The Smallest Website in the World
Created | Updated Mar 27, 2009
Until nano-technology becomes so advanced that website designers can break the mythical one-pixel barrier and become super-small, we will have to make do with www.guimp.com. Smaller than a postage stamp, the site contains all a human requires for a Friday afternoon - Pong (recognised as the first ever blockbuster videogame), Space Invaders (the godfather of shoot 'em up videogames), a Drum Machine, poetry corner, webcam. You name it.
The site is a rigid 18x18 pixels (a restriction informed by the media involved - flash movies don't come smaller1). It is the product of Dr Alan Outten, of the London Design Collective, who decided that, as the web expanded exponentially, it became increasingly important for websites to constrict, thus making room for additional material. Claims that a sinister sponsorship deal with a well-known high street opticians was behind the squint-inducing site have been vigorously denied by the London Design Collective. There is no word as yet from any opticians.
It has been alleged that the website's name, Guimp, stands for Graphical User Interface for Miniature People. This has been dismissed by Dr Outten as 'a bit lame'. History may prove him right.