PART OF THE INTERNET, OR CONNECTING TO THE INTERNET?
       
       2025-08-05
       
       Some time in the last 25 years, ISPs stopped saying they made you "part of"
       the Internet, just that they'd help you "connect to" the Internet.
       Most people don't need a static IP, sure. But when ISPs stopped offering FTP
       and WWW hosting as a standard feature (shit though it often was), they became
       part of the tragic process by which the Internet became centralised, and
       commoditised, and corporate, and just generally watered-down.
       The amount of effort to "put something online" didn't increase by a lot, but
       it increased by enough that millions probably missed-out on the opportunity to
       create their first homepage.