The Ecology of Web Development

It's easy to make the mistake of thinking of your Web site as a single project that stands alone and has value in its own right, much like a biologist might study a single organism. But an ecologist would ask, how does the organism interact with its environment?

Back in the '90s, I was heavily invested in the Free-Net community networking movement, basically trying to create something like Facebook on a local scale, 10 years early. Community networking is now a footnote to history because we fundamentally misunderstood how the ecosystem of the Internet was developing at the time. That fundamental misunderstanding still persists in many if not most sites being developed today, even as we move forward into the semantic Web.

Permaculture is a field of study that aims to apply the lessons of ecology to create sustainable human settlements ("permanent culture"). As a certified permaculture designer, I will walk you through some of the teachings of permaculture that are most relevant to Web design and development, and I will teach you some simple exercises to help you find ways to make your sites more self-sustaining.