Lynx

Lynx is a text-based web browser that became famous for doing something that sounds almost impossible to younger computer users: browsing the World Wide Web without displaying pictures. Instead of treating the web as a collection of colorful pages, Lynx presents information primarily as text and selectable links. That makes it extremely lightweight and surprisingly efficient, especially on slow connections or machines with limited hardware. There is something wonderfully minimalist about the experience. A modern website may contain advertisements, videos, tracking scripts, animations, and enough JavaScript to launch a small satellite; Lynx simply asks what information you actually wanted. Its DOS version is an especially interesting snapshot of early Internet culture, when the web was smaller, simpler, and considerably less obsessed with making every button move. Using it today feels like visiting the Internet's archaeological layer, where hyperlinks were the stars and bandwidth was treated like precious gold.