Possibly. I know good jokes are ruined if they have to be explained, but would you mind on this occasion :)

Well, here goes:

Once upon a time (around 1995, first time I tried this 'internet' thing) the internet already existed. But this newfangled http protocol was not very popular (it existed since 1991)

You see, Curl was created in 1997, Wget in 1996

The way to access systems was through telnet mostly. Some modern clients, like lynx, also supported Gopher http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gopher_(protocol)

(Yes, lynx got http support at a later time)

So, their choice for a page readable from a terminal ends up being kind of an Anachronism =)

Oh, I know all that (I was building websites in the mid 90s, so I'm old enough to remember a life before the WWW).

I assumed you were referencing an old meme or a famous quote from some notable UNIX greybeard. I hadn't realised you were just joking about being old (that wasn't clear from your original comment).

Sorry mate, I just misunderstood the context of your joke. (my epic lack of sleep probably didn't help)

Ah it happens, don't worry =)

Saving the explanation, try this:

    $ telnet towel.blinkenlights.nl

I don't think there's a single nerd on the planet who hasn't already seen that.