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Consider me Clarity. Yes, that’s clearly an alias. I’m sure you understand, though? I’m a stray cat, loose on the World Wide Web.
Cats don’t often answer to the names people give them. Most of us have our own extra names, just in case we need ‘em. This is one of mine: Claire, or Clarity. When I was a kitten, a book in my school library warned me against giving out my “real” name online. I took that advice to heart!
Despite being a cat, I learned to make websites in the late 1990s. I started with America Online's WYSIWYG website builder. Pawing around it, I made a page about dachshunds and other small dogs. In middle school, I soon used a WYSIWYG editor known as Claris Home Page for schoolwork. I gradually became conversational in HTML. In 1999, I created a couple detailed, yet messy fansites for my favorite characters (La Femme Nikita and Alex Krycek).
Many of my earliest sites used linkware graphics provided by an artist (well, she preferred the term artiste) named Moyra of Moyra.com. Moyra eventually disappeared, but still inspires me! I launched a small, goofy blog a couple years later, when I finished middle school. This was, ironically, hosted on Geocities, but using Blogger, back in the brief moment when that was a possibility.
On my sixteenth birthday I got my first domain. I also got hosting space. Finally, I had my own little online territory to prowl. I shifted to CMS tools like Greymatter, MovableType, and WordPress. Stray cats do love web space. It's always nice to have a small space to curl up in. We all need a place to just kinda be there, even online, right?
Soon, Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram appeared. Yes, they seemed lovely to me initially, but cats like me aren’t always smart. It took time to realize that the algorithms really do stalk you like predators. They’re always lurking. A lot of people are trying to abandon these sites. It’s difficult. I doubt I will ever truly ditch all so-called “social media.” Still, I see potential in the culture of the “indie” web or, as I call it, the new web.
I don’t expect it will feel much like the internet I experienced as a kitten. I don’t expect to “get good” at coding either. I’m just a silly stray cat, padding through the Web. I also enjoy sniffing and pawing through the Internet Archive. I know it’s a complicated, yet subtle thing to allow yourself nostalgia. I try to avoid what I call “Golden Age” thinking, though. I readily slip into cynicism, too, so that's also something...
I know that not everyone is an “internet” person. But even the most offline of people must’ve noticed how the internet has changed our entire civilization, and not always for the better. The future is still up for grabs, or at least, I certainly hope it is! This site, launched April 20th, 2024, is me, wandering around, hopefully forward, but who knows? Still a stray cat wandering the World Wide Web, happily so.
Say meow (or hiss at me) if you like! Cats (…or humans?) can leave pawprints in the askbox, find me on Discord (@ClarityAnne), or use the contact form. My email is clarity (at fabled.day, of course).
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Not a Cat, NOT A FURRY
I’m obviously Not a Cat IRL. I don’t identify as one, as a couple people on Discord went and quickly asked. I don’t believe I’m some kind of feline entity in human or anything like that. Not catkin here. Shoutout to actual catkin, I guess? I’m also Not a Furry. In short, I’m not a cat, I just play one online LMAO.
I’m definitely not named Clarity nor Claire. I chose that name during my time with an online sapphic Conservative VR cult in Second Life for a while. Oh, and in fact, a lot of how I act on here is, yeah, kinda like being a character of sorts. Stray Cat Claire is definitely me. But Claire is me thru a certain lens. What else can I say? I'm not really a gray cat!
The concept of being one, though? It’s fun! And it's making this site more interesting to write and update! That’s what I’m trying for. Cats are, after all, very online, yet still really sensible critters. I’m also Not A Furry. Not that there's anything wrong with furries...
This page was last updated on September 24th, 2025.