Ask HN: How to find non-popular blogs and forums?

It used to be possible to use Google Search operators to search narrowly for something you were interested in, and then you'd find niche specialized forums, and random blogs with like 5 active readers.

I feel like this is no longer possible. I cannot find my own blog, like, at all. I'm not even indexed. What do you use simulate the web search experience from, say, 15 years ago?

27 points | by dominicq 4 days ago

13 comments

  • markx2 4 days ago
    I'm currently using https://micro.blog/discover along with https://bearblog.dev/discover/ and https://indieweb.org/
    [-]
  • mindwork 4 days ago
    There was a post about 2 years ago on HN so that people would post links to their blogs. Somebody saved that post and extracted all the links in to the CSV file with their name and karma, and put it on a website(it's not there now). I've downloaded that CSV file and slowly went through all 1626 blog links over the last 2 years. I finished just about a week ago. It was quite a journey! Some links I would glance at the homepage and immidiately close, and some I stayed for days - reading all interesting articles from the Archive link. It was a blast!
    [-]
  • drewbitt 4 days ago
    https://kagi.com/smallweb
  • understandwp 4 days ago
    Here is a human curated list of almost 1000 personal & independent blogs and sites - https://blogroll.org

    The site design is great, you can filter the blogs by topic and also submit your own.

  • skydhash 4 days ago
    There’s the search engine Marginalia. But the most helpful practice for me is to hang around forums for topics you’re interested in.
  • andyjohnson0 4 days ago
    Kagi has an option to search the "small web*. On the occasiona that I've used it, it has sometimes given me unusual results.
  • mmarian 4 days ago
    I haven't come across blogs where I consistently like the posts written (practical bootstrapped startup tips + domain insights). Not that it's an issue, I don't expect people to like all my blog posts either.

    I just search for a topic I'm interested, and sometimes come across the perfect post for it.

    So the key is to POSSE. I do that by sharing my content here, on Reddit, and LinkedIn. And it works!

  • achempion 2 days ago
    https://marginalia-search.com/explore
  • muzani 4 days ago
    A popular programmer once messaged me on LinkedIn, said he appreciated my comment, and asked me for a link to my blog. I think that's how you do it in this day and age. Just find people who say clever things and dig around to see if they blog.
  • fsflover 4 days ago
    https://wiby.me and https://geti2p.net.
  • chistev 4 days ago
    You can check out mine -

    https://www.rxjourney.net

  • neuroelectron 4 days ago
    Check out this link aggregator, "Hacker News."
  • asquithdenardis 3 days ago
    The small-web never left—it just got buried. Three zero-friction ways to dig it back up:

    1. Marginalia Search → pastes only lightweight, hand-curated pages; add your keyword in quotes. 2. Feedle.org → RSS-only index; most 5-reader blogs still ping it. 3. `site:blogspot.com inurl:2025` on DuckDuckGo → bypasses Google’s engagement layer.

    If you want to see these forgotten sites instead of just reading them, I built a micro-tool that screenshots every result and auto-caption it with FLUX Kontext (https://flux-kontext.io). Ten lines of code—grab it from the repo linked on the landing page.