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A Convo w/ Neal Agarwal

Tag:Open Tab
Published:November 29, 2023 at 2:20 AM
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Open Tab | A series of stories about the Arc members building the future of the internet where we dive deep into their work and passion projects and share the corners of the internet they love the most.
Open Tab
A Folder from
Neal Agarwal
Neal Agarwal's Member Card
Arc Member Card
Find yours in the Settings dialog
Open Tab
A Folder from
Neal Agarwal
Neal Agarwal's Member Card
Arc Member Card
Find yours in the Settings dialog

We are back with the newest installment of Open Tab - a series of stories in which we pop into the inbox of one of the Arc members, hoping to get a closer look at their projects and an invite to their favorite places on the internet.

The latest person we chose to distract from the important work of keeping the internet's lights on is Neal Agarwal - an independent designer and developer behind numerous viral online games, visualizations, and interactive experiments. You might know him from The Password Game that manages to turn something as frustrating as creating a secure password into an infinite thrill. You might have seen his visualization of just how deep the sea is which is both incredibly exciting and slightly terrifying. Or perhaps, you've crossed paths in the Arc member lounge when he joined us back in May 2023. In any case, Neal's work is a great reminder that the internet can, and should be, a place for creativity.

If Neal got a dollar every time someone asked where he draws inspiration from, he might have had enough to give Bill Gates a run for his money. Lucky for Bill, all these curious people can now refer to the following list of sources for Neal's infinite creative inspo that he so graciously curated for us:

  1. Web Curios is an incredibly thorough weekly newsletter filled with links to creative projects in digital art, AI, and much more.

  2. Waxy.org by Andy Baio is a unique collection of blog posts and links to all kinds of new and interesting stuff on the web that's been around for over two decades!

  3. If that doesn't sound impressive enough, take a look at Kottke - an iconic blog about  art, technology, food, and what is self-described as "endless nonsense" that's been active for the past 25 years.

  4. Embedded newsletter with essays and interviews by Kate Lindsay and Nick Catucci is a great way to keep up with the online culture and find "weirder" parts of the internet. 

  5. If you are in the mood for a thought-provoking read, check out Read Something Great - a site that will serve you up 5 timeless articles from the depth of the internet.

  6. FlowingData by Nathan Yau explores how we use analysis and visualization to understand data and ourselves. It's a curation of Nathan's own projects, work of others, and visualization guides showcasing various social and cultural phenomena.

  7. the html review, a journal of interactive HTML poetry and literature, is a cool representation of how people are using the medium of the web in unique ways.

  8. No longer active but nevertheless fascinating, Real Life Mag has published tons of articles about society's ever changing relationship with technology.

  9. LOW←TECH MAGAZINE is another great publication about less-talked about technologies that Neal finds no less fascinating than the cutting-edge modern tech.

Feeling so inspired that you can't wait to share all of these with a friend? Use this handy Arc Folder to share all of Neal's recommendations at once.