Does the indie web have a more younger demographic?

[Vidknight]

The following thread was heavily inspired by this thread. Recently during my time surfing the web I noticed something about the sites I was finding, and it's about how most of the webmasters I saw was under 25 (including me at 19), hell I can call back to a time I saw a site made by a 14 year old, and this seemed pretty interesting to me, and I wanted to open up discussions about it to see other people opinion on this.

(Side note I don't intend for this to be some sort of generational war thing personally I groan every time I see something along the lines of Gen Z this, or Boomers that  .)

With that out of the way I guess my first question to anybody reading this is, do anybody else have the same experience? With more, and more personal sites popping up by the day it's no brainier that people will have a different experience who knows maybe you're finding sites by people between 30-50, or possibly even older   

Another question is, why might this be a trend? What is it about the indie web, and just creating a whole site that attract a lot of younger people. I feel that it could just be younger folks wanting a new experience, or something exciting online instead of just browsing the same 4-6 sites, but there's a lot of different theories here.

Personally interested to see other people experience, ideas, and theories

[Melooon]

There is a particular bubble of Neocities, MelonLand, NekoWeb etc that has had a downward trending age range for a few years now - its not representative of the wider indie web, but sites that have a fun, maximalist or otherwise retro style do all seem to be more popular with younger people - where as 30+ people tend to favor more minimal information sites (or they just use social media).

Partly that's just normal aging-out (most people get more boring as they get older  ), but I will say that Neocities in particular has gotten younger overall (I was 22 when I joined and I was one of the younger people) - I'd also say that neocities has gotten more maximalist since I joined, the sites created today are a different vibe from the ones that were there a few years ago - so its more like younger people have remade neocities culture, and the more that happens the more it attracts other younger people.

I really appreciate when I see much older people jump into the mix too, and I also appreciate younger people discovering web craft and making it their own! As long as younger people are interested in web craft then web craft has a future, but homepages also need to grow with people as they get older, so you need both view points!

I'm always curious to hear why younger people are interested in web craft, particularly those who were not around pre-social-media; so this thread is a great question

[KrazyKoen]

I've passively noticed the same thing. I think it's alot of things. Younger people tend to spend more time on the internet. I'm just old enough to have grown up watching the web transition into what it is today and I imagine alot of other people around my age got to witness the same thing which has led to a general disdain and disillusionment with the modern web. There's also the fact that putting energy and passion into self expression is and always has been popular with teenagers so I think the idea of having your own little spot on the internet to do whatever you want with is particularly appealing to alot of teens. These are just the things I can think of off the top of my head.

[nobo]

I will say that Neocities in particular has gotten younger overall

When I first joined Neocities I was not involved with the community at all. I had a page I left there and it sat for a long time. I remember during that time there were a lot of people from the Hacker News thread. Most of the people I encountered seemed like they were either engineers or they grew up in the 90s/2000s.

By the time I came back, things had changed dramatically and I noticed a lot of teenagers. At first this came with a lot of excitement: "Maybe this generation actually isn't going to let big tech take everything." Thoughts like that. I was eager to give advice and help to people.

But over time it started to wear on me. Interacting with mostly young people on Discord, I found myself subconsciously acting more childish, getting involved in Neocities drama, and it took me a while to realize it was time to leave neocities to the kids.

I often find a lot of people especially from that older time very bitter about how neocities has changed, and maybe at one time I was also one of them. They have expectations for neocities to be something other than what it is. Neocities started out as a throwback that was spearheaded by engineers. But over time, it became what geocities originally was: A place for amateurs to learn, a place for kids to play.

A lot of the neocities crowd thinks that oldweb was nothing but geocities-like sites. It wasn't, geocities was a specific demographic. It's where people went to learn.

[cynderthekitsune]

agreeing with Meloon and others here

i think it could be partly to do with how some people find social media exhausting, no matter the age. and the more people of a certain age group there is, the more likely others around that age are to join!
i've definitely seen some older people on the indie web - and yea some younger people may join because of 'aesthetic' appeal, but again it's up to the individual as to why they joined, not lumping them into a large generalisation.

in general there's been a bit of a downward spiral in terms of the average age of users on sites like Neocities and Nekoweb - i'm 17 and i know i'm still young, but i've also seen people as young as 13 or 14 around here too.
especially with that in mind, my own site has had some messages and things to help people, i think? mostly about remaining cautious and things - i'm not exactly holding your hand but i'm trying to guide you, yk? 

[Slix]

I also agree with a lot of the points here. Younger people have more intentional interests (games! movies! music!) and more free time on the internet. Many people tend to lose free time as they get into college or working in a full time job so they put down their hobbies sometimes then. Friends tend to be made by people of similar ages, even in areas where ages aren't explicitly stated, due to interests and how they see the world too. Nowadays, I would also think it's due to more and more people becoming frustrated with the way social media and the larger internet is from the larger companies right now.

I was 14 when I started my website, and I was probably on the slightly older end of web admin ages when it was getting off the ground! :P