Low Hardware Requirements of the Small Web

Loading a modern React web app requires downloading a JavaScript bundle, parsing and executing it, rendering a virtual DOM, reconciling it with the real DOM, and repeating on every state change. A modern Chromium browser uses ~2 GB of RAM in normal operation.

A Gemini capsule in Bombadillo requires: a terminal emulator, a network connection, and a TLS library. The entire browser is a few megabytes. This runs on a machine from 2005.

• NASA's Gemini Guidance Computer had 20 KB of memory
• A laptop from 2008 that cannot run Chrome can run Bombadillo
• Six million documents in Gopherspace, thousands of Gemini capsules — accessible on obsolete hardware
• Lower energy to manufacture and run
• Electronic waste: hardware that can't run modern browsers can still participate in the small web

Who gets to participate in an Internet that requires increasingly expensive, frequently-replaced devices? These protocols meet you where you are.

• Clients
• Solarpunk and the Small Web
• Return to protocols