The web can still be wonderful, and Flipboard’s Surf proves it

Hello again, and welcome back to Fast Company’s Plugged In. More than 15 months ago, I wrote about Surf, a discovery engine for the social web from Flipboard—itself an earlier twist on the same concept dating to the early days of the iPad. At the time, it was still a rough draft, and in private beta. Rather than rushing it out to a broader audience, Flipboard took its time. The app went through a series of revisions that were both numerous and substantial, ending up significantly different than the intriguing prototype I tried in December 2024. This week, the company finally deemed Surf ready for prime time. It’s now live in web form at Surf.social; a beta Android version is in the Google Play store. (The iPhone and iPad versions still have a waitlist.) If you’ve grown jaded about social networking or the web in general, I recommend taking a look. Surf’s sheer ambition makes it a challenge to describe coherently. It weaves together material from Bluesky, Mastodon, and Th