Just Setting Up My Twtxt

2022-06-20

There’s often talk that the Web is dead. That major corporations and services have broken the Web up into content silos and proprietary platforms. I myself have participated in that discussion several times now. It was a few days ago however when I stumbled upon twtxt that for just a moment made me smile and reminded me why the Web is fun.

Twtxt is a “decentralised, minimalist micro blogging service.” While that may sound like every other fledgling social network out there, what caught my eye with twtxt is that it operates entirely over plain text. Yes, plain text, not HTML.

Twtxt effectively works by specifying a text file on your website as your feed (think RSS). This feed can then be populated with statuses via the twtxt command (available via Pip). You don’t have to login to an account or install an app, you just type twtxt tweet followed by your status. You can even follow other users by simply copying their feed URL (think RSS) and seeing their latest posts with twtxt timeline.

My point with mentioning RSS is that, as I’ve said before, I feel the Internet really peaked with the service so anything that draws inspiration from there is always good to see.