Welcome to Vermin of the Internet
Thirty years ago, I got online for the first time.
A researcher friend created an account for me at the local university. In those days, only universities were connected. I logged on through a screeching 2400 baud modem, a sound that meant the world was about to get bigger.
I was awestruck.
One of the first sites I visited had the script of Monty Python's Dead Parrot sketch. The server was in Australia. I was in Italy. A joke about a dead parrot, stored on a computer on the other side of the planet, appearing on my screen. It felt like magic.
The internet has changed a bit since then.
Today, it is a machine for turning attention into money. Every site wants your email, your attention, your behaviour. Pop-ups beg. Newsletters promise secrets. “We value your privacy,” they say, while forty-seven tracking scripts fire in the background.
The whole ecosystem is designed to turn readers into “leads” and curiosity into conversion.
And then there are the grifters.
The snake-oil salesmen of old moved from town to town, one step ahead of the complaints. Today they set up Facebook ads and reach millions before breakfast. When the reports pile up and the brand turns toxic, they change the company name, spin up a new Shopify store, and start again. Same grift. Different logo. Infinite marks.
This is the enshittification of the internet. You’ve felt it. I’ve felt it. We’re all swimming in it.
This site is my small contribution to fighting back.
I do not have a solution. I have a corkboard.
I pin specimens here. The scams. The pseudoscience. The fear merchants. The wellness grifters who sell common sense in a lab coat and call it a protocol.
Not because I think I will stop them.
Because someone should at least point and say:
Look.
Look at this.
This is what we have built.
And maybe, if enough of us start looking, we will build something better.