In 1991, a coffee maker at the Univerity of Cambridge went online. The Trojan Room Coffee Pot cam was the very first webcam.
To save people working in the building the disappointment of finding the coffee machine empty after making the trip to the room, a camera was set up providing a live picture of the coffee pot to all desktop computers on the office network. After the camera was connected to the Internet a few years later, the coffee pot gained international renown as a feature of the fledgling World Wide Web, until being retired in 2001.
People put their hobbies online - building elaborate homemade tributes to their Beanie Babies, Star Trek collection, and their Pogs. Local stores started making outlandish websites, often with tons of photos but to actually buy something you still had to call the store. Others started to experiment with what a website could be: a place for experimentation, sharing, jokes, games.
You can find a variety of older as well as more recent sites handbuilt around people’s interest through the Wiby web search, particularly through its Surprise Me feature (caution: this is open to the wider web!).
Taking inspiration from these handmade sites, we are building a web zine today dedicated to items found in the Natural Sciences Building. In a small team of 2 - 4 people choose an item or area of the building of interest to you. Consider the science display cases in front, a hidden seating area, a funny poster on a wall, or the vending machines - these are just a few examples, but what are you drawn to?
Take a photo or several photos documenting your item/area.
Create a single page website that puts your item/area/feature on the Internet. The site does not need to be responsive. Consider color, font, add text - at least a title and some description. But it should also have at least one meaningful interaction where a click, rollover, or other event triggers a maningful change. Perhaps explanatory text is added when you roll over the item. Maybe a halo and glowing aura effect gets added.
Upload your site via FTP to the Purchase web server.
We will link to your sites from a central zine landing page.