One problem is that setting up your own website hasn't been getting easier. Sure, you can pay a monthly fee to Shopify to host your merch store, but that's not your website; it's just your little corner of a larger platform. To run your own website is actually harder than during the 90s. One reason is that HTTPS is basically required by browsers. Setting up a TLS certificate is a lot harder than setting up an HTTP daemon. And don't get me started on the boondoggle that is Let's Encrypt and other "free" certificate authorities.

While it is easy to blame search engines for not helping people find small websites, the truth is that most small websites cannot be searched for. The OP basically admits as much. A journal about your life will be lost in a sea of a billion other journals about other people's lives. If your website is about an obscure topic, then very few, if any, will ever type the obscure search query that will lead to your website.

The OP mentions federated bookmarks as a possible solution. I am of two minds on this. On the one hand, it seems a lot like webrings, which the OP claims is too random. On the other hand, the OP provides bookmarks to the front page for websites without any explanation as to what they are, which is too vague. Ideally, a bookmark should have a note that explains why the bookmark matters, and it should lead to a specific page, not a front-page. Maybe with that and some other tweaking, this idea might help.

This link was posted by ggpsv 28 minutes ago on HN. It received 15 points and 0 comments.