V.H. Belvadi — Re-defining the IndieWeb • (Venkatram Harish Belvadi)
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Venkatram Harish Belvadi<br>Mr<br>Venkatram<br>Harish<br>Belvadi<br>V.H. Belvadi<br>Website<br>E-mail<br>UK
academic
University of Cambridge
PGP: 315C306F3640596B0D939235999A60106F845417<br>Writer, photographer, and historian and philosopher of science
V.H. Belvadi writes at the intersection of science, technology and society.
He is a Trinity–Cambridge Researcher at the University of Cambridge doing his PhD on the development of regional climate models, and a member of Gonville & Caius College.
In his spare time he enjoys long walks, cycling, debating and photography.
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Painting: The art of protecting flat surfaces from the weather and exposing them to the critic.
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Re-defining the IndieWeb
Focus on the philosophy, not on tools
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‘A convivial society should be designed to allow all its members the most autonomous action by means of tools least controlled by others.’
Ival Illich, Tools for convivality
What is the IndieWeb? I have been thinking of this question since I hosted the IndieWeb Carnival in December 2025 when quite a few contributions engaged with some form of this question. This is a rather difficult topic to address effectively, which explains why I have been sitting on this essay since 2 February this year when I first started writing a major portion of it. I have since revised it four times in six months.
In the end, a collective effort will prove critical in establishing a definitive answer to this question, but as an individual I can nevertheless contribute by building on the ideas others have already discussed. For better or worse, that is what this essay has amounted to, perhaps dishearteningly.
Spirit and letter
Just to be comprehensive, I want to start by clarifying that the specific terms ‘IndieWeb’ and ‘indie web,’ written as they are, are not what I intend to address. And for the purposes of this essay at least I will treat them as interchangeable...