Before the internet learned to recommend everything, people recommended one another. Perhaps that simple idea deserves another chance.

Somewhere on the internet, there is a website you would absolutely love.

It might belong to a photographer documenting forgotten places. A programmer building unusual tools. A historian investigating an obscure subject. Or someone who writes beautifully about everyday life without ever trying to become famous.

You don't know the website exists.

Its creator doesn't know you exist.

And despite all the technology connecting the world, the two of you might never find each other.

Unless someone shares a link.

That simple act was once one of the defining traditions of personal blogging. People created small collections of websites they enjoyed reading and placed them on their homepages for visitors to discover.

They called them blogrolls.

The idea was wonderfully uncomplicated. If you liked someone's writing, you helped other people find it.

Now, as more readers become interested in independent publishing and alternatives to algorithmic feeds, the blogroll is attracting renewed attention.

And there's something surprisingly modern about this old-fashioned habit.

A Small List That Made the Internet Feel Connected

Imagine visiting a personal blog in the early days of the web.

You might find a simple layout, a handful of articles, an About page and, somewhere along the side, a collection of links labelled "Blogs I Read", "Friends" or simply "Blogroll".

There might be ten links. Perhaps fifty.

Some would lead to people with similar interests. Others might take you in completely unexpected directions.

A technology blogger might recommend a photographer. A writer might link to a political commentator, a musician or an amateur astronomer.

The connections weren't necessarily logical from the perspective of a search engine.

They were personal.

You were looking at a small map of someone's interests, built from the websites they had encountered and considered worth remembering.

That made blogrolls more than navigation tools.

They were expressions of identity.

The IndieWeb community's explanation of blogrolls describes the idea broadly: a collection of websites someone reads, follows or recommends.

The remarkable thing is how little technology the concept requires.

No recommendation engine. No enormous database. No complicated ranking system.

Just people, websites and links.

And sometimes that's enough.

How We Stopped Following Links and Started Following Feeds

The internet didn't abandon human recommendations overnight.

Our habits gradually changed as social media platforms, search engines and recommendation systems became more central to how we discovered information.

Instead of moving from one personal website to another, we increasingly encountered content inside feeds designed to gather enormous amounts of material in one place.

This brought undeniable advantages.

Finding information became faster. Following favourite creators became easier. Discovering people beyond our immediate circles became possible on a scale that earlier web users could scarcely imagine.

But something changed along the way.

On a personal website, the creator chooses which links to share.

On an algorithmically ranked feed, the platform largely determines which material receives attention.

Those two approaches aren't inherently enemies. Algorithms can introduce us to excellent independent writers, and human recommendations can be biased, repetitive or unreliable.

Yet they offer fundamentally different experiences.

A feed asks: What might keep you interested right now?

A thoughtful blogroll asks: What do I believe is worth your time?

The distinction is subtle, but meaningful.

One is built around prediction. The other around personal judgement.

We needn't reject modern technology to appreciate the value of both.

The Blogroll Never Completely Disappeared

It's tempting to describe the return of blogrolls as a dramatic revival of something long forgotten.

The reality is more interesting.

Blogrolls never entirely vanished.

Independent bloggers continued maintaining them. Some used traditional lists of links. Others created dedicated recommendation pages, reading collections or directories of favourite writers.

What we're seeing is not simply a forgotten idea being rediscovered, but a longstanding practice finding new relevance.

Several active projects show what that looks like.

Ye Olde Blogroll: A Human-Curated Map

Ye Olde Blogroll is one of the clearest examples of the concept in action.

Rather than functioning as a search engine, it offers a large collection of independent blogs and personal websites selected by human curators.

Visitors can explore topics such as art, photography, technology, personal writing, digital gardens, science and daily life.

What makes the project appealing is its emphasis on selection rather than automated popularity.

You aren't simply looking at whatever happens to be trending.

You're exploring websites that someone has deliberately chosen to include.

The collection also demonstrates an important principle: a blogroll doesn't need to be limited to a tiny sidebar.

It can grow into a substantial, browsable guide to independent publishing while keeping human judgement at its centre.

Blogroll Club: Discovery Through Shared Interests

Blogroll Club takes a similar interest in connecting readers with independent bloggers.

Its directory organises blogs into subjects including art, gaming, history, music, photography, science, technology, travel and personal writing.

It also provides an RSS feed for updates.

The appeal is straightforward.

If you're interested in a subject, you can browse people writing about it without beginning with a conventional search query.

You might encounter a writer who publishes occasionally, maintains a simple website and has little interest in social media promotion.

That doesn't guarantee the content will be wonderful.

But it gives you another way to discover it.

Molly White's Blogroll: Personal Taste as a Guide

Writer and researcher Molly White maintains a public blogroll featuring blogs, newsletters and news sources she enjoys reading.

The page provides direct links, RSS subscriptions and downloadable OPML files that readers can import into compatible feed readers.

It's a particularly useful example because it demonstrates how a blogroll can be both personal and practical.

A visitor can browse individual recommendations or take advantage of the subscription tools.

The list also has an important quality that algorithmic recommendations sometimes lack: you understand whose preferences are shaping what you're seeing.

The recommendations belong to a person with recognisable interests and perspectives.

You can agree with those choices, disagree with them or simply explore them.

A Modern Personal Blogroll

Another interesting example is David Daniels' blogroll.

It includes concise descriptions of the people and websites he reads, alongside RSS links and an OPML download.

Instead of presenting an anonymous collection of domains, it explains why each destination might be interesting.

That small addition makes a difference.

A bare link tells you where to go.

A sentence explaining what someone writes about gives you a reason to visit.

Perhaps that's the key to making blogrolls especially useful today: they should offer context, not merely accumulate URLs.

Why a Recommendation From a Person Feels Different

Think about the last time a friend recommended a book.

You might not have recognised the title or author. Perhaps it wasn't especially popular.

But the recommendation carried meaning because you understood something about the person making it.

You knew their tastes, interests or judgement.

A blogroll can create a similar experience online.

If you regularly read a writer who publishes thoughtful essays about technology, you're likely to be curious about the websites they consider worth following.

Their recommendations offer another perspective on the web.

This doesn't mean every link deserves your trust.

Personal recommendations can reflect narrow social circles. Friends sometimes recommend friends. Communities can become repetitive, with the same familiar names appearing everywhere.

Human curation is not automatically impartial or superior.

But it provides something distinctive: a visible chain of recommendation.

Instead of asking only why an algorithm displayed a particular article, you can ask why a particular person chose to share it.

And that question can lead to an interesting conversation.

The Quiet Value of Sending Readers Elsewhere

There's another reason blogrolls matter.

They challenge the assumption that every website must keep visitors on its own pages for as long as possible.

Many online businesses measure success through engagement, retention and conversions.

Those measurements can be useful, particularly for businesses that depend on online revenue.

But personal publishing can operate according to different priorities.

If your aim is to share ideas, helping a reader find another excellent website isn't necessarily a failure.

It may be one of the most valuable things you can do.

A blogger who recommends someone else's writing is effectively saying:

You've spent some time here. Now here's something else I think you'll enjoy.

That generosity helps the independent web feel less like a collection of isolated pages.

It makes it feel like a community.

And for smaller creators, a thoughtful recommendation from another website may introduce their work to readers who would otherwise never encounter it.

That doesn't guarantee substantial traffic or improved search rankings.

Its value lies first in helping interested people make meaningful discoveries.

Blogrolls and the Joy of Internet Serendipity

One of the strange consequences of modern digital convenience is that we often know exactly what we're about to consume.

A search query expresses a goal. A subscription follows an established interest. A personalised recommendation reflects previous behaviour.

These experiences are useful.

But they can also make online exploration feel predictable.

Blogrolls introduce a different kind of discovery.

You begin with one website you enjoy.

You follow a recommendation to another.

That second website introduces you to a third.

Before long, you've travelled through several different subjects, personalities and creative worlds.

The journey is shaped by relationships between websites rather than a single central feed.

Projects such as indieblog.page offer another version of that experience.

Its random discovery feature takes visitors to posts from independent blogs, allowing them to encounter writing without first selecting a topic or author.

It isn't a traditional blogroll, but it shares the same spirit: helping readers reach websites they didn't already know they wanted to visit.

Sometimes the most memorable discoveries happen when we stop trying to optimise the journey.

How to Create a Blogroll People Actually Want to Explore

The good news is that building a blogroll is remarkably simple.

You don't need to run a publishing platform, develop software or establish an enormous directory.

You only need a collection of websites you genuinely believe deserve attention.

Here are five principles worth following.

1. Recommend websites you actually enjoy.

Avoid building a list simply because certain websites are famous or popular.

Choose the writers, creators and projects whose work interests you.

Your selections should say something about your curiosity.

2. Give each recommendation some context.

Don't just publish a domain name.

Write a short description explaining what the website offers and why you find it interesting.

A useful recommendation might say:

A personal blog exploring the history of forgotten technology, with fascinating photographs and hands-on restoration projects.

That tells readers much more than a bare URL.

3. Mix familiar subjects with unexpected discoveries.

If you mainly write about technology, consider including an excellent history blog or independent art project.

A little variety can make the collection more interesting.

4. Review the links occasionally.

Websites move, change ownership, stop publishing or disappear.

Checking links periodically helps maintain the usefulness of your recommendations.

It's also an opportunity to discover what your favourite writers are doing now.

5. Make it easy to follow the writers you recommend.

Where available, include links to RSS feeds.

RSS allows people to receive updates from multiple websites in a reader of their choice, without needing to rely entirely on social media feeds.

For larger collections, you can also offer an OPML file so readers can import groups of feed subscriptions.

These features are optional.

A simple page of thoughtful links is still a perfectly good beginning.

Should Every Website Have a Blogroll?

Probably not.

A business website offering a specific service may have little reason to create a personal reading list. A portfolio might be better served by highlighting collaborators or inspirations.

And a blogroll created solely to exchange backlinks is unlikely to offer much value to visitors.

There's an important difference between recommending a website because it deserves attention and linking to it purely in the hope of receiving something in return.

The first can enrich the web.

The second risks turning a human recommendation into another marketing transaction.

The strongest blogrolls feel natural because they reflect genuine interests.

They aren't maintained to satisfy a search engine.

They're maintained because the creator believes certain websites are worth sharing.

Perhaps the Future of the Web Needs More Small Gestures

Discussions about the future of the internet often focus on enormous questions.

Artificial intelligence. Platform power. Search engines. Digital privacy. The economics of online publishing.

These subjects matter, and their influence on the web is undeniable.

But the future of online culture is also shaped by smaller decisions.

Someone chooses to publish on an independent website.

Someone decides to share a useful resource.

Someone maintains an RSS feed, preserves an archive or recommends a little-known writer.

And someone adds a link to their blogroll.

Individually, these actions can seem almost insignificant.

Together, they help preserve the connections that make the internet more than a collection of isolated destinations.

The blogroll won't replace search engines.

It won't make algorithms disappear or solve every problem facing independent creators.

It doesn't need to.

Its appeal is simpler than that.

It reminds us that the web was built to connect information, ideas and people through links.

And those connections don't always need to be selected by machines.

Sometimes, a recommendation from one curious person to another is all it takes.

Maybe the most meaningful way to make the internet more interesting isn't to build another algorithm.

Maybe it's to share a link worth following.

Websites Worth Exploring

The Open Web Journal is an independent publication exploring online creativity, digital culture and the people making the internet worth discovering.