Why shoutbox?

In ancient times (around 2005), when almost everyone could make their own website, many people did, and most of those websites sucked horribly, we didn’t have really dynamic web like today. No social media worth mentioning, no instant commenting, almost no way for real time communication, and most of all, websites were static. This means that you couldn’t really interact with them, in most cases, aside writing an angry e-mail to the author.

It was also time, when first dynamic components were introduced. You could give your visitors a way to comment on your text, you could let them write something (probably horrible) in a guestbook, and you could add to your page something called shoutbox.

It was a tiny gadget, that allowed your guests to leave short text messages,that showed up instantly to other users, kind of a proto-chat if you wish.Naturally, it became sort of a hydepark, where people felt safe to post their opinions, hot takes, and other things they deemed worthy. It was a beginning of communities focused around the website itself, not IRC channel or mailing list, available instantly to every visitor.

When I decided to create this place, I knew I wanted something similar. A place, platform, maybe in time a community, where I can post my various hot takes, reviews, gossip and news about one of my favourite things – audio fiction.