I’ve added more annoying GIFs, a guestbook, a links page, and a cyber cat hangout.

UPDATE 2: And added even more gifs, an amazing Amiga demo, and a ton of links.

@asklemmy #tech #webdev #neocities #technology

  • Turun@feddit.de
    13·
    7 months ago

    It’s readable on mobile. You need to unfix that immediately. The font must not appear bigger than 5px. Responsive layout is forbidden.

    • CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org
      4·
      7 months ago

      Also, no popups. That’s both retro and not retro enough. (Or were those introduced for the first round in the early 2000’s? I don’t know, I’m too young)

  • Simon@lemmy.dbzer0.com
    11·
    7 months ago

    Sorry but were you alive in the 90s? That tile background is way too big. Take it down to 128 x 128 anything bigger than that takes too long on my 56k. Also I don’t see one frame or table border.

    • Blackmist@feddit.ukEnglish
      1·
      7 months ago

      frame

      Man, how did I forget those abominations?

      Saved so much time and bandwidth reloading several kilobytes of headers and menus.

  • Furbag@lemmy.world
    11·
    7 months ago

    Guestbook, hit counter, a midi file playing in the background, and a dead hyperlink to another page of the same website.

    Edit: omg I can’t believe I forgot about marquees. Do that too.

  • dan@upvote.au
    10·
    7 months ago

    For the authentic experience, you need two versions of the site: An Internet Explorer version, and a Netscape version. The two browsers didn’t support the same features back then, so a lot of sites would have two different versions.

    Also run it on your own server and limit the transfer speed (can set a rate limit in the Nginx config) so it loads slowly :D

    • elvith@feddit.de
      2·
      7 months ago

      Remember that JS file that rendered a text besides your mouse pointer and when you moved your mouse, the text would follow it letter by letter?

  • Go-On-A-Steam-Train@lemmy.ml
    9·
    7 months ago

    Signed the guestbook :)

    I think it could do with a very literal under construction image, with some sort of machinery- every website seemed under construction at the time!

    Something like this?!

  • IrregularActivity@lemmy.worldEnglish
    8·
    7 months ago

    Remove adaptive formatting, fixed width everything. Why should you care about my browser and screen size? That was part of why the pages looked more clunky in later years: the increase in screen resolution were not taken into account, so that pages sat tinily in the top left of the screen. Generally, lack of useful formatting was widespread. Just writing the text into naked HTML, having a few links (in default blue/purple) and you’re good to go. I’m not sure if bullet points were even used.

    Once you add some content, put it into a default HTML table without added styling. I don’t even know if browsers still display these shitty gray bars, but you saw them everywhere.

    And if you want to look professional, of course use frames! Preferably with fixed sites, too much text in them and scrollbars everywhere…

    :funnytagthatonlytranslatedtoanemojionaspecificbulletinboard:

  • InputZero@lemmy.ml
    8·
    7 months ago

    Your text is too readable, I think it needs to be aliased a lot more. It also wasn’t uncommon to see a black box around text. Your text looks good on the background, it shouldn’t. There should be something between the text and background.