It's not obscure, but, for me, Wikipedia is the ultimate example of the old internet that still persists today.
Free to use, no account required, ad free, non-corporate, multilingual, heavily biased toward text, simple and utilitarian design. Hyperlinks concatenate relevant pieces of information, which serve as the means to navigate the site. The code is very simple (seriously, view the page source of a wikipiedia article). It's based on the human desire to learn and share knowledge with others, and has remained resilient to corruption by commercial interests that pervert that desire for monetary gain. It's a beautiful thing.
Really awesome old school sites. Crazy gifs, web rings, etc.
Kernel.org, home of the Linux kernel, hasn't changed much.
Kernel.org today:
Kernel.org in 1998:
https://web.archive.org/web/19980130085039/https://kernel.org/
https://www.spacejam.com/1996/jam.html
I’m pretty sure spacejam.com showed that page up until the sequel supplanted it.
Not a website, but since you mention BBSes...one thing that would look pretty familiar to a 1990s Internet user would be most of the text-based MUDs, the ancestor of MMORPGs, that are around.
The MUD Connector is still around, and still has a list of active MUDs.
While I suspect that most dedicated MUDders use dedicated clients, the base protocol is still normally telnet, and you can use a plain old telnet client to play...a protocol that predates Internet Protocol itself.
Florida’s unemployment website
And pretty much the rest of the FSF and GNU websites.
If you want one that isn't actually from that time, just feels like it, I'd say https://tildes.net/
Your way back search engine https://wiby.me It even comes a surprise me button
How is it that 2 days after this posted no one has said “Craigslist.”
wow nobody mentioned https://www.lingscars.com/
Not the original, but...
gradients, animated GIFs, "best browsed on", and a frame once you click enter. Only thing it's missing is an index page.
I get most of the stills for my Star Trek memes from trekcore.com which has a pretty old-web feel to it.
They are trying to be 90s, but I love it. I thought they had a site counter at some point, but maybe I am misremembering and it was just the guest book.
https://search.marginalia.nu/ is a search engine for non-commercial content and is pretty great regarding the old-school factor :-)
Extremely useful website for collectors of dead media formats (LD, D-VHS, HD-DVD, CED, VHD, etc.) Still has an old style interface with priority given to function and utility over styling. Also has a storefront where you can buy and sell discs.
My healthcare services websites. Their website and mobile app require separate logins. The website logs in then redirects to a completely different website.
They have a tax-free “store” that feels like a completely different website.
Everything is laid out using what seems like the idea of middle management and not modern design philosophy.
I'm on a couple forum sites still (both phpbb I think). I still read fark.com but rarely if ever comment anymore.
4-ch.net (not to be confused with 4chan) is a 90s BBS that is still online and occasionally active. It's neat to see posts from the 90s still on the front page.
telnet bbs.lunduke.comhttps://celeryman.alexmeub.com/
(Not really mobile friendly, which holds true to the old school Internet)
Some examples that I remember are:
- The Berkshire Hathaway's website (https://berkshirehathaway.com/)
- The UNIX website (https://unix.org/version4/)
- Xorg Project website (https://www.x.org/wiki/)
- Marginalia Web Search (https://search.marginalia.nu/)
- W3C (World Wide Web Consortium) pages containing Standards (e.g.: https://www.w3.org/TR/controller-document/)
- Pd (Puredata) Project Website (https://puredata.info/)
most private trackers
No JavaScript sites on onionland
https://everything2.com/node/e2node/An Introduction to Everything2 - massively interlinked information site
https://www.dieselsweeties.com/ - robots and people comic
https://realultimatepower.net/ - ninjas
Sites that have old forums. There aren't many anymore, but ones I've seen that have been very helpful of late include car sites, a timeshare forum, and the Fantasy Grounds forum (my virtual tabletop of choice).
I'm sure there are others out there, but it's definitely more rare than it used to be. Is Something Awful still around?
jwz.org/blog, for obvious reasons.
https://www.vernoncoleman.com/
Feels very home made.
https://bobistheoilguy.com/ and the oil forums.
It's pretty niche, but https://alternativess.com (sport archery retailer)
Hubski
people often say they can find this kind of thing via my employer, Mojeek: https://www.mojeek.com/
textfiles.com still looks like the 90s. It has stories, jokes, essays, and generally interesting stuff.
Lookup brutalist websites or the gemini protocol.
