So if you wanted people to read your blog, you had to make it compelling enough that they would visit it, directly, because they wanted to. And if they wanted to respond to you, they had to do it on their own blog, and link back.

There are bright spots [for blogging], though. I fear we’re in a newsletter bubble (how many subscriptions can one person pay for?)

Some of the best blogs have evolved and expanded. Independent media is more important than ever, and Donald Trump’s recent attempts to censor mainstream outlets, comedians he doesn’t like, and “leftist” professors underscore the fact that speech is critical.

it’s actually a lot harder to intimidate a million different outlets, each run by a single determined person.

If someone wants to be read, it has to be compelling enough that visitors would come.

Sad.

Arguments clés:

• les blogs sont plus sains que les réseaux sociaux
• les technologies permettent actuellement de créer un blog très facilement, il y en a pour tous les goûts
• l'écriture peut être une thérapie; le blog en est alors l'outil
• chacun maîtrise son temps d'écriture
• suivre d'autres blogs est aisé avec les flux RSS

But hear me out, peeps. By making these changes, I wouldn't have 95% of my online life wrapped up in a website that I built. I'm not a dev, people. There's a good chance this house of cards could all come tumbling down at some point—and that worries me.

IndieWeb carnival is a blog carnival on topics related to the IndieWeb specifically. An IndieWeb carnival will help motivate people to post more on their personal websites and provide inspiration for writing.

Existing systems:

• SemVer
• Calendar Versioning
• Sequential Versioning
• Hash Versioning
• Build Number Versioning

For a blog, the most complete system found by the author is:

• YY: The year of the most recent update.
• Push: A sequential counter tracking the total updates made during the year.
• Type: Categorizes the nature of the update:
  • N: New post.
  • U: Content update (e.g., clarifications or expansions).
  • F: Fix (e.g., typos or formatting corrections).
  • X: Feature update (e.g., design or functionality changes).
  • M: Mixed updates involving multiple types of changes.
• DDMM The date (day and month) of the latest update.

For example the version number v24.628.M.2111 tells me that:

• The blog was last updated in 2024.
• There have been 628 updates so far this year.
• The most recent update involved multiple changes on November 21st.

Eventually, I got sick of manually converting my equations, so I wrote a Python script to automatically convert LaTeX expressions to MathML in my blog posts. I started considering writing an automated tool for inserting my navbars into the HTML files, and then I realized that I was completely wasting my time. After some shopping around, I decided Zola was the least deranged of the existing site generators, so I tried rolling with it.

I’m using a fork of Zola with Typst support written by cstef.

For thousands of years, man has invented technology to ameliorate the petty pains and discomforts of his life. It would be an insult not to use it.

In lieu of that, I like the idea proposed by Chris and Dave where you basically new versions of these slash pages as blog posts and redirect the slash URL to the latest one, kind of like a bookmark. I may start doing these for some of them, starting with /defaults which is, conveniently, already a blog post.

Old slash pages can be referenced and stay at the same URL. At the same time, the most recent slash page gets the default URL name, such as /defaults

A feedback roughly 1600 TILs written over 10 years

Promises

1. Bear won't shut down
2. Bear won't sell
3. Beat won't show ads.

The project is built to last. The codebase is intentionally simple and maintainable.

Roadmap:

• full documentation
• support of trusted developers with access to the codebase
• clear instruction to maintain the platform

The roadmap should ensure the platform will live on without Herman.

I've recently chatted to a few bloggers and legal professionals on what a good structure looks like for a project like this. And the common theme was that the legal structure didn't matter nearly as much as the intentions of the people running things.

It means if one platform becomes bigger, then it won't last as someone will want to takeover for profit.

TILs (Today I Learned) are useless, have terrible signal-to-noise ratio, create FOMO.

True, but they are not meant to be the best raw material ever made. They are made to add some randomness in your feeds (or way your consume news or content). They are personal. They don't share or are structure as a lesson. Most of the TILs I read are on Mastodon, toots shared on the fly because someone learned something. The tag Today I Learned is missing, but it remains a TIL nonetheless.

TILs are a way to discover things. Why on earth do you need some random facts to spark your interest in something?

Good point.

There are other advantages to the TILs. They can be read on the fly, in public transportations. They don't need focus or immersion as a fiction book needs.

I think in between: a majority of TILs is undesirable, a few can be useful. A balance is healthy. It is sometimes convenient to put your concentration aside, and distract yourself while reading something short.

Pika is blogging powered by people. No algorithms or AI, but real human beings writing about their experiences. Tell your story at Pika now!

How to maintain the slash pages over time?

Leon had some similar thoughts on this with an idea for each blog post being a section of a page but rendered as one. The end goal for him, and me, is that the new additions get syndicated via RSS, POSSE, and so forth. I like the idea of redirecting /now to the latest post tagged as now so one could see the latest version of what I'm doing now.

The new structure of the blog:

• Today I learned
• Articles
  • Problem-solving
  • Reflections

Shaarli is a kind of link blog