An Internet of Zines

Chris has a lot of exciting stuff to say about Arc here and why he hasn’t been interested in other browsers until now:

I’ve developed some doubts about how much value a skin over an existing browser engine can actually bring. Like, don’t build me a browser with a built-in crypto wallet or whatever. Don’t want it, don’t need it. I’d rather have the lightest-weight browser I can get and let me change things with proper Web Extensions, or so I thought.

My mind has changed.

Sounds like Arc is catching on! Chris then digs into all the tiny details about what makes Arc so great and amongst my favorites is not even a feature at all: each week they consistently blog about their updates and I am genuinely excited about them. I often drop whatever I’m doing to read them and see what weird experiments they’re up to. How many apps can you say that about?

Arc has been my main browser for a couple of months and I’ve been trying to experiment with as many of the weird features as I can. Take easels, for example. It’s a tool within the Arc browser that lets you write and draw within it and then share it to the rest of the web. Here’s an example of an easel—click that link and think about what this kind of thing opens up! Collaborative browser tools!

Robin also wrote about this exciting time we’re in right now—new browsers and website powers and social media titans falling by the wayside. I think he captures the excitement of this moment well:

Spend some time with Arc, the new browser from The Browser Company of New York. It’s an opinionated application that’s currently flexing and morphing as the team embroiders in fresh ideas. Using the app at this stage in its development feels almost like following the new season of a TV show.

I couldn’t agree more — it’s exciting to rethink what a browser ought to be. But this reminds me: the other day someone said “an internet of zines” at me and I haven’t been able to think about anything else since. I think that’s what’s so exciting about Arc—it feels like a thing that could become a printing press for zines.

So Arc is already real nice but it’s easy to see the future, the raw potential for a browser that doesn’t just plug your whole life into a search engine, but one instead that’s made from the ground up to help us build a better web.