I’m not sure how popular outside the UK it was, but Piczo was a website builder / blogging site that I was very committed to in 2007. I guess it kinda functioned like a teenage emo orientated Wix or Squarespace, with some more social aspects.
I remember a lot of sparkly stickers and gifs — having to redo the whole site each time my aesthetic changed a little bit. Shoutout to glitter-graphics.com! You could add a little “guestbook” where visitors to your site could leave anonymous comments. I had a page dedicated to the music I liked (a lot of My Chemical Romance), and a page dedicated to my “photography” (a blurred local park shot on my Dad’s DSLR). I had one page just with pictures of my friends and little bios for them, with links to their Piczo sites. In retrospect maybe it was too much information for a 12 year old to be putting online about themselves...but I loved being able to customise my little corner that I’d carved out of the internet through late nights on my laptop under the covers.
I really miss this vibe of making your own website without it being dedicated to a business or art practice.
