Made By Actwu
I have spent many years working in the world of web development and research. I started with web two and I loved it. Web two gave me a strong foundation and taught me discipline. I learned how to build clean and fast websites and how to respect the browser. I enjoyed seeing how people used my sites and how they interacted with them. But I also saw the problems that web two created. Too much centralization. Too much reliance on the cloud. Too many unnecessary layers and abstractions. Still I kept working and I kept learning. I also explored the research side of technology. I built my own Linux based operating systems and my own artificial intelligence stack. I wrote my own protocols and even designed my own devices. I always wanted to understand how systems work at their core. I believe in fixing the foundation instead of adding more and more layers on top. This mindset shaped the way I look at the web today.
Why did I decide to create web four. Because I saw a gap. I saw a need for a better way to build the web. I wanted to give users more control. I wanted to treat the browser as what it really is. A powerful computing node. I wanted to stop pretending that the browser is just a dumb client and the server is the master. I wanted to stop patching problems with more frameworks and more complexity. Instead I wanted to rethink the relationship between the browser and the server. I wanted the browser to take responsibility for its own state and to be part of a true peer to peer mesh. I wanted to bring back simplicity and speed. I wanted to make the web more reliable and more distributed. This is why I started developing web four.
The more I worked with web two the more I saw its weaknesses. Web two brought interactivity and better user experience but it also created dependency on central servers. Every click every save every update had to go back to the data center. And if that center went down the whole site went down. Then web three came. Web three promised decentralization. Web three promised that users would own their data and that the web would not depend on a single server. But when I looked closer I saw that web three was just another layer on top of web two. It added cryptography and openness but it still relied on servers to save progress. You can give people a unique identifier and let others copy it but where do you save the actual progress of the user. Where do you store their state. Most web three apps still fall back to web two patterns when it comes to storage and computation. To me web three felt like fake decentralization. This made me think deeply about what a real solution would look like.
The answer I found is what I call web four. Web four starts by respecting the browser. It lets the browser become the server for itself. When a user needs to save something the browser saves it in its own storage. When a user needs computation the browser does it itself. When a user wants to talk to others the browser joins a peer to peer mesh using web rtc or web sockets. All of this is possible today because browsers are already powerful. But we need to formalize it. This is why I am also writing a user is server protocol. This protocol defines how the browser exposes its state and how other browsers can talk to it. This creates a real distributed system where users are not just clients but also servers. This is not about adding more layers. This is about fixing the foundation and keeping it simple and fast. This is what web four is all about.
Who is web four for. Web four is for developers who care about simplicity and performance. It is for researchers who want to build better systems. It is for users who want more control over their own data. It is for anyone who is tired of bloated frameworks and fake decentralization. It is for anyone who believes the web can be better than it is today. It is for the future of the web.
When should we start thinking about web four. The answer is now. The longer we wait the more we build on broken foundations. The more we depend on cloud layers that can fail. The more we lose the original promise of the web. We already have the technology we need in browsers today. We already know how to use web rtc web sockets and indexed db. What is missing is the mindset and the standard. This is why we need to start now. Not tomorrow not next year. Now.
Why is web four important. Because the web matters. The web connects people and ideas. The web is how we build and share knowledge. If we let it become bloated fragile and centralized we lose its potential. Web four gives the web a chance to become distributed resilient and fast again. Web four gives users power over their own data and experience. Web four respects the browser and builds on its strengths. Web four is not just another layer. Web four is a fix to the foundation. This is why I believe in web four.
Why Web4Now. Because the web cannot wait. Because the problems are already here. Because every day we build more apps that depend on clouds and data centers that can fail. Because every day we teach new developers to rely on bloated frameworks and meaningless abstractions. Because every day we lie to ourselves that the web is decentralized when it is not. Because every day we add more layers on top of foundations that are weak. Because every day we make it harder for users to control their own data and experience.
Web4Now is not just an idea for tomorrow. It is a practice for today. The browser already has the power to store data and compute state and connect peer to peer. The browser is already capable of becoming a server for itself. The only thing missing is the mindset and the discipline to build that way.
Web4Now means stop waiting. Stop pretending someone else will fix it. Stop writing more wrappers and patches on top of web two and web three mistakes. Start building clean and distributed apps now. Start writing meaningful and semantic markup now. Start respecting the browser now. Start treating the user as the owner of their own state now.
Web4Now means users do not have to depend on a server somewhere else to save their progress. They can save it in their browser now. They do not have to wait for some blockchain transaction to confirm. They can store and share their state now. They do not have to trust a cloud provider to keep their data safe. They can own it now.
Web4Now is a statement and a standard. It is a way to say the browser is no longer a dumb client. The browser is a node. The browser is a server. The browser is the user’s own.
If we wait another year or another decade we only make the problem worse. The longer we keep pretending that layers can fix broken foundations the harder it becomes to rebuild.
Why Web4Now. Because the web needs it now. Because users deserve it now. Because the browser is ready now. Because the foundation is broken now.
This is why I built it now.
Web4Now is not only about semantics. It is also about formatting and readability. Many developers confuse the two or ignore both. But if you care about the foundation you must care about how the code looks and how the code feels.
It is common sense that when you write a system you use a system element. When you write a script you put it inside a script element. When you write content you put it inside a content element. This is readable and logical. This is how the browser understands it and how other developers understand it.
It is also common sense that your code is always columns and your layout is always rows. That is the reality of CSS. That is how the browser flows content by default. If you respect that you get clean and reliable layouts without hacks.
It also makes sense that when you put something in section one it belongs to section one. When you put something in section two it belongs to section two. And so on. Do not scatter your code. Do not make your scripts and styles live in random places. Keep your code together. Keep your sections clear. Keep your structure simple.
This is not just semantics. This is also about being readable and maintainable. This is about building systems that make sense to humans and machines. This is about respecting the foundation and respecting the browser.
Web4Now teaches you to write what you mean and mean what you write. Use the proper element. Put the code where it belongs. Write your HTML in rows and your CSS in columns. Keep your sections clear. Keep your structure readable. This is how you build clean and fast systems. This is how you make the web better.