Can you introduce yourself?

Sure thing, hello! Taanshi! My name is Brennan Kenneth Brown, I'm a Queer Red River Métis writer and web developer. I'm 30-years-old and I've been writing and chronically online for over fifteen years now. I love writing about a wide variety of topics, and using my software development skills to make open-source projects that I hope will benefit others.

During the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown, I realized I wanted to go full-thrust and try to follow my dreams. I enrolled in university as a mature student and majored in English Honours. I founded and ran a creative writing collective called Write Club during my undergrad, and we released two anthologies under my tenure.

What's the story behind your blog?

I've loved blogging since my elementary teacher, Mr. Rehak, taught our class about Google's Blogger when I was only ten-years-old. While I started sharing my poetry online in junior high, it took until I was 19-years-old and finished high school to feel confident enough to start blogging.

I wrote my first blog post on Medium in 2015. I would post on the platform a couple times every month for several years, often during my lunch break when I was working as a cook at a children's hospice and a on-call custodian. I only ever got a few dozens views on each blog post, but I deeply enjoyed writing for the sake of writing.

I went on a blogging hiatus while getting my degree, because I was so busy with schoolwork—I took full-time fall, winter, spring and summer semesters for all four-years straight. I graduated with a 3.8 GPA and a peer-reviewed academic article, yipee!

My writing skills improved greatly (at least, I hope), and I minored in creative writing specializing in creative nonfiction—I realized this was the genre I loved the most—taking the mechanics and rich sensory imagery of fiction and applying it to real life and true stories.

That's what I wanted to do with blogging, and I wanted to try making a living as a full-time writer. I started posting near daily starting in November 2025, and I haven't really stopped for half a year by now! My views and earnings skyrocketed by posting so often (which I always thought was a myth) and I have no plans of stopping.

Now, that was a lot of background to actually answer the question: I began getting interested in the IndieWeb during my writing on Medium, and found Adam Newbold's community project omg.lol. I initially began a blog with his platform, but I realized that there were a lot of limitations, and I had the technical skills to start my own website from scratch. I had actually been making blog themes for years before this, but I always felt intimidated to start my own. There were too many design options and Medium just let me write.

But the work I did on weblog.lol I was able to transfer over to GitLab, I got the domain Brennan.day for the project and I've just been working at it since. I began iterating on the site each day as I wrote new posts. I read up and added IndieWeb functionality among many other things, little by little!

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

Perhaps unsurprisingly, I've written a blog post about my blogging workflow.

It is nothing special, really. I write a minimum of 750 words each day on Buster Benson's site 750words.com. I've been doing this on-and-off since 2011 but I now currently have a 483-day streak. Sometimes I'll have an idea for a blog post in my head going into it, or sometimes the idea makes itself known during the freewriting process.

I would say that I try to be curious about everything, and have a great thirst for life and knowledge. I never assume I know something, because the act of discovery, asking questions, and learning opens up opportunities for blog posts. Likewise, I am very passionate about things I think are important, which also lends itself well to finding blog post topics. No rabbit hole is too niche or intimidating for me to not go down!

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

This is a great question. I would love to fulfill the romantic vision of working in a cozy café or in a public library, or at university campus. But I am far too easily distracted! I just end up peoplewatching and enjoying my surroundings.

I need to be able to focus deeply, and being in my bedroom or office is where that's easiest for me. As Woolf wrote, a writer needs a room of one's own. I set my desk up in front of the window, so I have a lovely view of the outside, and my working space has art and little mementos that spark joy.

I also need my working space to be completely decluttered, it helps so much with my mindset. I don't know if I'm a minimalist, but I want all desk space and table space cleared and empty. I have storage solutions in places I can't see—out of sight, out of mind!

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

Absolutely! I built brennan.day using Eleventy (11ty), a fantastic static site generator built on Node.js. I chose Eleventy because it's simple, fast, and template-agnostic. I use Nunjucks as my templating engine, but you could use Liquid, JavaScript, Handlebars, or others if you prefer.

For content, I write everything in Markdown with front matter. I've extended the markdown-it library with several plugins to support rich content: emoji support, footnotes, task lists, definition lists, and KaTeX for mathematical expressions. I also have a custom rule that automatically converts internal .md links to clean URL slugs.

The styling is entirely custom CSS with a Gruvbox-inspired color scheme. No CSS frameworks here! I prefer writing vanilla CSS as it gives me control. For code syntax highlighting, I use Eleventy's syntax highlighting plugin with a custom theme that matches my site's aesthetic.

On the IndieWeb side, I've implemented microformats2 markup throughout (h-card, h-entry, h-feed) so my content is semantically structured and discoverable. Webmentions are handled via webmention.io, fetched at build time. I also have RSS/Atom feeds, IndieAuth support, and a Micropub endpoint for posting from external clients.

I've set up WebSub (formerly PubSubHubbub) for real-time feed updates, so subscribers get notified instantly when I publish something new instead of waiting for their feed reader to poll my site. I also have 20 rel-me links that cryptographically verify my identity across platforms—no paying for verification checkmarks!

For search, I use Pagefind, a static search library that runs entirely in the browser. No external services or databases needed. It indexes the site at build time and provides fast, privacy-friendly search.

The site is deployed to Netlify, which handles automatic builds from my GitLab repository. I use Netlify Functions for serverless endpoints: auth-callback, token-exchange, micropub, media handling, comments, and WebSub pings. This has let me build dynamic functionality while keeping the core site static.

For DNS security, I'm lucky to be able to use Deflect.ca nameservers, which provide free DDoS protection for civil society organizations and independent media like mine. It's a Canadian social enterprise protecting sites facing digital threats and censorship.

The entire stack is open-source and follows IndieWeb principles: I own my domain, I own my data (plain text files in Git), and I own my identity.

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

I think because I only started my personal blog half a year ago, I'm in a privileged position to say that I wouldn't change anything. Except starting sooner, of course! I'm sure I'll have an answer a couple years from now.

Financial question since the web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost or does it generate revenue? And what's your position on people monetizing personal blogs?

My personal blog, brennan.day, does not make any money, no. I have a couple wonderful people supporting me through Ko-fi and my toonie club. I don't run any advertisements, take sponsorships, or use affiliate links. And I never will. The only costs associated with my blog is the domain on Porkbun, which runs $10/year.

That said, I am one of those few very lucky writers that can say that I do make a living blogging online. I'm enrolled in Medium's Partner Program, where I syndicate my blog posts on the platform and I'm paid based on views, reads, comments, etc. when I paywall my content. The wonderful thing is, though, that they allow me to have my writing on my own site with no paywall, so it really is a win-win.

Since I began seriously blogging in November 2025, my earnings have fluctuated month-to-month, but it's around $1,000CAD/mth.

Monetizing on the IndieWeb in general is really tricky. I would love us to support each other more, like through grassroots community mechanisms similar to mutual aid. The ways people can make money often degrade the quality of their writing and site (intrusive advertising, dishonest product reviews, etc.), but if people can find ethical, non-exploitative ways to make money, I absolutely think they should.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out?

Oh my goodness, I have so many! Please check out all my friends listed on my blogroll. I really feel like I can't choose specific folks and play favourites like that.

If you want to find new IndieWeb blogs, I suggest checking out directories where new blogs and writings are popping up every day. My favourites are Marginalia Search, Bubbles Town, ooh.directory, and of course, Ye Olde Blogroll.

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

The world is in an increasingly volatile, unstable state. There is no need for us to continue using and giving our finite time to the exploitative, misery-creating corporate social media that are so commonplace.

I promise you're capable of learning how to buy your own domain and start your own website. And I promise it's worth it. I've specifically wrote an IndieWeb guide for non-technical people. There is so much joy and fun to be had.

A better, kinder, more human Internet isn't just possible, it's already being actively developed. Join us!

Can you introduce yourself?

Hi! I'm Zachary Kai, a twenty-something queer Australian. I have too many interests, not enough time or brain space, but I'm (slowly) clawing everything back.

My greatest loves are the internet, books, and writing, all centered on: words.

Struggling with socialization combined with compulsive reading in youth created an encyclopedic knowledge and interest in (almost) everything. So if you contact me, I'm sure we'll have something we can talk about, whether it be the physics involved in baseball or the history of earthenware.

What's the story behind your blog?

Can I call it a blog when I only post once every ~three months? I can tell you the story behind my site, which I wrote about in 'Falling In Love With The Internet (Again)' for Good Internet.

It's been up for two years now (already, my goodness!) and I'm proud to say I've redesigned it once. (Not calling anyone out but myself here, considering how easy it is for me to get scattered.)

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

Process? What process? System? What system? If I actually make the time for it…just pick a random phrase from my 'blog fodder' list (courtesy of Thomas Vander Wal) and begin.

I write it in my beloved Obsidian, proofread it, use an online tool for turning Markdown to basic HTML, arrange it in a HTML file in my site's folder, add it to the sitemap.

Then, I 're-build' the site, which is just a chain of esoteric prompts to update a few pages/the feeds.

I risk sounding conceited saying this, but when I actually sit (usually stand) to write, producing words is of no struggle. Writer's block exists, yes, but not for me. Give me any topic you wish, and I'll (hopefully) churn out something semi-coherent. Words are my everything.

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

I've been to (several) places around the world, and the only way to survive this earth as a neurodivergent soul is to force flexibility on oneself. So I don't have one. Because why tie something so lifegiving up in arbitrary, never guaranteeably available physical circumstances?

Sure, I'd love a writing shed beside some gorgeous lake in the mountains, but that's why I (aspirationally, at least) write fiction. This planet is a wonderful place, but dreaming of impossibilities sometimes leads to misery, especially when I tangle it in things I need/want to do.

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

I wouldn't be surprised if this causes gasps of surprise from the programmers reading this, but it's just Static HTML files with a motley bunch of PHP scripts for building the sitemap and the RSS feeds.

Yes, I edit by hand. Yes, it was a deliberate choice. Yes, I sometimes wish I hadn't made it.

Though: simplicity, longevity, sticking to my decisions, and readability for this non-programmer are the things I'd rather have than the one-off convenience of WordPress (though I adore it.)

I use a rented VPS for hosting my sites. As my colophon says: 'hand-typed in HTML/CSS in VSCodium, backed up on my server, transferred through SFTP, hosted by an Ubuntu VPS.'

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

I'd start with a cheaper VPS so I don't have to migrate everything (twice.)

Realize just because I can self-host almost anything doesn't mean I need to. (Same goes for almost everything that's possible with internet services.)

I'd also make more time for writing for my site. Because it's when I feel most myself. And given how I (still) have no idea who I am, that's saying something.

Financial question since the web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost or does it generate revenue? And what's your position on people monetizing personal blogs?

As it stands: ~25 AUD for each domain (zacharykai.net, lunaseeker.com, roadlessread.com, leoflynn.com) a year, ~20 AUD a month for the VPS, and more for the newsletter, and email.

I'll be migrating to a smaller server soon, so that'll help.

It's (mostly) just a cost, one I'm happy to pay given how being on the internet has changed my life. Indirectly, I've worked with various wonderful clients, and been paid for writings published.

My position? Do whatever suits, but do it with intention, clarity, consideration, and care.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out?

Yes! Plenty, always! Here are a few I've found/rediscovered recently:

• Jack Cheng for thoughts on writing, slow tech, and life.
• The (simply wonderful) Brennan Kenneth Brown is as prolific as he is considered.
• Unsure how (perhaps Bear Blog 'Discover') but I found Anne's blog: a delightful design, and thoughtful writing. (If you're reading this, and wouldn't mind being interviewed, contact me.)
• Honeybunch Of Onion Tops for vegan, gluten-free recipes and gentle words. Despite them being Australian, the only reason I found them is on the lovely Eri's recommendation.
• Card Catalog: thinking like a librarian in the age of AI.

You are the last guest of my 150 interviews cycle but you'll also run this series from now on. What plans do you have for the series moving forward?

'People And Blogs' was one of the first things I discovered when venturing into the wider indie web, after finding James' website, in early 2024. I'd decided I wanted to start a site in 2023, but was still working up the courage to begin. After all, who was I to think I had the right to visibility on the web?

I was looking for reassurance, for commiseration, for community. Finding this interview series gave me all that and more, and thanks to the weekly schedule, Friday became one of my favorite days.

I often emailed Manu with suggestions for folks to be interviewed. My plans? Continue the series in a similar vein with the same questions (for now at least) and hopefully interview folks who might be artists or writers or chefs or creatives first, and bloggers second. I'd be interested in their thoughts.

What made you decide to step in and become the new person behind People and Blogs?

I saw the post where Manu explained his experiences running the project and was touched by his honesty. Running projects like these take effort. While the people who benefit from them appreciate them, how often do we, if we have the capacity, at least even email to express appreciation?

So the motivation split between two underlying feelings: showing my gratitude the only way I (really) know how, offering to help, and wanting a series I loved to continue.

Is there a "dream guest" you plan to have on?

If we're aiming high, the wonderful Austin Kleon, Jack Cheng, Paul Watson, or Phoebe Thorburn. I adore their work.

Do you see yourself running it for many years to come or, like myself, you plan to run it for a limited stretch and then pass it to someone else?

I'd like to run it for the foreseeable future! I'll admit I struggle with imagining the future, but I hope I can continue assisting in cultivating the 'indie web commons' as Brennan Kenneth Brown calls it.

Long live the small and delightful corners of the internet, and the humans who make the place.

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

Yes! A few things, if you don't mind, dear reader:

• I run an interview series called 'Shelf Source' on my book blog, Road Less Read, and if you talk about books on your site, I'd love to interview you!
• If you're a creative person, or work with a small-business on the internet, might I offer my freelance services, should you be in-need of something?
• If you'd like to go for a web wander, might I suggest The Forest, a collaboration between Manu himself and Carl. I've found so many excellent sites there!

And most importantly: have a wonderful morning, wherever you are.

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

Hi, my name's Andy Baio. I'm a writer and coder living in Portland, Oregon. You might know me from my blog, Waxy.org, where I've written for 25 years about the internet. If you've never heard of it, I rounded up some of the highlights from my first decade of blogging in 2012, and the second decade in 2022.

You may also know me from some of my other projects? I ran the XOXO festival in Portland for 12 years from 2012 to 2024, launched (and relaunched) the events community Upcoming.org, and I helped build Kickstarter as a long-time advisor and their first CTO.

Along the way, I coined the term "supercut," produced a chiptune tribute to Miles Davis's Kind of Blue, and got threatened with lawsuits a bunch of times. (I did some other stuff, too.)

These days, I'm mostly helping my wife Ami with her game design studio, Pink Tiger Games. We've self-published seven conversational party games since 2017, with three more slated for later this year.

What's the story behind your blog?

Before I started Waxy.org, I mostly sent links via instant messenger to my friends who had blogs. I knew I was good at finding things online, and after the umpteenth friend told me to start my own blog, I finally did. I wanted a place of my own online, somewhere to experiment and write about weird corners of internet culture, online community, and copyright, as well as a sandbox for new experimental projects of my own.

By the time I launched Waxy in April 2002, I felt like I was late to the blogging trend, which in hindsight, seems ridiculous. I was still pretty early, as it turns out. Within a year, I'd been interviewed by the New York Times and other major papers dozens of times for news stories I'd either broken or somehow found myself tangled up in.

The name, Waxy.org, came from a Perl script I'd written the year before to search for available .com, .org, and .net domains using every dictionary word in the English language. (I also picked up Meaty.org, which I never ended up using, and Upcoming.org, which I did.) "Waxy" didn't really mean anything, but I'd been using "waxpancake" as my alias for years so it seemed like a good fit.

I added a linkblog, Waxy Links, to the sidebar about 18 months after launch, which became a good outlet for quick links that didn't warrant full posts. I redesigned the site in 2008 with a cleaner design and better mobile support.

After 14 years of blogging, I switched from Movable Type to WordPress in 2016, with a new redesign that I slowly improved in the years since. I recently added redesigned archives and search, which I'm pretty happy with.

It's always under construction, a work in progress — like me, you, and the rest of the internet.

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

I used to do much more investigative journalism, but these days, Waxy is primarily a linkblog where I point to fun or interesting things I find online. Unless I stumble on a story too compelling to ignore, forcing me to pull the string and see where it leads.

Those story ideas and links can come from anywhere. I'm a voracious consumer of information online, and I've always joked that Waxy is the natural byproduct of endlessly procrastinating from doing other things by looking at the internet.

I subscribe to around 450 feeds in Inoreader, my RSS reader, and skim it all nearly every day. I follow another 1,000 or so people each on Bluesky and Mastodon, with custom lists for each so I don't miss particular people. I'm in dozens of Discords, many with people sharing their work or pointing out good stuff they find online, and nearly 100 mostly-niche subreddits covering many of my interests. I use tools like Sill and Scour to find signal in the noise, and even built a link aggregator of my own that I used for years to find good links on Twitter, until Elon shut down the API.

My frequency of posting has waned over the years, first cannibalized by social media and then by larger life and work stuff. I've recently found myself drawn back to it, posting more regularly, trying to wake those atrophied writing muscles. Even if I've slowed down, it's hard to ever imagine stopping entirely.

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

I used to be able to work from anywhere, typically a coffeehouse or library, and tune out the rest of the world on my laptop with a good pair of earbuds.

As my eyesight's worsened, I find that working on a large monitor is more of a necessity than a luxury for any serious length of time, especially if I'm coding.

I also used to love working around others, but these days, I tend to like retreating to the quiet of my basement office. No music, no sound. Just a quiet hum of my computer and the sounds of my keyboard.

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

I use WordPress with my own custom-written theme, using the Advanced Custom Fields plugin to handle all the special fields necessary for my linkblog. I use a custom bot to cross-post my links to Bluesky, and a plugin called Share on Mastodon to post things there. (I stopped automatically cross-posting to X/Twitter years ago, for obvious reasons.) Everything's hosted on a DigitalOcean droplet along with a bunch of other side projects, with Cloudflare managing the domain and DNS.

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

I would have started collecting email addresses from the very beginning. I've never really liked reading newsletters by email, and I read almost every newsletter I subscribe to through my feedreader, which gives me so much control over my attention. But I never considered that people would start to shift their attention away from the web, or that feedreaders would largely go away, so I never tried to build a mailing list for my own projects.

The ability to directly reach the people who care most about your work, outside of the capricious nature of social media algorithms, is essential. It's my one big regret, and I hope to change that soon.

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetising personal blogs?

My blog has never cost much to run, and never made much money. I used to have a dedicated server that cost $150/month, but these days, it's running around $50/month on a shared instance with some other projects of mine.

The visibility and reach from writing on Waxy opened a lot of doors for me, though. I met so many amazing creative people through blogging, and it gave me a platform for launching projects that I wouldn't have had otherwise. I met most of my friends, directly or indirectly, through the writing I did on Waxy.org.

I did run ads on my blog for a few years, experimenting with Google ads from 2004 to 2005 and, in 2006, joining as one of the first members of The Deck, Jim Coudal's pioneering unobtrusive, privacy-centric boutique ad network that helped support sites like Daring Fireball, Kottke.org, Ze Frank, The Morning News, A List Apart, and many others. It paid me a reliable $1,000/month for ten years, until shortly before it wound down in 2017. I haven't made any direct income from my blog since then.

I think anything that supports independent writers/bloggers, artists, or other creators on their own terms is a good thing, whether it's through Kickstarter, Patreon, or more commonly, through paid subscription newsletters. I have major issues with Substack's management, but I credit them for normalizing the idea of directly paying bloggers a recurring monthly fee. But please use Ghost or Buttondown instead.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

Oh, god, too many to list. Off the top of my head, Marcin Wichary's Unsung is probably my favorite new blog, constantly updated with new insights about user interfaces and design. Nobody notices things the way that Marcin notices things.

Matt Muir's Web Curios is like a month's worth of good links crammed into a single post every Friday. I don't know how he's done it so well for so long.

Depths of Wikipedia's Annie Rauwerda isn't a traditional blogger, but spreads her curatorial eye between two Bluesky accounts, two Instagram accounts, TikTok, a newsletter, a touring live stage show, and a very good personal website. She's just so funny and weird and good. I wish she had an RSS feed that combined it all. Maybe I'll make one for her.

I think David Friedman's Ironic Sans is incredibly underrated, moving from a traditional blog to more of a newsletter format, with weird little side projects and games along the way. He's been continuously great for 20 years.

I'd love to see Jason Kottke interviewed. More than anyone I can think of, he's carved out a Kottke-shaped hole for himself on the web, growing it into a sustainable living through direct reader support over nearly 30 years. Even now, he continues to refine and adapt and evolve his site in surprising ways.

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

The last project I worked on was the permanent archive for XOXO that launched in April, collecting everything we did related to the festival. The site was a huge undertaking, bringing together every lineup, schedule, recap video, conference talk, and standalone website that we ever made into a single permanent archive, filled with little photos and ephemera from the festival.

XOXO was a huge part of my life for 12 years, easily the most creatively rewarding and emotionally exhausting work of my career, and I'm really proud of how the archive came out. At the very least, go poke through the video archives. The featured tag highlights some of our favorites, like Cabel Sasser's wonderful talk from our final year.

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

I'm Anne. I've spent almost a decade in what I call the 'open ecosystem', the first five years as a lurker and participant, the second five as a researcher and facilitator. I've done ethnographic studies of OpenStreetMap, was the Community Manager of The Turing Way, and have held a variety of fellowships with organisations ranging from the Internet Society to the Software Sustainability Institute. Outside of all these things, I would call myself an artist-of-sorts, maybe to say that I make art more than I embody the spirit of an artist, per say. But I sometimes throw the title around anyway. I guess I'll say it: I'm a researcher, facilitator, and artist.

What's the story behind your blog?

I was a big 'micro' blogger in my teens, using platforms like Xanga, Livejournal, and Flickr to document my teenage life. Then I inevitably moved to Tumblr alongside many angsty and artsy teenager girls right as Facebook started to take off in parallel, before moving to Instagram (and using it as a kind of 'blog' for years). I've gone through the inevitable cycles of use then rejection, of deleting and reactivating all my social media accounts. My original Facebook account is gone now.

When I started grad school in 2019, I started my blog as a method of sharing more about my life and research when I moved to Geneva. I think it came out of the joint desires for self-expression and a desire to get out of social media. We now collectively call this platform decay "enshittification", but I really felt like what I was putting online was performative more than anything else. The blog felt like shouting into a voice, yes, but it was my shout, on my own website, in a void of my own creation. There's no like button for that.

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

I often just create a new page on Obsidian or VSCode and just start to write. Sometimes it all comes out in one go - sometimes the draft will take years to fruition (and yes - I'll often backdate that post to when it was created, not when it was published). There's actually a secret draft folder on Github that hosts all my drafts in progress.

Out of all the creative processes, I find writing the most difficult, but also the most transformative. I rarely enjoy the process, but always feel better, or have more clarity, or understand something or myself better, afterwards.

In parallel to writing, I'm very much a power user of are.na which feels like a more instinctual, affectual, and social form of thinking out loud. I think a lot of the nascent themes contained there eventually end up on the blog in some form or another.

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

I'm a big listener of NTS radio (specifically the Breakfast Show with Flo) and use earth.fm a lot. Sounds really create a space for me - and are a way I stay grounded and aware, no matter where I might be working. If I have control over that however, I tend to need a big desk for books and papers of all kinds - maybe I need a messy desk in order to have a cleaner mind. I absolutely believe that physical spaces influence creativity. When I'm writing something long form for example, I'll usually surround myself physically with books and visual artifacts (photos, sketches, and other detritus) related to the topic, almost like it's a living altar to the work, or an externalised process of thinking that starts with the visual, then becomes ingested and cognitive. I've been on the move for the past year or so, and I've really felt its impact on my creativity: in some ways I'm more spontaneous, but less deep and situated with my thinking. I have no doubt that this is because of my perpetual motion.

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

My website (and blog attached to it) is very simple. I used to host my website on Github Pages, but now it's built on Netlify (very open to alternatives - please reach out!). I used to use Heroku before it was shut down. The whole website and codebase is on Github. You can see more about the ethos of the website, and specifically the practices I am aiming to adopt better practices for accessibility and open practices on this easter egg of a page (which you can find by clicking the sticky note in the footer): https://www.aleesteele.com/design

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

Field Notes from my Desktop is the name of both my blog and newsletter these days. I feel all sorts of ways about having a newsletter now – I've only sent out one so far. It's a very different feeling to have a captive audience, some of which have been subscribed automatically after an event I've facilitated, or joined from the web. I don't know if I like it, but it feels like in the age of information glut, there's something about the inbox that remains sacred for many folks. I want to respect that, and maybe want to think of it as a seeding process...

For my blog, I remain dedicated to maintaining it as is, without any real changes. Looking back, I guess I would have held myself accountable to finishing more blogs in the moment: when that whiff of an idea, or a concept, or an event or reflection has completely captivated me and I feel the need to write about it. Unfortunately I have so many half-finished blogs not because I didn't like the topic, but rather because it was such a struggle and a slog to finish, that I didn't bring it fully over that crest into fruition. Maybe I should have ritualised it.

At the same time, I don't want to be too hard on myself. I did the best I could at the time. Maybe the newsletter is meant to be the rhythm, and the blog is the burst of free jazz.

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetising personal blogs?

I have no monetization plan, and currently don't monetize anything I do for the blog. In fact, I pay to use Buttondown at the moment, and I'm debating whether to do that (currently $9 USD a month since they changed their membership plan). I pay for my domain, which is £12 GBP annually.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

Now I'm mixing blogs and newsletters! I've been such a periodic reader of a bunch of different things that I tend to save on are.na, that it's hard to pick out a few.

I've been a passionate reader of the Marginalian and the Creative Independent for many years. At this point, both are less blog, and more of a wiki-like resource about life, creativity, ecology, and all sorts of topics that make life meaningful and mysterious. I've also read and used Open Culture for many years – which is also a blog-of-sorts. I recently learned about The Examined Mind.

One person whose writing practice I look up to is Shannon Mattern (an academic anthropologist turned New York Librarian-of-sorts) and my friend Jonathan Gray who has a fantastic (and consistent!) public writing process. Both of them are academics with public practices - and while I'm not an academic, I do have a research-informed process.

I also love Julian Stodd's blog on leadership and organisational practices. He's done a lot of deep and open thinking that I've appreciated about the topic, and has stayed loyal to old school Wordpress.

This question inspires me to bring together a more curated list of blogs I've read and followed over the years, and also to recognise the shortfalls of my own 'blogging' practice. I have saved blog instances (meaning individual blogs), but I haven't 'followed' a single blogger in a really long time actually. Is that because of the newsletter because I don't use RSS feeds?

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

I'm developing a series of mapping meditations, based on Pauline Oliveros' Sonic Meditations. If you have a map or a meditation to share, please reach out.

I also run internet infrastructure walking tours in London, in an effort to make invisible infrastructures more embodied and playful. This year, I've been experimenting with a monthly walk, and you're welcome to join one using Luma.

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

Hello! I'm Edoardo, in my thirties, born near Milan (Italy) and raised in the Alps of the same region, to escape the boredom of too flat a horizon. I studied physics, first in Milan, then abroad in Switzerland, where I spent a little over four years on a PhD that convinced me academic research wasn't for me – or so I thought, since I didn't stray too far. In the following years I became a "research software engineer", meaning a software developer who works closely with research. It took me a while to realize that, despite the many benefits, that work had become a routine I was taking too much for granted. Or better: I had lost sight of why I was staying there; why I kept choosing that configuration for my life. Now I'm trying to figure out if teaching the two subjects I'm most passionate about – math and physics – is what I want to do in the next chapter of my career.

I can never get enough of hiking in the mountains, especially over multiple days – as long as my body agrees. And sharing an experience with other people who love the same thing is my ideal vacation. Books, writing – I don't know how many experiments with novels and short stories I've done over the years – and puzzles of all kinds (including programming challenges, even though I'm a particularly slow coder) are some of the activities that can easily fill my free time.

What's the story behind your blog?

Having always loved tinkering with computers, I think I started writing random things online quite early. If I remember correctly, it was on LiveJournal or MySpace, prehistoric stuff now. I discovered WordPress during high school, following a guy from my same school who wrote ironic essays on philosophy topics. I tried to emulate that model, but I didn't get very far as it wasn't my thing. Years later, with some friends fond of cinema, again on WordPress, I started a collective blog where we wrote our opinions on the movies we watched, often together. The name of the blog – Sweet Sue and Her Society Syncopators – was a tribute to a classic 50s American comedy. (I'll let you work that one out.)

During my PhD, I collaborated on and managed the university cinema club's blog. At the time, however, I also started publishing my very personal ideas on books and movies on another blog, whose name or domain I honestly don't even remember now. I think I tried to recover something from that blog via the Wayback Machine, with no success.

Fast-forward several years, I realized why none of those blogs had survived: I was writing on commission – I loved the perk of press screenings, but writing something afterwards was non-negotiable. Or I was performing for some imagined audience by covering whatever was trending, not what I actually cared about. I could say that my personal blog was born when I decided that my online space would be only a public personal journal: the only rule was to write about what interested me the most, in the way that felt most natural. This is still the reason behind my current blog. How long is it going to survive? I don't know. It did well, so far, with ups and downs.

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

Beyond my hiking recaps, almost everything I write starts from curiosity – a science-based question ("if I ate an apple a day for a year, how many kg of peel could I accumulate?"), something I want to understand well enough to explain, a brain teaser that sometimes keeps me awake. Since it's often something I don't know, a research phase almost always follows – and I admit that, sometimes, it derails my intention to write. I keep a dedicated note for each idea, where I track its evolution. When I feel like I've reached a conclusion of sorts, I then sketch out a structure and use it as a guide for the first draft. Curiously, all my notes are in English, but the first draft of anything I write is always in Italian. Then I translate into English, and very often rewrite some parts that don't flow very well in the other language. And yes, I often use Claude for a final proofread: I've given it strict instructions on what it can and can't touch, and how. The content is always mine, and I'm careful to keep it that way: I don't want to end up with a voice I no longer recognize as my own.

As for the tools, my personal notes live in an Obsidian vault – because they must be plain text files – and I write all my drafts almost exclusively in iA Writer. It's been my first choice for many writing projects, at least in their early stages. One feature I particularly love is its support for authorship, without violating the plain text pact.

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

When I sit down to write the first draft, I have only one need: to be alone in a fairly quiet environment. Honestly, I've never tried writing in a public place, like a café – and the few times I did write on a train, it was surely due to a deadline I couldn't avoid.

As far as I'm concerned, it's more the act of moving through space that stimulates what I might call creative thinking – which I take to mean authentic rather than original, as in "totally new". And I'm also convinced that the environment influences my creativity, but I couldn't say how or why. Often I've only realized much later that I had visited an environment from which I returned with ideas I considered creative – whether these didn't go very far is another, unresolved story.

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

I think I've tried dozens of frameworks to create a blog, starting with the large family of static-site generators. After several attempts, intrigued by some input from Manu, I gave Kirby a chance and discovered that it met all my needs. One above all: my blog's content must be in plain text, as I don't want to deal with any kind of problem taking it with me, wherever it might be in the future. So, for the moment: Kirby CMS, hosted on a fairly basic server managed by Hetzner. The domain is registered on Porkbun, and the DNS is managed by Cloudflare. I've also written a dozen custom plugins to tweak many aspects of my website because, for me, tinkering with the mechanics of a personal blog is part of the joy of having one. I just can't resist – and I keep telling myself "tinker less, write more".

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

I would probably study web design and web technologies properly from the start – I mostly stumbled into this stuff through my day job. I say this to avoid having to settle for some preconfigured service that isn't right for me.

I would love to have a domain like firstname.blog, but the problem isn't availability so much as the popularity of my name. And, honestly, I'm not ready to pay $200 a year for a personal website.

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetising personal blogs?

The maintenance costs for my blog are quite low: 4€ and something a month for the server, plus the annual cost of the domain – about 20€. Kirby CMS requires a one-time license (100€, renewed every four years), and this is the only expense I periodically re-evaluate: the moment it no longer aligns with my needs, I will have no problem planning a migration elsewhere. In fact, I've already done it several times as a stress test, but for now I don't feel the need to.

My website generates no revenue, nor have I ever tried to make it do so. Personally, I have nothing against monetising a personal website, provided it's done honestly. If I were to do it, I probably wouldn't rely on platforms like Substack – only because I like building things myself. Even today I financially support some blogs because I believe in the work of the people behind them – or to give a friend a small nudge to keep going.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

A good part of the blogs I follow, or like to return to from time to time, I discovered thanks to "People & Blogs" – or through "Ye Olde Blogroll". I think it's unlikely that anyone reading this page doesn't know either of them; but if that's the case, I invite you to take a look, exploring even the older, less obvious stuff.

I want to mention a friend's project, halfway between a personal blog and a photography portfolio, that I had the pleasure of contributing to. I'm very fond of it: partly for my friendship with the author, and partly because it circles a theme that has quietly followed me for years: the sense of belonging to a place, or to multiple places; the idea, the concept, the experience of what we call home. The project is "Stay Stay Stay" by Elettra Pistoni: if you're not into reading about this topic, her pictures are well worth a look. I also think she would more than gladly welcome the opportunity for this interview, but I'll leave the decision to those in charge.

I've lost count of how many newsletters or feeds I've subscribed to over the years, and it doesn't really matter. I've reached the point where the list of online content I follow consistently has no more than ten items. Among these, two blogs and a newsletter (in Italian) that I return to quite regularly, even to reread older things:

• "Useful Fictions" by Cate Hall
• Julia Evans's blog, a trove for tech enthusiasts
• The newsletter "It's Friday I'm (not) in love", partly inspired by "Modern Love", the New York Times' well-known column.

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

I'll take this as a cue to share a bit of what's going through my head – two thoughts and a side project that will maybe see the light someday.

• Whenever I feel like telling someone "I don't have time", I stop and remind myself that it's almost never true. In fact, never. It's just my fear of making a commitment, or a lack of courage to admit what I really care about. I try never to hide behind this excuse with the people I really care about, because they don't deserve it. I've also written a short post about it.
• This could be one of my guiding tenets, because I haven't been able to refute it yet: "Actions, not words, reveal our real values". It's not mine, and I often struggle to accept it myself. But I'm convinced that if we actually lived by it, we would have far more genuine and satisfying relationships with other people – in whatever sense you want to take that.
• Being a hiker obsessed with traveling light, I started working on an app (web only to begin with) that lets me keep track of my gear and which items I decide to bring on each trip. Dozens of these tools already exist, but this is my vision of what I'd want such an app to do. I called it "Baseweight", and I hope to have an alpha version out in the near future. If someone is curious, the app's future home will be at baseweight.my. And if you'd like to share your thoughts on it, don't hesitate to reach out! Opinions and suggestions are especially welcome at this early stage.

Finally, a heartfelt thanks to Manu for offering me the opportunity to share a bit of myself with this community!

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

A native Scotsman, albeit half German, living in the beautiful, cosmopolitan, and windy city of Edinburgh. I live with my partner and two Burmese cats. I'm a digital product designer, founder, and aspiring entrepreneur with a long-standing love for minimalism and rock climbing. But I'm also interested in fashion, architecture, tennis, cycling, football, and, admittedly, experimenting with AI tools too. Right now, I'm working in the field of chat communication, creative tooling such as 3D mockup production, and a bit of consultation when I have the time. Slowly preparing for a probable life where my skills are surpassed by robot while trying to figure out how to independently survive and thrive.

What's the story behind your blog?

I think I created my blog around 2011, which was pretty much focused on design curation. Predictably named after myself, I was simply sharing aesthetic things I liked and it helped shape my taste at the time. My personal site has taken on a few different forms and functions over the years, but since 2020 it's been exclusively a blog — a digital space where I can think in public. The topics vary a bit, but typically I'll be yapping about projects I've worked on, perspectives on procedural design, and the occasional lifestyle story or social experiment. I don't write as often as I'd like or once did, and I think the main reason for this is that I've stopped reading and listening to books for the past year or so. Reading seems to fuel my writing, but I'm prioritising creative output over consumption right now. I reckon this will change next year though.

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

My writing process varies depending on the topic. If I'm blogging about work I've done, there's very little research I need to do. It's just a free-flowing explanation of what I've made. Yet, if it's more of a thought-piece, then I'll make a note of the topic and some references that have inspired the thought because I also like to cite those if I can. I'll then start drafting in iA Writer. I'll usually leave it a few days or weeks and come back to it. When I feel like I have a decent post, I'll share it with robot to proof and get some feedback — mostly grammar, structure, and light shaping. I tend to take a bit more care in what I publish on my blog than when I journal offline.

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

I enjoy silence or natural sounds if I really need to use my head. It's really the only way I can truly focus. But sometimes I love to write with instrumental music (house or techno) if I'm running with an idea that requires a little less attention. In terms of the physical environment, space matters, but I'm pretty flexible. Normally, it's when I'm home in my office or stretched out on my sofa, locked in by my cats. And I'll only ever write on my laptop — never on my phone.

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

The site is built on Kirby CMS, where all my posts are published as markdown. The domain is registered with Hover and is hosted by Hetzner. I tend to follow Manu's advice when it comes to such things, even if he insists he has no clue what he's doing.

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

I probably would have moved to Kirby sooner. It's a fantastic CMS, even for a basic blog. But I also use it for my portfolio, so I feel like I get a lot out of it. And as it's modular, it can be as light or as heavy as you need it to be. No built-in bloat. There are other super lightweight blog-specific solutions out there that I like the look of, but not enough to convince me to change. In terms of doing things differently from a writing perspective, I think we naturally express ourselves differently as life happens. Looking back, I think some of my posts might have tried too hard to be intellectual, but I think I've generally maintained a consistent tone of voice, which I like.

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetising personal blogs?

I don't monetise my blog, so it earns nothing in a tangible sense. But if it helps me connect with people, whether sentimentally or collaboratively, that's good enough for me. The domain is $19 per year, Kirby is a one-off payment of around $115, and hosting is on a shared server, so I don't pay anything for that.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

These are all worth a look:

• thewonger.com
• davidreina.com
• thu-le.com
• electricgecko.de
• arun.is/blog

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

There are a few projects I've worked on that I'd like to share:

• Local Log: a simple offline journalling macOS app to log thoughts through text or video.
• The Forest: a place to get lost on the web for a while.
• 099 SPLY: a minimal web app for creatives to generate and download mockups.

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

I'm a programmer-type from rural Minnesota. I grew up on a farm near a small town. Now I live in a bustling city of 27,000 people…surrounded by farmland. In other words, I'm still in rural Minnesota.

I studied computer science at a small private college, which led to my 26-year career programming computers. First it was at an insurance company, then it was at a SaaS startup, and now it's for myself at a little company I run with my business partner.

My hobbies are mostly typical: reading, watching movies, and the occasional video game (meaning Fortnite). My favorite sport is baseball, though I'll watch the occasional other sport. I also try to do a little woodworking, cooking, and, well, blogging. Blogging is a hobby, yes?

What's the story behind your blog?

I decided to start a blog in 2004. Personal blogs were popping up all over, and I was enjoying meeting new people through the comments section in these blogs. I also have a couple non-blogging friends that were doing their thing on Xanga. The blogs I followed were either friends, friends of friends, about the Minnesota Twins (baseball), or about U.S. news and politics.

Online I generally use the handle bjhess. That was what my college gave me for my first ever user account. Toward the end of college I was looking for a domain name, and unfortunately there was already a techy person with my first and last name who grabbed that obvious option. (They still have the domain to this day!) So bjhess.com it was, and the name stuck.

I blogged via b2evolution and WordPress in the early days, probably at Dreamhost. In the early 2010s I switched over to a self-hosted and customized install of Scanty, and I ran that for a long time. In 2022 I switched to an HTML-only site. That lasted about a year before I and my colleagues built Pika.

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

I don't have a system or process for blogging. My inspiration is generally from interesting things happening in my life. That can be a vacation, a recent discovery, an experiment that I'm trying, or a feeling that I'm feeling.

Most of my posts are written in a single session, with a couple rounds of editing for grammar, tone, and flow. There's only been one occasion where I asked others to read my writing before posting. I've recently tried the "weekly update" format of posts, which to this point has been me adding links and notes to a draft leading up to finalizing the post on Friday or Saturday. I'm toying with updating the draft post daily throughout the week before publishing, but then if I'm doing that I wonder if I should…just post those daily updates daily?

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

Inspiration comes and goes, but I generally prefer to have quiet while writing, whether that's natural or simulated via headphones.

Aside from that basic need, I don't strongly believe that physical spaces influence my creativity. However, I've been noticing that my office is in a state of constant clutter…and I'm starting to believe. Now the question is whether that clutter impacts the mind or whether the cluttered mind leads to a physical manifestation? A little of both, I think.

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

Today, and for the rest of my life, my blog is hosted at Pika. I write my posts directly in the web editor.

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

I would start my blog on Pika, naturally!

I believe pretty strongly that most bloggers probably would be better off not rolling their own static site generators or CMS installations. For those that want to play in that world, though, there's nothing like it. For the rest of us there are a number of small, independent blogging platforms that make things quite a bit easier. They all tend to play nice together, offering exporting and importing options if you ever find a different platform to be a better fit for your style.

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetising personal blogs?

If I were paying for my Pika account, it would be $60 per year, and my domain is $13 per year. Not bad for a favorite hobby! I pay $9/month for Plausible analytics, though I'm not entirely sure why. As a programmer, I think it's mainly that I want a place to look to see any weird happenings to make sure nothing is amiss. If traffic to my blog disappeared, I'd be curious if I did something wrong technically to cause it.

All's fair for monetizing. I don't do it, but I know affiliate links and such make sense in some contexts.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

Let me dial up my feed reader here. Okay, for a selection…

I'm not sure how Chris Glass keeps his daily photo journal going, but it's great. Rafał Pastuszak does fascinating things at Untested. Adam Keys is usually thinking. Since Luke moved away from my area, I like to read what's going through his mind on recursion. I travel vicariously through MacPsych. Maique gives me all the photo inspiration. Holy cats, Jamie Todd Rubin is an avid reader. Brendon Bigley provides cool video game news. Annie lends me insight. Davey and Jamie share lives well lived. I also like to keep up with Derek Sivers, Hugh Howey, Craig Mod, and Cabel Sasser (I still need to read the 2025 snacks rundown). Oh, and, boy howdy, Mike Monteiro.

Any of the above who haven't been interviewed would be a great option to interview next!

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

I won't be shy — I'm working on Pika and I would greatly appreciate it if you gave Pika a look. Our biggest project at the moment is The Pika Pulse, which will be a great help to discover Pika blogs. I think that's a good thing for the readers of People and Blogs!

Mostly, though, I'd like more people to blog. I want people of all ages and backgrounds sharing their experiences at their own domain online. Whether you do that via Pika or any other setup or service (yes, even WordPress), I'll be excited! See you online!

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

What's going on, Internet? Kia ora, I'm fLaMEd 🔥. I'm originally from Te Awa Kairangi (Lower Hutt), now living in Tāmaki Makaurau (Auckland), Aotearoa, New Zealand with my wife and two kids.

I get up every morning at 4:30 am to get to the gym before the kids get up and the day begins. I've recently picked up golf again, but find less time for that than I do for website work.

You can get a better idea of what I'm into over at my website, Flamed Fury.

I'm not a developer, not a designer, just a guy who loves the web.

What's the story behind your blog?

Flamed Fury started in 1999. It's been through more versions than I can properly count, but the rough timeline: 5 versions before it became a personal blog, a few side quests at different domains inbetween, and finally 4 versions in the 2020 era when I landed back at flamedfury.com where I started.

Started in summer 1999 on one of the free hosts, I don't remember (probably cjb.net). Moved to sweeetnet.com in 2000 through hanging out in the #sweeet IRC channel. A guy called kertiz from #sweeet took pity on my design skills and gave me a proper redesign, then stuck around contributing. Another guy fitty-two joined in. We iterated every couple of years until the dot-com bubble burst, advertising money dried up and the IRC crew drifted apart. I tried to keep it going by myself with a 2002 layout that wasn't great. But "blog" isn't really the word for any of this. The 1999–2003 version was effectively microblogging before microblogging was a thing, built around a niche (lifestyle magazine style, lol) before niche blogging was a thing either. We just didn't have the vocabulary yet.

November 2003 was when Flamed Fury became a blog in the way I'd recognise the format today. Posts about polytech, nights out, whatever was going on. That lasted until 2005, then I parked it and tried being "more adult" at another domain through 2006–2008. Took a break as MySpace, Bebo, Facebook and Twitter took over. Came back in 2012 with a niche barbeque blog and carried on with it for six years before archiving the whole thing in 2018, once I realised how much I absolutely loathed niche recipe blogging.

Revived the fLaMEd persona in 2019 on a new domain (Hugo + Netlify). In 2021 I settled back on flamedfury.com with Eleventy on Neocities. Two redesigns later and a move to a local VPS, here we are.

Every version of this site, going back to 1999, has been the same instinct: a personal site as a place to be yourself on the web. The 1999 version was more of a microblogging website with three friends collaborating around celebrity magazine scans, that's where the era pointed. The 2026 version is the opposite. Everything and nothing, no algorithm to satisfy, no brand. Different tools, same instinct.

There's a longer version of this story I'll get round to writing on the site soon. It's in draft, I promise. Hit me up if you want to see me finish it.

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

Inspiration for what I put and write on my website comes from across the web and life experiences. A gig, a new record, a beer, a trip with the family, or any number of posts I find across the web gets me thinking. Storytelling, sharing my experiences and interests.

I love monthly recaps to populate my now page, reflections of last night's gig, new (usually local) music finds, a fun time out with my friends or family.

Drafts begin as a note on my phone, my notebook before I find myself with a spare opportunity at my computer.

I'll begin with these rough notes and begin fleshing them out. I'll have a couple of tabs open to grab details and links of what I'm talking about to sprinkle through the post.

Sometimes I'll start a draft and they'll sit there for days, weeks, and sometimes months in an untracked markdown file in Codium.

Depending on what I'm writing about I won't have any proof reading. If I'm writing about something topical about the web I'll often have xandra or one of the other 32-Bit Cafe crew read over it and give me some pointers or a thumbs up.

Then after sitting on it for a minute, an hour or a day, I'll publish it.

Other pages on the website will get worked on and usually published in unfinished states and I'll continue to work on these over time — nothing is ever really finished is it?

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

My ideal creative environment is in my home office, at my desk or couch in silence. I might listen to a few songs or watch a couple music videos to get me in the zone, but when it comes to focus time, all noise off and I work in silence, often talking to myself.

If I'm away from home and I get a moment to myself, it's either at a table, kitchen bench or an arm chair. Hopefully with silence, but usually with the chaos of family life going on around me.

Our kids are young, they're busy, noisy and need lots of attention so focus time these days is few and far between :)

Do I believe the physical space influences my creativity? Heck yeah, if I'm not in the office, then a walk around the block or through the village listening to music will help me get creative — as long as I get those thoughts out of my head before they dissapear. If I'm travelling, then any beautiful location might inspire some spark.

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

I use Eleventy for building my website. I originally started with Eleventy Excellent by Lene Saile, but it's evolved beyond that over the years. I often check in with her when she releases new versions to make sure I take in any key updates, but also find some changes I've made find their way back into the starter template :)

These days flamedfury.com runs on an NZ-based VPS to keep the site close to home. I use a local domain registrar for my domains.

Deployment is a simple npm run build then rsync directly to the VPS.

To participate in the web, I've implemented a bunch of IndieWeb features, Webmentions, h-cards, h-entries and of course provide a number of Atom/RSS/JSON feeds which are syndicated to Mastodon through EchoFeed to meet people where they are.

My Bookmarks are backed by the 32-Bit Cafe's instance of Linkding and pulled into my website at build time and shared via Atom/RSS/JSON and EchoFeed.

I run an instance of Forgejo on my homeserver and commit the project there multiple times a day.

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

I don't think so. If anything I would have tried to preserve everything rather than ditching things over the years. I've managed to recover a lot of the old stuff through old CD-Roms where I'd burnt old versions of the website or from the Wayback Machine.

I would have definitely tried to keep in contact with a lot of the old crew from IRC. We drifted apart before it was easy to keep in contact with each other. I do regret losing those early relationships.

I'm really happy with how I've managed to salvage a lot of the old stuff and merge it into what the website is today. It really is a labour of love.

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetising personal blogs?

All in NZD. The domain is $39/year and my VPS is $82/year. All the other infrastructure on my home network is sunk cost over the years and I'm not sure how I'd put a $ value against that.

I haven't made money from my website since 2001 along with the original internet advertising bubble burst. I did have a go with ads and affiliate marketing with the barbeque blog, but that left a sour taste in my mouth. I'm a fan of services like ko-fi and the like but haven't looked into setting it up for myself — not sure if anyone would be interested in supporting me.

I throw money at the 32-Bit Cafe's ko-fi and contribute to infrastructure costs there as well as my time to help moderate and run the forums and will throw other bloggers tips here and there through their ko-fis, and will buy sticker packs wherever I see them being sold in the wider hobby web community.

When I need some new graphics for the website I'm always on the look out for a commission and will happily pay for talented graphic designers services.

I support a few independent journalists through their newsletters that I enjoy reading and support a local independent news/media website to help keep the lights on there as I enjoy their local content. A great way to keep up with what's going on in the country and the world without the doom-and-gloom.

What's my position on people monetising personal blogs? Go for it as long as it's not intrusive or full of dark patterns. Keep it personal and creative. I love the sticker packs or graphic commissions.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

So many to mention!

• Chris Burnell — we've become great friends over the years. I love to bounce ideas with; dev, IndieWeb, beer, music.
• Xandra — xandra is my small web bestie and I've got to know her pretty well over the years through the Cafe.
• yequari — another of the Cafe barista team. The driving force behind our infrastructure endeavours. His new project webweav.ing recently launched a guestbook service that I'm using on Flamed Fury.
• jay, fyr, key, and rodrick — all my fellow 32-Bit Cafe baristas who help running and making the Cafe an awesome place to hangout.
• Cory Dransfeldt — another I've chatted to heaps with over the past few years. We have heaps of the same interests. His media collection and the direction he's taken his website is "beyond amazing".
• Robb Knight — Robb always has a new and interesting project to check out. I'm always picking up neat things to add to my website from his.
• america's decline — not often seen outside of the Neocities circles, but one of my favourites on Neocities. A throwback to my favourite era of the web, music, celeb, pop culture, and fantastic graphics.
• shellsharks — an indie web powerhouse and curator of the fantastic scrolls weekly.
• James — another indie web powerhouse. James's blog is full of thoughtful and insightful posts about the web and has recently launched a new podcast centered around the independent web, Wonders of Web Weaving.

More at my blogroll and links pages.

Who do I think you should be interviewing next? Hit up Chris Burnell if you have time before wrapping the project up :)

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

If you're into making websites, or you want to start you should most definitely come and check out the 32-Bit Cafe — our small community of the web where we welcome hobby web developers of all skill levels and help each other out building our websites. We have monthly web weaving workshops, discussion forums, and other fantastic services offered free for the community and join in on the discussion at our forums.

Plugging my own stuff, check out my record collection, and my ever growing list of bookmarks.

And for all the readers out there, keep building the web you want to be part of. There's so much great stuff going on out here. Laterz 🤙

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

Hey, I'm Piri. I'm a software designer, engineer, and artist of sorts. I build Kinopio, and have been blogging about the craft of making software for 12+ years (:O).

I went to school in Toronto for biology and urban planning. There I learned that I liked illustration a lot more than writing boring reports and papers.

After school, I got a job at a startup as an illustrator, that turned into product design, when also turned into writing code so I could build the ideas in my head.

What's the story behind your blog?

I can't remember a time when I didn't have some kind of blog. In university, I met a lot of new friends around the world by doing more angst-y cringe-y livejournal-y style writing.

I started designing pketh.org while on a flight to SF, paid for by Yahoo, for a job interview at Flickr (times sure have changed).

If you’re curious about the green design, I was inspired by the 1956 Jaguar D-Type, which I still think has such a unique prototype race car shape.

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

My posts are usually long essays that take about a week or two to write and produce, so I try and make them timeless.

When I have an idea for a post, I'll make a Kinopio space for it and collect thoughts, images, and URLs in it for a while. If after weeks or months it’s still on my mind, I'll start connecting and organizing everything into a rough outline.

From there I'll start pasting things in and typing it up in either IA Writer or TextEdit. When the draft is done, I usually have someone proof-read it and use that feedback to make final edits. Then the final HTML formatting bits are done in my code editor of choice, SublimeText.

Writing is like a muscle that atrophies when you don't use it. Mine's out of shape so the process is quite painful. When I finally git push a new post out to the world, I just want to lie down and never get up again. Probably related, but I end up throwing away 1/2 to 2/3 of what I write in a blog post.

If I had the time to write more often I suspect it'd get easier. I think I could get pretty good at it.

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

I prefer different places and tools depending on where I'm at in the process. I collect notes, inspiration, and connect related ideas wherever I am, usually on my phone.

I like doing the early writing stage in a coffee shop or in bed. Anywhere that doesn't make me feel like I’m doing “Real Work™” yet.

When I get really into it, I like to type on a desk with a good keyboard (I'm a big HHKB fan), on a screen big enough for me to keep my context windows (dictionary.app, Kinopio spaces, related web pages) next to my writing window.

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

My blog uses Jekyll and is published on Github Pages. The domain stuff is done through Hover. It's quite basic.

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

I might use something newer and nicer than Jekyll, but it would probably be compiled from markdown files the same way.

The current design is a bit of a Ship of Theseus that I've been slowly and gently updating it over years, so it's kind of grown on me.

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetizing personal blogs?

I think the domain name is $20~/yr and I think that's it.

I'm split on blogs with paid content:

If writing is your job, then monetizing somehow totally makes sense. Quality independent writing and journalism is really important and should be compensated (I like Craig Mod's approach).

But for basically everyone else, blogging is a thing they do on the side for fun, and I think it sucks when people feel pressured to turn everything they do into a passive-income side-hustle potential-business-empire.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

Skimming the depths of my RSS feeds, I realized that I’ve subscribed to literally 1000s of blogs. But sadly most have withered away over the ages.

Funkaoshi has been around for even longer than I've been writing – I consider the author my Toronto blogging senpai.

I really enjoy Alexotos' in depth mechanical keyboard reviews.

It's really cool and encouraging to see newer people blogging the same way we did. Lilly Ashton’s blog is worth reading If you're looking for something more personal and cozy.

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

Since 2018, I've been building Kinopio, a spatial note-taking tool to collect and connect your thoughts, ideas, and plans. You can use it to make sense of your thorniest problems and grow your coolest new ideas into plans. I hope you enjoy it.

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

My name's rmf. My legal name's not terribly hard to find, but I like to keep it lightly buried just so my 2006 blog isn't the first thing you find when you search for my name. I'm a native of the Netherlands, where I reside. I live in a small city with my partner; she's an archaeologist and I'm a botanist, though I currently teach museum anthropology classes. I went from doing science, to teaching science, to teaching culture. I've never believed in restricting a whole human life to one field of study, so I'm having a blast.

My computer skills have always been self-taught. While I was in middle school I fiddled with Microsoft Paint and from there on I got to grips with ever more advanced graphic software (currently GIMP and Inkscape). In high school I liked to make videos with my friends which I edited in Windows Movie Maker, which lead to an ongoing on-and-off hobby of video editing (in Kdenlive). In 2002, I set up a WYSIWYG website which lead to me learning HTML and later CSS and, later still, PHP. Right now I do some graphics stuff for my job in education, such as making instruction sheets, posters and some other small-time stuff, but really, pretty much all my computing is done in my free time, for fun. I think that's a blessing - I don't have to work with anything I don't want to work with and do everything I do for the love of the game.

Beside that I make soap which is part hobby, part side job. I enjoy tinkering with technology, so I have lots of esoteric hifi equipment, some old games consoles, old calculators... if it can be tinkered with, I like it. I enjoy writing prose and poetry and have recently been getting into fermenting and pickling, though I am subordinate to my partner in that. She's the head of pickling and fermenting, I take care of the old electronics; she draws and paints, I write; and then at the end of the day, we cook together.

What's the story behind your blog?

I started my website in 2002 and by 2003 I had a little update box to briefly communicate whatever I was doing with the site. That update box turned into a shoutbox of my random thoughts and as those got a bit longer and rantier every time, in October 2005 I turned it into a blog. Blogging was the thing to do at the time and so, at age sixteen, I figured I had enough to say to warrant a stab at the practice.

It was all coded by hand: no CMS or JavaScript, just handwritten HTML with the appearance of a blog. It was all over the shop, subjectwise. A fair amount of it had to do with palaeontology and/or me being an epic atheist - ups and downs. It was simply named 'blog' and it changed over the years with the design of the site but all in all, it was very simple. No RSS, no comments, just static HTML pages updated manually. The surprising thing to me is that I had an audience - I got somewhat regular emails about my posts.

I blogged until 2009. I did that classic thing of writing fewer and fewer posts and finally announcing a newer, better blog hosted at Blogger. I wrote a grand total of 4 posts for it, stopped for a year, and finally took it down. I lost interest and so, it petered out.

Cut to 2026, I'm reading a few more blogs than I had been for the past several years and I start to get the blogging bug again. Or perhaps the bug was dormant and now reawakening. I'd been considering it for a while but specifically, funnily enough, after reading your article about stopping the People & Blogs series, I got inspired to pick up the pen again.

Over the last decade I've written on and off for a couple of magazines and I had a regular column in a local newspaper for a while. I think my intrusive blogging thoughts started when that column went away - I like to write, it's something of a compulsive thing, and while the newspaper let me write practically whatever I wanted, it still had some constraints such as length, a certain form, and at the end of the day, some amount of harmlessness. It had to be a column - it could make the readers think, but not too much or about controversial things.

So the blog suddenly popped into my head as a perfect fit. Whatever topic I want, whatever length, whatever form. And so in 2026, I picked up blogging again. I did write a CMS and some code for an RSS feed - other than that, I tried to keep the form of the blog as close to the original as possible.

And again, to my surprise, there are people reading this blog. I'm clueless as to how they're finding it, buried in a subsection of my site as it is, but I'm getting emails again. A grand total of two people suggested I give the blog a name, which I did. It's now called 'bakelite & roses', a name I explain at baccyflap.com/prs/blog/2026/?m=03#1773065697.

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

My inspiration comes from whatever happens to me. So far I've written about umbrellas, tamagotchi, deadly accidents, CD collections and some other stuff - that's the most liberating thing to me, getting to write whatever the hell I want. I like it to be interesting, to have some novel (to me) observations in it, but other than that, it's just whatever occurs to me. It's comparable to the columns I used to write in that sense - I write them quick, maybe give them a quick read later on, and then just post. I'll often read them to my partner who will usually describe them as 'cute', which is good enough for me.

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

I write wherever. Back when I had deadlines I'd slack off right until the final hour and then just use whatever's to hand. I've written a few on my phone but I suppose I mostly write on my laptop, just because it's faster. I'll do it at home, on the go, at work, wherever inspiration strikes.

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

My site's hosted on a buddy's server. He runs a small IT company so he takes care of the domain too - it's an old arrangement and we're sticking with it. I pay him, he pays the bills.

The blog itself is written in PHP - when I restarted in 2026 I finally wrote a backend, still pretty primitive but it makes my life a bit easier and crucially, it enabled me to provide an RSS feed. I type a post into a dirt simple little CMS and hit 'post' to add the post to a JSON file, which the RSS feed also pulls from. I may provide the source code at some point, when it's not as hokey as it is now.

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

Well, I started it in January, which is pretty close to today, so I think I'm all good. I guess, looking back at my old posts, I do sometimes cringe at them. I added a disclaimer to those posts, just to distance myself from the bad ones. But I didn't remove them - they still reflect who I was at the time and in some weird way, who I am now. I wouldn't be honouring teen me by removing any of it and looking back I guess I could say I'd wish I'd written better stuff... but you know what, that's what I wanted to write at the time and as confident as I was of my own intellect at the time, so I am now about the public's capacity to contextualise these posts. There are wonderful, thoughtful posts in there, but also some dubious stuff, and some garbage. So short answer: I think it's perfect, wouldn't change a thing.

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetising personal blogs?

I pay my buddy €100 a year to cover his costs and so he can write me a bill which is good for his company. It generates precisely nothing, which is how I like it. People can do whatever they want with their blogs but for me, it's just a bit of fun in my free time. No Patreons and Ko-fis for me - I know everyone wants to turn every aspect of their lives into a revenue stream these days, but for me, it's just a way to reach out.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

Of all blogs, the one I've been reading for the longest (22 years!) is Pharyngula. Out of all the 'new atheist' types, PZ Myers is one of the few who did not turn out to be a dirtbag. He stuck to his progressive guns and has as sharp a pen as ever. For the sheer dedication of the author it's worth a read, whether the range of topics is up your street or not.

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

I'm currently working on a podcast, a bit of a personal project that has been taking more of my time than I thought it would. Currently in the outline stage, it'll take some time before I can finally start recording. It is driving home to me that making a podcast is, at the best of times, an effortless thing that very few people know how to do well. I honestly don't like most podcasts but one I've been enjoying, one of those podcasts that springs up on you and just keeps on giving, is Bread & Bananas, a podcast about Kampung Gelam, an old neighbourhood of Singapore, made and presented by three inhabitants of said neighbourhood. And if you're wondering why on Earth this would be a topic of interest to anyone outside that neighbourhood... well, just give it a listen. It's chill, it's thoughtful, it'll surprise you. Six episodes so far, a new one every couple of months.

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

Hi, my name is Nicola Losito. Born in the mid-70s in Bari, I lived through the first wave (in Italy) of the television invasion of Japanese cartoons—which I would later discover are called anime—and US TV series like the A-Team, Knight Rider, CHiPs, Dukes of Hazard, MacGyver, and many others. Other playmates were American comics and the first consoles (Atari, Intellivision, Commodore). Finally, I remember with immense love the long afternoons riding around on a Vespa, or in the garage with friends taking apart and putting back together our Vespas, fixing the small hiccups that cropped up or trying to make them go faster. All this led me to university studies in Mechanical Engineering until a break to give 10 months of my life to Military Service, which was mandatory in my day. Upon my return, I had missed the boat with my studies and, by then twenty-five, I finally convinced my parents that the computer was not just a toy but a multipurpose tool. I also discovered I had a bit of a knack for it, so I changed my field of study and city, graduating in Computer Science.

Two years ago I received a great gift, a new heart from a 27-year-old guy that today allows me to continue living with my wife and see our son grow up. Comics, science fiction novels, motorcycles, and padel (instead of the tennis I played so much as a kid) are still part of my life.

I continue to read superhero comics, along with more mature European and Japanese productions, with the recent addition of a couple of Korean authors. I ride a Ducati Monster 1200S, and my son and I are venturing into the world of minicross with an unfortunate LEM 50 DX3.

Perhaps you have noticed that I have not told you about my job yet, because especially after the long period of illness and having re-evaluated the priorities of things, now for me it is just a task I have to face, something I no longer believe in and for which I can no longer get excited. Anyway, I have an anecdote to share: I found a job opportunity thanks to participating in a motorcycle mailing list for two or three years. The interactions on the list made me "interesting" or "reliable" enough that another member of the list eventually called me and invited me to participate in a selection process at the company where he had already been working for a dozen years. I started for fun, and it’s been twenty years now that I’ve been at the CNR. The lesson is: never rule out participating in something that interests you; you never know where life, passions, and the people you meet will take you.

What's the story behind your blog?

As far as I can remember, I started coming across "blogs" towards the end of 2001, and certainly by 2002 several college friends had one. Thanks to the advent of an Italian blogging platform very similar to the current Blogger (it was called Splinder), on February 28, 2003, I took the plunge and opened my first blog on that platform, starting to interact with all the other bloggers (essentially Italians) who had an account there, or on other then-nascent platforms. In September 2004, I registered my first and current domain, installed WordPress release 1.2, and imported the old content. Since then, I haven't left the platform, and I believe the current incarnation of https://koolinus.net/blog has only been re-installed once during these twenty-two years, performing updates release after release. Over time, I participated more actively in the international blogosphere, spanning various platforms: Live Journal, Jaiku, and WordPress.com practically since it was born in 2006 when I joined it to publish in English…

Today my online activities are concentrated on the "historic" blog in Italian; I’ve made nicolalosito.it my personal space for English language content and I use Scribble for micro-blogging. I’ve always used Tumblr as a pinboard for images and quotes that strike me, and another instance of WordPress on a hidden subdomain to occasionally publish something more intimate that I felt like writing anyway.

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

I essentially publish in three distinct ways:

1. I curate a regular and periodic column called linklog on both the Italian and English blogs, where since May 2015 I have been publishing interesting URLs that I collect (currently on Bear) during my daily browsing;
2. I publish how-tos on how I solve specific IT problems (which happens VERY rarely today, unlike in the past);
3. I publish on the emotional wave that a song, a quote, a photo, or a dialog triggers in me. These days I mull things over a lot in my head, and I very rarely expose my thoughts publicly in writing.

A recent and controversial post you wrote, Manuel, is exemplary of why I have this attitude. This then resulted in me sharing the following quote which somewhat summarizes the current mood:

The fact is that certain things you can only say to those you know can understand them. Which is also the reason we talk so little about what really matters to us.

by Enrico Galiano, Eppure Cadiamo Felici

Anyway, in all these modes, I write directly in the WordPress editor (Gutenberg), publish, and then make grammatical and typographical corrections. As someone once said, the publish button is the best editor. WordPress database maintenance plugins are my great friends.

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

Over the course of these twenty-two years, I’ve written just about everywhere: airports, hospital beds, car seats, cafe tables, desks at home or in the office. Very often with a soundtrack in the background, though in recent weeks often without music to accompany me. I’m working from home a lot—I’m "full remote"—and my neighbors are renovating. So the construction noises are more than enough as ‘white noise’.

As I mentioned, I write directly on the computer, so I do not use notebooks or anything else.

In my personal case, it is the inspiration of the moment that drives my writing, so the fact that I can immediately put my thoughts into bytes depends only on having a keyboard and an active internet connection available. In short, physical space in the strict sense has never compromised the desire or the possibility to knock out a post.

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

My domains are all currently registered with the European provider OVH. For a few years now, I’ve been using SupportHost for hosting, after having tried almost all the big names in the industry: BlueHost, SiteGround, GreenGeeks along with a couple of national ISPs… problems arose with all of them sooner or later. Since my friend Lino Sabato told me about this company and I migrated all my content, I’ve become a happy and (above all) listened-to customer, and every time I’ve recommended this provider, those who migrated in turn have only thanked me.

So to recap, I’m on a cPanel-based hosting, and I use WordPress as a CMS. I’m tempted to switch to something static, but so far I haven't found the courage or the time to approach it. Who knows if 2026 will see me make progress on this front.

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

One thing I question a lot is the fact that I somehow gave in to splitting my nickname and my name; at many times, keeping a nickname associated with certain concepts would have allowed me to talk about them freely, without potential repercussions in real life. Having created a point of contact between these two parts is perhaps something I regret. Given how today's tech world has developed and is developing, guarding your anonymity with tooth and nail, or at least clearly separating public and private, is an effort that should be made at the expense of convenience.

For me and for the vast majority of early bloggers, this is no longer possible. It serves as a warning, however, to those starting today or about to start (or for my son when he enters the web).

From a practical point of view, however, I think the important thing is to choose any platform to start on and get a "feel" for your desire to tell your story, making sure you can export what you've written to another platform later on.

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetising personal blogs?

I chose a hosting solution that allows me to have several domains (as well as sub-domains) within the same plan. I think this year we reached about €200 including taxes. I host 4 blogs for other friends, including a couple belonging to a friend who recently passed away, who contribute to the expense. Then there are the costs of the .it and .net domains, which run between €11 and €16. Could I save money? Probably yes, but currently I sleep soundly and I don't have any malfunctions (especially because for one of the domains I heavily use the email provided with the hosting plan and I have never, and I mean never, encountered a problem).

On monetization, as expressed by almost all the friends already interviewed, I am indifferent to the fact that there are people who make blogging a profession. As long as this is done while respecting the reader and not treating them like a fool or a fruit to be squeezed, I can tolerate even the most aggressive ads or pop-ups. But when everything becomes self-referential and closed in an ecosystem, then I stop following.

Personally, I try to support some authors by buying software, with a donation – either monetary or, occasionally, purchasing hardware or something else I read they are interested in. I support your work Manuel, and another couple of pals, with the 1 dollar a month initiative.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

I would have certainly pointed you to Luca, but as I mentioned, he passed away in the first days of march 2026. I would like to give visibility to Luigi Mozzillo and Nicola D'Agostino author, among other things, of the Stories of Apple project which in my opinion hasn't received the love it deserved from the public.

Then there are people who don't have a blog but passionately curate newsletters. Is it okay to mention them too? In that case, I’d say the work of Anne-Laure Le Cunff is certainly noteworthy. I also really like the reflections of Tobias van Schneider both on his blog and in his newsletter. Among Italian newsletters, I’d highlight those by Gianvito Fanelli, the Polpette (meatballs) di Vanz, and everything Mafe De Baggis writes. I could probably write a whole post about the newsletters I follow.

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

I'm not the type of person to suggest things off the cuff; what I like or inspires me is regularly described in the pages of my blogs.

I would like to share these ‘life tips’ instead.

• Start being honest with yourself as soon as possible.
• Eliminate what you don't like from your life, or confine it to a cage, and don't let it eat up what is important to you. Remember that work is a gas that expands to occupy all the space it is given.
• You must be consistent with the things you say, even if it's often inconvenient.
• I believe you have to be kind regardless. A great luxury in life is being able to afford to trust others, even when they prove they don't deserve it, and thus not be too damaged by it.
• Above all, don't put off until some random tomorrow the things that make you feel good or make you happy; proceed step by step but without hesitating, and allow yourself to experience every single milestone. Tomorrow morning you don't know what will become of you or the world.

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

Hyde Stevenson is a nickname I've been using online for years. It's a mix from Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, and its author Robert Louis Stevenson. Privacy is important to me, so I generally avoid using my real name.

My parents are from Serbia, but I was born in Paris. I lived in London, and, now, I live in southern Europe. More vitamin D was needed in my life.

I had two passions as a kid: sport, and computers.

Sport has always been a big part of my life.

When I was a kid, all my friends played football, but I was always more into basketball. I don't mind watching a good football game, but that's where it ends.

But, basketball is another thing. I'm a big Nikola Jokic fan, and I haven't missed a Denver game for the last four years.

When we were kids, we all dreamt about the NBA. There weren't many games available to watch. We had one guy who ordered games on tape direct from the US. Then, we shared, and copied them. Basketball was our life. We played at school, after the school, the weekends. We were chasing the best playgrounds to compete with other players. It was great.

It was the end of the 80s. Bird, Magic, Jordan, the Pistons Bad Boys, and also Yugoslavian players like Vlade Divac and Dražen Petrovic. The Dream Team too, the real one. I'll always wonder what might've happened if the war in the Balkans hadn't happened and the USA and Yugoslavia had played each other in the Olympics final.

That love for the game made me play at a semi-pro level. But, a bad coach put me off the courts. I was young and didn't understand why I couldn't play more when I knew I had the level. I remember one shooting training where I got 46/50 on 3pts, and the guy behind me got 36/50. Did the coach say something to me? Nope.

That was enough, and I took a break from the game for a few years to pursue another passion: boxing.

My love of boxing probably stems from those nights when my father would wake me up at 4am to watch Mike Tyson's fights.

I've always loved boxing. My father's mate's nephew was a boxer. He invited me to train at his gym. And I got hooked. Sad story about this young man. He went pro, but after a bar fight, I heard he was murdered out for revenge by someone involved in that brawl.

I also had a great group of friends, and we trained grappling, and MMA for four or five years. A good friend trained us grappling. Today, he trains fighters who fought in the UFC, and got lucky to meet many MMA fighters like Jon Jones. Another one, Guillaume Kerner trained us Thai boxing.

Guillaume was one of the first western European Thai boxer who won a World Title in Thailand. You can check some highlights of his career.

That was before I moved to London. When I got back in France, I was training exclusively in boxing until 2021, when I moved abroad. Since I relocated, I've really missed the camaraderie of the boxing club. I'm lucky enough to have a garage where I've hung a punching bag and can keep training.

For those interested, I started last year a #50kPushUps challenge. The goal is to make 50,000 push-ups in one year.

I could write many anecdotes about people I met, but I want also to share my other passion: computers.

When I meet people, the first thing they say to me is that I don't look like a computer guy. Stereotypes... 🤷

My passion probably started when one night my father brought home the VCS, the Video Computer System, later renamed the Atari 2600. It's not a computer, but that's where it all started.

Later, I asked if I could have a computer, and they offered me the Amstrad CPC464 with its 64Kb RAM, and cassette deck.

Later, my grandmother offered me the updated version the CPC6128 with the same RAM, but with a 3-inch floppy disk.

After that I had many other ones. I started to build them. I tried my first Linux distro in 1995. It was a Debian. Today, my main distribution is still Debian, even if I tried, and used many others.

I've tried probably many window managers over the years. But, for the last 15 years more or less, I've been using only awesomewm, a tiling window manager, light, and customizable if you know Lua a bit.

I could write a lot about Linux, but I don't think it'd be of much interest to our readers. What I can say is that my love for computers is what got me to where I am today in my career.

What's the story behind your blog?

My first blog was about Debian, the GNU/Linux distribution. It was in 2001, and it was called debianworld.org. I used to write how-tos, and articles about Linux. I used the blog to post English to French translation of the Debian Weekly News, but also the Securing Debian Manual, and some part of the Advanced Bash scripting guide. Then in 2014, after a long summer, I found out I got cyber squatted. And, just like this it was gone.

Then, for five years, I didn't set up anything online until 2019. I met a colleague that asked me if I participated in any conferences, or if I had a blog. That's when I wanted to have a personal place online again.

I love bears, that's why I chose that domain name. And, lazy, because I am sometimes.

About the theme, it took me some time to create it, and be happy with the final result. But, then, it didn't really change.

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

It depends. First, I need a topic, or an idea.

Sometimes a blog post, a news, a new tool, or basically anything can inspire me to write directly a post.

But, often, I like to go through my Zettelkasten.

Every morning, I use this keybinding <Ctrl>-0. That opens a random note. If it doesn't sparkle anything, I hit the same keys again. A "new" note appears, and, sometimes, a discussion starts. I will add more content, or argue with previous thoughts. That's how some drafts start.

English not being my mother tongue, I read the different parts multiple times to be sure to make sense. My goal is to make simple sentences, but that connect with everyone.

Once done, I check if some grammar hasn't been forgotten by my LSP.

Then, a script will sync the content to my blog, and post it also on Mastodon.

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

I don't. I just need my laptop, a terminal, and a coffee. That's all.

Maybe the physical space could help some people. Maybe if I had a seaside view, it could impact my creativity 😅.

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

Previously, for other projects, I used Drupal, then Wordpress. But, for this one, I wanted something easily to maintain. No database, or plugins updates. Something simple. That's why I went for a SSG, a Static Site Generator.

I chose Hugo, and I've been happy with it for years.

There is some JavaScript from Carl Schwan's post to add Mastodon's comment on the blog. So far it works well. Everything is hosted on a dedicated server.

All post have been written in Neovim, my go-to editor, on a Tuxedo laptop. My local repository has a backup on a Synology DS1812+ NAS, which also had a remote backup. That repository is pushed on a private Codeberg repository too.

Domain name was purchase at Unlimited.rs, a registar in Serbia. Originally, the name of the blog was lazybear.io, but since the announcement that it will disappear in the future, that's when I switched to a Serbian one. For other projects, I use also Porkbun that I love.

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

I don't think so.

A few of my friends suggested that I should specialize and monetize it, but that was never its goal.

It's my little corner on the web where I can do whatever I want. I can tweak it as I want, try new things, post photos the way I want, without having to follow a specific format.

It was always meant to be my place to experiment.

I don't track visitors, I don't care about numbers.

Now, and then, I get some emails, and I like the discussions I get there. Keep them coming 🙌

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetising personal blogs?

The domain name is around €24 per year. The dedicated server around €30 per month, but I use it for other things too.

It doesn't generate any money. I could add a Ko-fi account, and maybe I will... just in case. 😇

If people want to monetize it, I don't see any issue with that. Everyone is free to do whatever they want.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

Ok, I have a couple of them!

• Rldane.space
• Zerokspot.com
• Joelchrono.xyz
• Benjaminhollon.com
• Christiantietze.de

And, two French photographers:

• Jeremyjanin.com
• GregoryMignard.com

I also have a list of blogs I enjoy, and follow.

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

Yeah start a blog, value your privacy, and send an email to Manuel so we can find more about you.

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

I’m dad, designer, cyclist, designer, texture guy – currently living in San Luis Obispo, CA. My oldest kid just learned to blow his nose. The other one is in his prime baby time. These days I day dream about bikepacking and permaculture.

Born and raised in France, I landed in California in 2016. An odd mix of work ethic and ego led me to define myself through the stuff I make: all sorts of combinations of rectangles and text boxes, mostly for screens, solely because I got good enough to get paid for it. While I'm filled with gratitude for my career, I spend a humorously uncomfortable amount of time torn between ascetic ideals and pragmatism.

While I’m not a technologist, I’m not a monk either. I’m way too fidgety. Time outdoors, family life, movement, and occasional meditation keep me sane.

What's the story behind your blog?

I adopted this domain name in 2016 as I didn't like having my real name spelled out in the URL, it felt weird. I bought my initial domain back in 2012: nicolas-soleri.eu, I thought it was clever. SLRNCL is a concatenation of my last name and my first name without the vowels. It's hard to remember, which is great since I'm not trying to play the SEO game.

I truly started to put effort into writing in 2022. The birth of my first child probably had a lot to do with it – and getting off instagram. I couldn’t fathom the idea of being a dad with an instagram account. But I’d love for my kids to one days read the blog of their silly dad.

Self-awareness and allergy to grandiosity creates a tension between craft, skepticism, and my embodied experience which I love to put into words. The blog-therapy is (still) working. It’s eating up most of my creative ego and filling my feed.

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

Nowadays I use the default iOS notes app. I write whenever. I edit little.

I used to have a notes.txt file on my desktop where I was putting down all interesting nuggets, like a wine cellar, hoping for them to mature. Instead, they mostly degenerated and created a bunch of anxiety from doing nothing of it.

I breed an uncomfortably large amount of thoughts daily. Most of them are unexceptional. I cultivate poor writing hygiene because I do not want to truly get into writing. Yet, there seems to be something that keeps bringing me back to words. To tame my ego and avoid creating a generational supply of passable notes I use my blog as a graveyard.

Typos are my own, I’m working on it. With AI it now feels like a mark of authenticity. Sometimes I ask my wife to proof-read, but that is rare because we end up arguing, worth it.

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

Following the flow of life is what makes my creative juice flow. I often write on the toilet or in public parks while keeping an eye on my kids. I thrive in “white-space” time - time in between things. So I jot down notes when I’m out and about. I’m not a coffee shop person and I hate my home office.

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

My website is home cooked. It runs mostly on PHP. I still have Jquery installed but I’m slowly removing all Javascript dependencies. I'm not a great dev and prefer to stay 5 years behind trends. My website is constrained by my skills. This has kept me grounded and covered most of my needs and ambitions. I don't recommend inspecting my code, it's really not great but decently light. Building stuff is a great way to keep myself grounded in the process. I use Inter as the only font because it's nice, plain, and open source. It will default to system font if Inter isn't available. Because I don't want to import anything custom or use CDN. I'm not better than Inter (and few out there are IMO).

The site is hosted by OVH in France. I’m considering self-hosting since my house produces excess solar power.

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

I’d use bearblog if I was not a pretentious web designer and had to start over. I recommended it to my wife, she likes it. The simplicity and authenticity of the project is lovely. That said I do not regret the torturous process of having redesigned my website tirelessly over the last decade. The process taught me a lot about myself.

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetising personal blogs?

My domain name + hosting cost under 20 euros/year. I do not run ads or track anything - I don’t plan or change this ever.

That means my website has had an incredible ROI considering the career opportunities it gave me. The many people who hired me all visited my website (and told me about it). I had some rewarding connections with internet strangers. My gratitude is larger than an html file can hold, and definitely magnitude greater than what it cost me to run my website.

Money is important, and I’m a lucky bastard. I don’t have anything against people monetizing their thoughts - though I’m rarely compelled by a paywall. Digital patronage and crowdfunding seems highly relevant to get out of the social media hell realm of today. It has pitfalls, the main one being requiring mass adoption which seems highly delusional. But hope and compassion are contagious while big tech fights entropy. Social media always comes back in a different form, meanwhile, html is still there. It’s the cockroach business model.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

• These two crack me up and make me think: Keenan and Taylor town (already seen on P&B)
• Some wholesome Aussie stories: Beau Miles
• Maggie Appleton always gets me interested
• The only design blog Tobias Van Shneider I've ever read
• I'm a fan of Faircompanies stories and mission
• Not a blog but worth checking out James low audio archive

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

There are so many goodies out there, one link away. Sharing is fun, side projects too. In my case it took me a decade to get my head out of my own butt and realize the cost of my own ventures. I believe a lot of us are similar to me, moving through life and accumulating stuff. Cleaning up, giving up, and passing along are necessary processes. So as a closing thought I’d suggest to sit, close your eyes and think of all your stuff. If you’re comfortable with it, great. Otherwise, spring is coming.

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

I go by JTR these days, which is based on an earlier pseudonym I picked up long ago. Sort of an alter ego I guess. I like how it rolls off the tongue, so I stuck with it. I was a writer (and a bit of a journalist) and a teacher before I found my way into IT. Today I’m a sort of manager who still writes plenty of technical documentation and attends a lot of meetings.

What's the story behind your blog?

I had a few blogs in the past, but when I started working for the medical center which I'm still working for today, 8 years ago, I decided to record my quest to learn technology in a blog. Soon after I started there, I was looking for an app to write checklists and bullet points, and I found Orgzly. It seemed minimal, and I liked that it just writes everything to text files. I had no idea what org-mode was (or Emacs for that matter), and after a few weeks with the app I was deep down in rabbit hole.

So the start of my current position, along with learning Emacs and org-mode gave me a boost to start blogging what I was learning. I think it was my boss back then or one of my co-workers who didn't understand why I couldn't just use one of the many note-taking apps that were already available to us. That question, along with my reputation of always asking many of my own whenever we had meetings, had me come up with the idea that I should just call my blog “The Art of Not Asking Why,” hinting at one of my favorite books, Zen And The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. It was just organic like that. “The Art of Not Asking Why” is kind of long, so I started to abbreviate it with “TAONAW” (I pronounce it "Tao-Now"), and I liked how it sounded... so here we are.” (the name of the book should be all caps…)

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

Today, my blog is a mix of quick thoughts and longer posts, both of which are handled well by design by Micro.blog, my blogging platform, which I’m very happy with. For short posts (300 characters or so, "tweets" and "toots" basically), I usually use my iPhone or Android.

Longer posts usually start in Emacs org-mode as a draft, and then are edited by hand before I pass them through Grammarly and/or AI for typos and various checks. AI is excellent to find broken links, technical terms that I might want to expand on ( and suggest links to those), and switching back to org-mode so that my draft ends up being updated with the same post, typo and error-free (or almost free) on my blog.

For screenshots, I use SnagIt, which is paid for by my job (I write plenty of technical documents). Snaggit is excellent, and I'd pay for it in a heartbeat myself if I had to. For photos, which I take with my Sony camera or iPhone, I use Apple Photos these days for light editing. I also have Darktable and Krita on my Linux desktop, both of which are free, excellent tools that are highly underrated in my opinion. They give me all the power Adobe Photoshop and Lightroom used to give me, without costing me a dime and just make me feel good to use.

My posts usually come from different experiences I go through, technical or otherwise. Sometimes I look in my journal and modify an entry from there to a post, at other times I go to my old blog and import a post from there and add it to my blog with the original timeline, yet other times I got over my images and pages on my blog - there’s always something to do, beyond just writing the posts. I think that’s part of the fun. A good blog grows with you, and you learn to tell more about yourself as you progress.

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

I used to work from coffee shops, but today I mostly blog from home. My apartment is quiet and less distracting, and the best time for me to write is in the morning (if I have enough time available), so this combination usually wins me over. I need to focus when I write, and I don’t like to get distracted, which is another reason why home is usually the best place. I absolutely love my noise-cancelling Sony WH-1000XM6 (and the WH-1000XM5 before those) headphones, which have been a life changer for me, a person who can get distracted when my neighbors from across the hall return home. My mechanical keyboard, a Kensis Freestyle Edge RGB, is about 7 years old now and I love the feel of the mechanical keys under my fingers. The ergonomic setup (it's a split keyboard) helps my wrists, and my standing desk helps my concentration further. When I write, I also listen to music: electronic or classical. Songs with lyrics usually distract me.

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

I have two computers. A MacBook Pro M2, and a System76 thelio mira, currently running Kubuntu, which is also my gaming computer. From these two, I lean slightly toward using the Mac for my writing because I take most of my photos with my iPhone and the Micro.blog desktop app that I use is for macOS.

My blog is hosted on Micro.blog, which is a hybrid of a social platform and a blogging platform in one. Micro.blog uses Hugo to build the blog and Micropub for the social network. It also syndicates to other social networks like Tumblr and Medium and plenty more that I don't use. It’s a rather unique place that follows the POSSE (Publish Own Site, Syndicate Elsewhere) principles. I like the fact that I can download all of my data, which includes my posts, my media and my CSS/HTML templates, any time I wish and take them elsewhere. That’s how the web should be. When I joined Micro.blog I had to register my own domain, which I did, but these days you can also get a domain through them, and I believe you can also get a certificate through Let’s Encrypt in one go. It's a bit confusing at the start since the concepts of a social network and a blog (=website) are different aspects in our minds, but they don't have to be that separate.

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

No. What I know today and the tools I use are the best ones for me at this point. If anything, I’d encourage myself to have learned to use Emacs much earlier and to have adhered to POSSE long ago; that would have saved me from losing work on Medium and Blogger, which are now long gone. I recommend micro.blog wholeheartedly.

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetising personal blogs?

My plan on Micro.blog (hosting) costs $100 a year, which isn't horrible when you break it down to $8 and change per month. Micro.blog comes with many additional tools (such as hosting podcasts, encrypted notes, storing videos and more) which are worth it in my opinion. My domain costs about $30 a year.

I absolutely hate how ads work on the internet today, and I will never have ads on my blog, but I believe it's OK to ask for support or, as I like to think of it, "tips." If someone likes something I wrote, they are welcome to leave a tip. I don't need it however to keep the blog going, thankfully.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

I don’t have a long list, and I think most of the folks I know were already covered in this series. I will highlight a few that are more active:

• Annie’s blog: she often writes essays about feelings and life experiences, about once a week or so.
• Sal: mostly tech, here and there some other life stuff
• The Wandering Lensman He's professional photographer, usually an image and a short text. I like what he says about taking photos.
• Pluralistic from Cory Doctorow does this guy really need an intro…? I love how well-linked and resourced the daily essays are. An (the?) online privacy activist.
• Jack Baty Daily I lose track if this is the “real” blog or not. The guy changes blogs and platforms like we change shirts. But that’s part of the fun.

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

I’d love, love to see more non-techie folks on POSE-style blogs. I’m not talking about Medium or Tumblr; these are Silos. Some exist, here and there. There used to a be a priod, back when people published on movable type and wordpress was still something new no one knew about, where I was following a diner waitress from Jersey, a fighter pilot who was a patriot in the good kind of way, and of course, there was the USS clueless (I think he’s still around, in retirement). Now, you have to be in the industry to do anything like that. I had a conversation with my partner the other day and he just shrugged. The term “silo” (he uses Tumblr) is so regular now that it’s like explaining water to a fish. And it’s a shame. Those that are different, micro.blog included, seems to require some knowledge of what, I guess, used to be common knowledge if you wanted to be online. I don’t know. Perhaps if I was still a teacher, I’d teach these internet “basics” to teens.

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

Hi, I'm Frank. A somewhat older, beardy, less grumpy digital Gen-X'er from Utrecht, the Netherlands. Since October 2025 I've been self-employed. I work as a trainer/coach/writer on using AI in a creative and responsible way and I help knowledge workers with their digital awareness, digital skills and personal knowledge management.

My whole career has been online. Since I stumbled on this internet-thing in 1993, graduated in 1996 and joined one of the first free Internet Service Providers in the Netherlands. We would now call it a startup. Back then we were cowboys doing crazy stuff.

In 1997 I started at an internet agency with two of my close friends. I left in 2009 to become self-employed, had some incredible adventures as a freelancer at the Utrecht University of Applied Sciences, telecom companies, publishing houses. An IoT startup brought me back into agency life, went bust in 2019, and I ended up back at my old agency for 6 years. In October 2025 I went solo again.

I live in Utrecht with my lovely wife and two kids. We are obedient to the true master of our family, Bowie the cat. We spend time reading, watching movies, visiting concerts, going on walks, playing D&D as a family and mostly just chilling through our lives.

I recently became a member of the Metal Business Club. A business club for anyone who also likes their music loud. Which gives you an idea of my musical taste.

What's the story behind your blog?

In 2000 I stumbled upon a Dutch site from a guy who was just describing his day-to-day life. Sharing links, publishing short posts. I worked at an internet agency where we made our own CMS but I had never seen this thing called a blog. I clicked through on an orange button with the word Blogger on it, signed up, made my first post of a site I just visited... and that was that. I was hooked. Even though we made CMS systems for our clients, it hadn't occurred to me I could do this myself. I didn't need an editorial team, a studio, a radio tower. I could just... blog. I named my first blog Punkey, which was my nickname on IRC in the years before. And that's how it all started.

I fully engaged in the Dutch blogosphere. Since it was so small, we all got to know each other pretty fast, also because of the meetups we organized at least once every six months or so. I got active in a Dutch online magazine called about:blank, where we wrote about the Dutch blogscene. We also hosted weblogawards called the Dutch Bloggies.

In 2010 I wrote a book "Bloghelden" (Blog Heroes) about the history of the Dutch blogosphere. You can still read it for free online if your Dutch is OK.

My first blog Punkey.com lasted only five years, from July 2000 to July 2005. But after that I had plenty of other blogs:

Frank-ly (2002 - 2009) was the first agency blog in the Netherlands. I started it, left the agency in 2009, the blog continued without me. It's no longer live. What does live on is my infamous post from 2006 where I write off Twitter as a fad. One of my better mistakes.

Whatsthenextaction (2004-2008) was my English-language blog on Getting Things Done. A forerunner in what later became the productivity blogging industry. At some point it got picked up by CNN and Time Magazine. Web Archive Link.

Lifehacking (2007-2015) is the one that still stings a little. With a growing group of authors we put this term on the Dutch map. I tried to turn it into a sustainable online and offline publication. That didn't work out the way I wanted. In 2015 the site and all the posts passed to new ownership.

Digging the Digital (2014-2023) is the longest running blog I had. I changed the plumbing a few times (Ghost, Jekyll, WordPress) and it's the blog where I wrote a lot about the indieweb and owning your own platform.

Digging the Digital (2023 - present) Same name but a different URL. No more difficult titles (for now), just my name in the URL. Simple. WordPress became too heavy and too much for me. I wanted to get back to the basics of blogging, writing. Simple pieces of typing and not too difficult with themes, plugins and formatting. So I run everything on the great Micro.blog service.

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

It is not a really strict set of rules I follow. Actually, it never was. I always have a swipe-file with ideas in Obsidian, I've collected through the years. But to be honest, that's a big pile of files I hardly look at. Since 2025 I use Sublime as an Idea Discovery Engine. Sublime is the lovechild of Pinterest and Obsidian. You can save links, texts, video, images, audio, podcast-snippets. Put them on a canvas, connect them, find related ideas from other Sublime users and mold your own thoughts. I love to use Sublime to find new ideas, connect them and use it as a jump-off point for my own writing.

Besides that, blogposts also appear when I just have a thought. Or something I see and want to respond to. So nothing fancy. Just writing.

Sometimes I have Claude Cowork interview me on a subject or idea and use Hex (open source speech to text tool) to talk it oud loud. The unfiltered mess that comes out goes into Obsidian, where I puzzle the pieces into an actual post. It's surprisingly effective for me.

I don't have AI write the post for me. I tried this in the past, it never worked out really well. The voice is off, the thinking isn't mine. AI helps me shape my thoughts, but I stay in the driver's seat to publish the finished post.

And then there's the post-publish ritual: Somewhere between 10 seconds and 10 hours later, I spot the typos. Every blogger does this. Don't let AI ruin that experience of post-publish-typo-spotting!

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

I need it to be quiet. That's it. I need to focus on what I write and how the story evolves on screen. It doesn't matter if I'm in my studio, in the living room or somewhere in a coworking space. A physical space doen't influence my creativity. I've been blogging for so long, I don't need a specific creative environment to get me started. Just the energy, time and half of an idea.

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

Right now, everything runs on Micro.blog. It's a Hugo based blog with some specifics for the Micro.blog service but that's it. Locally I use Obsidian to write, with the Micro.publish-plugin from Otávio. I also use Drafts for shorter posts sometimes, in which I use an action to publish directly on my site.

For images and screenshots, I use the Bulk MB Image Uploader MacOS Shortcut from Jarrod Blundy's Heydingus Shortcuts Library and tweaked it a bit. It's not a perfect setup but it works. I might vibecode a better setup in the near future with these building blocks. Maybe create my own editor with shortcuts and workflows that are tailored to my way of working.

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

I would definitely stay focused on one domain and one name. I've had so many different domain names for different types of blogs, because I thought I needed all these different platforms and focus. Sometimes it is useful, especially when I use blog software for commercial purposes. But my personal site, from the early 2000-days to now, I would try to keep it more focussed on the same domain. While changing weblog software on the background. You could say I'm Jack-Batying Light ;-) (all the love to Jack, he is pushing the possibilities of blogging software!)

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetising personal blogs?

I only pay for my domains and hosting. I try to keep old domains as long as possible. The yearly costs of domains in total are €55. Micro.blog is $50 a year (€42). So give or take €100 a year. I don't create direct revenue from the blog. But because I've been around so long it gave me an extensive network of interesting people who want to work with me on digital fitness, AI and new technology. So there are indirect revenues, which I think is the best way in the long run. If people want to monetize their personal blog, go ahead! I don't mind you sell your zine, stickers, workshop and other stuff through your blog. Just don't put ads on them. Or do it the Dense Discovery way, with artisanal, value-aligned sponsors who fit in the format.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

I am so happy to see a renaissance of the personal internet. New search engines, cross-overs to digital gardens and personal knowledge management. That said, let me first drop some bloggers who have been around as long as the web.

• Dave Winer's Scripting.com, the OG. The Blogfather. Without him, blogging, RSS and podcasting would not be as open as it is today.
• Ton Zijlstra's Interdependent Thoughts, my dear friend who did keep his domain and blogging setup going for all those years.
• Peter Rukavina's blog, whose posts I love to read because of his stories on Prince Edwards Island, printing, art, his family and just... life!

Some others worth recommending

• Tracy Durnell's Mind Garden, I love her style of writing, her thinking and her weeknotes.
• Felienne Hermans, her published newsletter with critical notes on AI and education. Scroll down in an edition for the English version
• Austin Kleon, his books, blog and newsletter are interconnected. I love how Kleon works and publishes.
• Mike Sass, his Shellshark Scrolls are a weekly roundup at the intersection of the indieweb and the fediverse.

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

I have been quiet on my blog lately, something that happens to most of us. For me, it is because of work and a sideproject I'm working on. This is called CreativeNotes, in which I interview creative professionals in the Netherlands about how they use paper notes in their creative process. I'm exploring that pivotal moment when creatives consciously choose an analog tool over a screen. I want to document how paper notes not only help bring focus and flow, but often serve as the essential building blocks of the final creative product.

By collecting stories and notebook images from a wide range of creators, I'm looking for patterns in how ideas develop on paper. What I find may be useful for anyone who thinks for a living.

You can learn more about the project (in Dutch) here: https://notes.frankmeeuwsen.com/over-creativenotes

Let’s start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

Bonjour ! I’m a militant wayfarer, budding typographer, pathological reader, slow cyclist, obsessive tinkerer, dangerous cook, amateur bookbinder, homicidal gardener, mediocre sewist, and fanatical melomaniac living in Lyon (France). I was a technology journalist and journalism teacher for sixteen years, but i now work in instructional design.

In my spare time, i take photos of old storefronts to preserve a rapidly fading typographical tradition. One of these days, i’ll finally finish the typefaces i’ve been working on forever. And my novel. And the painting of the bathroom. (My wife is a saint.)

What’s the story behind your blog?

I was born a few years before the web was invented and grew up at this fascinating time when everybody wanted to do something with it, but nobody knew quite what yet. We were still supposed to learn Logo and Pascal in technology class, but most of the teachers understood the importance of the web and taught us the basics of HTML and CSS. I built my first website in 2000… as a school assignment!

By 2007, i was one of those insufferable tech bloggers who made enough money to feel entitled, but not enough to feel safe. (I moonlighted as a graphic designer.) When more established outlets came knocking at my door, i shut down my blog and became one of those insufferable tech journalists who make enough money to feel entitled, but not enough to feel safe. (I moonlighted as a journalism teacher.)

I kept a personal blog under the “zinzolin” moniker. This shade of purple is my favourite colour, partly because it sounds a bit like my name. Over the years, it became more and more difficult to find the energy to write recreationally after having spent the day writing professionally. In 2025, feeling more than a little burnt out, i rebooted my blog and switched from French to English. Fortunately, the name is equally weird in both languages.

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

I don’t have a process so much as a way of managing the incessant chatter in my head. I write to give myself the permission to forget, and i publish to gift myself the ability to remember. You’ll never catch me without some way to capture those little “brain itches” — a notebook, the Bloom app, a digital recorder, the back of my hand… (I wrote part of this interview as a long series of text messages to myself!)

In the middle of the week, i start reviewing my notes to find a common theme or extract the strongest idea. When an incomplete thought keeps coming back, i don’t try to force it by staring at a blinking cursor. I take a long walk, and usually, i have to stop part way to write. Most of the actual blogging is done long before i sit down to properly draft my weekly note.

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

I have this romantic notion that the more comfortable i am, the more i can edit, the worse my writing tends to get. If i could, i’d write everything longhand in a rickety train, stream-of-consciousness style, and publish the raw scans of my notebooks. You wouldn’t be able to read half of it, but i can assure you the illegible half would be Nobel-prize worthy.

But then, some things only happen after a few hours of diligent editing. If i give myself enough time, i can stop transcribing my notes and start conversing with them. There’s always something worth exploring in the gap between our past and present selves – even if the past was two days ago – but that delicate work requires a conducive environment.

Judging by my recent output, it looks like this environment comprises a good chair, a MacBook Air on one of those ugly lap desks, my custom international QWERTY layout, iA Writer for writing and Antidote for proofreading, cosy lighting, just the right amount of background noise, and most important of all, a pot of delicious coffee.

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

I’ve tried pretty much every CMS and SSG under the sun, but i’ve always come back to WordPress, until Matt Mullenweg reminded us that a benevolent dictator still is a dictator. Z1NZ0L1N is now built on Ghost and hosted by Magic Pages.

I used to use Tinylytics and Buttondown, but i’m now using Ghost’s integrated analytics and newsletter features. My other websites are hosted on a VPS with Infomaniak, which is also where i get my domain names, e-mail, and assorted cloud services.

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

That’s a question i had to ask myself when i rebooted Z1NZ0L1N last year. I switched to English in a bid to better separate my professional output from my recreational output. I jettisoned most of my audience, but i found a new community around the IndieWeb Carnival and quickly rebuilt a readership on my own merits. I get excited each time i get an e-mail from someone i don’t know from a country on the other side of the globe.

I wanted to find a way to publish regularly without turning Z1NZ0L1N into the umpteenth link blog. After a few experiments, i’ve settled on a weekly note that’s part “what i’m doing”, part “what the rest of the world is doing”. This is old-school blogging meets recommendation algorithms — and i love it.

Some things haven’t changed, though, and will never change. I use an open-source CMS that i could host myself, not a proprietary platform that i can’t control. I designed my theme myself. I don’t play the SEO/GEO game.

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what’s your position on people monetising personal blogs?

I pay a little less than €10/month for Magic Pages’ starter plan with the custom themes add-on. Considering that it saves me €15/month in third-party services, i’d say it’s a fair price. I pay €12/year for the z1nz0l1n.com domain, but i also registered a few variations, including zinzolin.fr, which was first registered in 1999! Blogging is my least expensive hobby — by far.

As someone who’s worked a lot on the economics of independent publishing, i’m happily subscribed to a few news outlets and magazines. I like the idea of $1/month memberships for blogs, but in practice, i find it hard to track multiple micro-subscriptions on top of my existing (and frankly far too numerous) digital subscriptions.

I wonder if we should create blogging collectives, almost like unions and coops, to collect and redistribute a single subscription in between members. In the meantime, i’ll continue not talking about my Ko-Fi page.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

The Forest and Ye Olde Blogroll are fantastic discovery tools. A lot of my favourite bloggers have already been featured in People and blogs: VH Belvadi, BSAG, Frank Chimero, Keenan, Piper Haywood, Nick Heer, Tom McWright, Riccardo Mori, Jim Nielsen, Kev Quirk, Arun Venkatesan, Zinzy… I’d love to see how Rob Weychert, Chris Glass, Josh Ginter or Melanie Richards would answer. Their approach to blogging couldn’t be more different, but they each informed mine in their own way.

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

Since 2008, i’ve taken thousands of photos of old storefronts. It began as a way to inform my typographical practice, but it rapidly became an excuse to go out and pay attention – really pay attention – to the world around me. You wouldn’t believe the things i’ve discovered in side streets, the number of conversations i’ve struck after taking a picture of a once-beloved shop, and how my way of looking at the evolution of cities has entirely changed.

If you’re up for a little challenge, find your own collection. It might be cool doors, weird postboxes, triangular things, every bookshop in Nova Scotia, sewer manholes, purple things, number signs… It’ll give you another perspective not only when travelling in foreign places, but also on your (not so) familiar surroundings. It doesn’t cost a penny, but it’ll pay off immensely.

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

Hi I'm Nikhil! I grew up the UAE and came to the United States for college and graduated with a degree in biomedical engineering. I worked in academia and industry for about 15 years before deciding to turn my attention and energies towards problems in healthcare. I'm now a graduate student at Columbia University's Medical Center and am studying clinical informatics and loving the magnificent beehive that is New York City. With the time I have, I love going to art museums, practicing calligraphy, reading short stories and graphic novels, and watching every suspense/mystery show or movie I can (huge fan of the genre; for example I've watched all of Columbo at least three times). I'm also trying to learn CAD and have 3D printed several small abominations.

What's the story behind your blog?

I started blogging around 2003 after discovering blogs like Kottke.org, Jeffrey Zeldman's blog, Greg Storey's Airbag.ca, and Todd Dominey's WhatDoIKnow.org. My first blog was at freeorange.net which I now use as a placeholder for my tiny LLC's future site.

I used to live in Ames, Iowa at the time and decided to and blog what I knew, about stuff going on in the town: gossip, lectures and shows I'd attended, photos of random scenes and events, and so on. That last part proved to be great: I'd hear from a quite a few alumni or former residents who'd have photo requests for nostalgia and I'd gladly oblige, especially since I was super excited to use my first digital camera, a whopping 5 megapixel Sony DSC-F717 😊

I then stopped blogging for about 10 or so years and resumed in 2018. My current blog is essentially a freeform dump: just this mélange of stuff I find interesting and/or may want to reference later. There's really no audience in mind. I use a lot of tags on my posts and am often delighted by exploring them a while later. I moved all my bookmarks over from PinBoard (an excellent service) and am trying to get off Instagram. I'm also trying to be better about making and sharing things (photos, calligraphy, art) no matter how terrible they are and not just consuming them.

As for the name, I really wanted a domain hack, www.nikh.il, but this sadly required permission from the Israeli government I was pretty sure I wouldn't get 😅 So I went with the shortest and 'coolest' TLD I could find and ended up with nikhil.io. I also have nikhil.fish as an alias for no reason.

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

I think half my site's half a a tumblelog. As for the other half, I have a Markdown file called log.md in my iCloud Drive that I dump inchoate thoughts into (it's at about half a meg right now). I also use the excellent Things app on my phone to save blog posts, names, recommendations, articles, and media of interest to peruse later. When I have time, I look at these two sources to post and comment on something I think is beautiful, interesting, or funny.

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

All professional creatives I know personally have a space that they attend to do their work and they have told me that this matters immensely to them. In my case, I have a setup I've used reliably over many years and love it. I especially love my sit-to-stand desk (on wheels), giant display, and clickity-clack keyboard. I always listen to ambient music or white noise while working on anything (Loscil's works are a favorite).

I've found that I just cannot focus in coffeehouses or libraries. And I absolutely cannot work or think in harsh "cool white" lighting (3000K or lower; if you need me to divulge secrets, just put me in a room with two tubelights for thirty seconds). I know a lot of people (like my wife, a writer) who can work anywhere and may be a bit envious. I am also in the habit of pacing around and muttering things to myself while working and these are not nice things to do at coffeehouses or libraries.

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

I write all my posts in Markdown and use an old and heavily modded version of 11ty.js with several Markdown-it plugins and supported by quite a few bash and Node scripts to generate the HTML pages. Images are processed with Sharp. The blog theme is a mess of TSX and SASS files. All posts and code are in git and Github. I build everything on my laptop and sync all the files to an S3 bucket that serves my blog through CloudFront.

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

Not really. I've spent enough time monkeying with the design/structure and code where my setup fits my needs like a bespoke suit. You can always nerd out over tooling, and it's a lot of fun, but I've suspended that in favor of using the tools. For the time being at least 😅

Now if my wife or a friend were starting a blog, I would absolutely recommend a platform like Bear. Anything simple, hosted, not creepy, and not run by greedy and/or awful people.

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetising personal blogs?

It costs ~$5 a month. A giant part of that cost is the domain name. Zero revenue. No plans on 'growing' it or whatever; it's just my little garden on the internet.

I have no problem with people monetising their blogs as long as the strategy they employ is respectful to visitors' privacy and unobtrusive to their experience. Patronage/memberships aside, The Deck comes to mind as an ad platform that achieved both these things very well.

I do have my problems with platforms like Substack and might write a blog post about this later.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

Please interview Chris Glass! His lovely and popular blog is a huge inspiration for mine, layout and content, and he's been at it since at least 2003 IIRC. Another old favorite is Witold Riedel's log. I'm also really digging this blog I discovered recently.

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

I just put up a small project I've wanted to do for a while, my own little curated digital gallery of art I've loved over the years. It was mostly a design exercise but I thought I might use some LLM to discover some themes in why I love these works (or maybe you just love looking at things and don't really need to understand why).

Other than that, I am so happy with what feels to me like a resurgence in personal blogging (here's a recent index of personal blogs from readers of HackerNews). Thank you for having me in your beautiful space and featuring several other lovely and interesting people! This is a fantastic project Manu 🤗

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

I’m a Group Product Manager co-leading the core product at Webflow, i.e. helping teams visually design and build websites. My personal mission is to empower people to make inspiring, impactful, and inclusive things on the web. That’s been the through line of my career so far: I started out as a designer at a full-service agency called Fuzzco, moved to the web platform at Microsoft Edge, continued building for developers at Netlify, and am now aiming to make web creation even more democratic with the Webflow platform.

I transitioned from design to product management while at Microsoft Edge. I wanted to take part in steering the future of the web platform, instead of remaining downstream of those decisions. I feel so lucky to have worked on new features in HTML, ARIA, CSS, and JavaScript with other PMs and developers in the W3C and WHATWG.

I’m a builder at heart, so I love to work on webby side projects as well as a whole bevy of analog hobbies: knitting, sewing, weaving, sketchbooking, and journaling.

What's the story behind your blog?

I have a couple primary blogs right now:

• melanie-richards.com/blog, simply the blog that lives at my main website. I post here about the web, design, development, accessibility, product management, etc. One practice I’ve been keeping for a few years now is my monthly Learning Log. These posts are a compendium of what I’ve been shipping or making, what I’ve been learning, side quests, neat links around the internet, and articles I’ve been reading. When I’m in a particularly busy period (as was the case in 2025; my first child was born in September), this series is my most consistent blogging practice.
• making.melanie-richards.com: this is the blog where I post about my aforementioned analog projects. Quite a lot of sewing over the past year!

From 2013–2016 I also had a blog and directory called Badass Lady Creatives (wish I had spent more than five minutes on the name, haha). This featured women who were doing cool things in various “creative” industries. At the time it seemed like every panel, conference lineup, and group project featured all or mostly dudes. The blog was a way to push back on that a little bit and highlight people who were potentially overlooked. Since then gender representation (for one) seems to have gotten a bit better in these industries. But the work and joy of celebrating diverse, inspiring talent is never done!

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

Big “yeet to production” vibes for me! I use Obsidian to scribble down my thoughts and write an initial draft. Obsidian creates Markdown files, so I copy and paste those into Visual Studio Code (my code editor), add some images and make some tweaks, and then push to production. I really try not to overthink it too much. However, I will admit that I have a tons of drafts in Obsidian that never see the light of day. It can be cathartic enough just to scribble it down, even if I never publish the thought.

For my Learning Log posts, I use a Readwise => Obsidian workflow I describe in this blog post. Reader by Readwise is the app where I store and read all my RSS feeds and newsletter forwards.

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

“Parallel play” is the biggest, most joyful boon to my creativity. I love to be in the company of others as we independently work on our own projects side by side.

There’s a delicate balance when it comes to working on creative projects socially. For example, my mom, my aunt, and I often have Sew Day over FaceTime on Sundays. Everyone’s pretty committed to what they’re working on, so it’s easy to sew and talk and sing (badly 😂) at the same time. I also used to go to a local craft night that very sadly disbanded when the host shop changed hands.

For writing or coding, that takes a bit more mental focus for me. I started a Discord server with a few friends, which is dedicated to working on blog posts and side projects. We meet up once a month to talk about our projects (and shoot the breeze, usually about web accessibility and/or the goodness of dogs). Then we all log off the voice channel to go do the thing!

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

Both of these blogs use Eleventy and plain ol’ Markdown, and are hosted on Netlify. Some of my other side projects use a content management system (CMS) like Webflow’s CMS, or Contentful + Eleventy. Again, Webflow is my current employer.

I use a Netlify form for comments on my “Making” blog, and Webmentions for my main blog. I will probably pull out Webmentions from that code base: conceptually they’ve never really “landed” for me, and it would be nice to delete a ton of code.

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

I generally like my setup, though sometimes I think about migrating my “Making” blog onto a CMS. As far as CMSes go, I quite like Webflow’s: it’s straightforward and has that Goldilocks level of functionality for me. Some other CMSes I’ve tried have felt bloated yet seemed to miss obvious functionality out of the box.

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetising personal blogs?

I have a Bookshop.org affiliate link and it took me several years to meet the $20 minimum payout so…yeah I’ve never truly monetized my blogging! I find there’s freedom in giving away your thoughts for free.

As far as costs go, I have pretty low overhead: just paying for the domain name.

I’m fine with other folks monetizing personal blogs, though of course there’s a classy and not-classy way to do so. If monetizing is what keeps bloggers’ work on the open web, on sites they own and control, I prefer that over monetizing through walled gardens. Related: Substack makes it easy to monetize but there are some very compelling reasons to consider alternatives.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

• Mandy Brown, Oliver Burkeman (technically a newsletter with a “view on web” equivalent), and Ethan Marcotte’s writing have been helping to fill my spiritual cup over the last couple years.
• Anh and Katherine Yang are doing neat things on their sites
• What Claudia Wore for a nostalgic pick; I’d love to recreate some of these outfits sometime. Thank you Kim for keeping the blog up!
• Sarah Higley would be a great next interview. She blogs less frequently, but always at great depth and thoughtfulness on web accessibility. Web developers can learn quite a lot on more involved controls and interactions from Sarah.

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

This is highly topical: I’m currently scheming about a directory site listing “maker” blogs! So many communities in the visual arts and crafts are stuck on social media platforms they don’t even enjoy, beholden to the whims of an algorithm. I’d like to connect makers in a more organic way. If you’re a crafter who would like to be part of this, feel free to fill out this Google form!

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

My name is Patrick Rhone. When I'm not trying to be the best husband and father I can be, I'm mostly known as a writer, blogger, technology consultant, speaker, mental health advocate, and general c-list internet personality.

I also restore old houses as a professional hobby. I do volunteer circus rigging at a performing youth circus school as a less professional one.

What's the story behind your blog?

The very first post on my blog, Rhoneisms, is dated November 7th, 2003. Of course, I had been blogging before that, and there used to be posts dated slightly earlier. But, my blog actually began as an internally hosted one at the college I used to work for and I lost those earlier posts when I moved to a different platform and brought it public… Gosh, that seems like it was just yesterday. Not 22 years ago. Such is life.

My main blog has had many different points of focus over the years. From geeky, mainly Apple, tech stuff to GTD-driven personal productivity stuff, to practical/actionable life advice stuff, to the anything I'm interested in sort of thing it is now. And, that’s exactly what a blog should be — a reflection of one's interest and attention over time. A reflection of who one is right now and where they've been. Blogs are living things that should grow at the same rate we do.

I say "main" blog above because I do have a couple of other topic specific blogs (one for my home restoration work and The Cramped which is not often updated these days).

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

I really just post anything I feel like. Links to things I find interesting. Essays of things that take me a bit longer to express. Short thought's I'm having. All sorts of things.

I’m 58 years old. The internet was not even anything regular people could use until I was in my early 20s. My first "online" writing was things I posted to dial up BBS systems/communities. In the old days of the internet, it was common to have a blog just links or thoughts much like mine is today. There was no such thing as content management systems (like Moveable Type or WordPress) or services. No such thing as blogging software. Things were hand coded HTML. There were no “rules” about what a post had to look like or be.

Here’s Kottke.org from 2001. No titles. No format. Just some thoughts and a bunch of links for the day. This is the feel I’m trying to recapture.

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

I generally do not have a specific creative environment. I believe the best inspiration can strike anywhere at anytime for the type of blogging I'm doing.

That said, for my longer form essays, in general my process is that I think about something for a very long time and then suddenly, out of nowhere at often at the most inconvenient time, what I call "writing brain" kicks in and I must find something — anything — to get it written down ASAP. It appears fully formed when that happens. So, no drafts.

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

My blog and domain registration is through Dreamhost who I've used for too long to remember (2012 maybe). It runs on WordPress. If I'm on iOS I use Drafts to post to it. On my Mac, I use MarsEdit. I very rarely use the Wordpress web interface for posting. Only if I need to jump in and edit the HTML of something complicated to format otherwise.

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

Nope. I'm very happy with where it is now and how it exists. Like I said, a blog should grow and change at the same rate I do so, who knows, that could change tomorrow and when/if it does, I'll change it accordingly.

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetizing personal blogs?

Back of the napkin calculation: My general unlimited hosting for all my domains (I have a lot), sites, etc. is $39.95 a month. It would be too difficult to break down how much it is just to host the one blog out of that.

It doesn't generate any direct revenue really and I don't do it for that reason. I suppose people who enjoy my work will buy one of my books or something but it is not for this that I do it.

I blog because it is the best way for me to catalog my interests and thinking over time.

If others want to monetize their work that's their choice and I have no real opinion on it. There are a few bloggers that I support with my dollars in different ways and I'm happy to do so.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

I remain a fan of Nicholas Bate who currently blogs at Hunter Gatherer 21C. In general, I enjoy his thoughts and insights. I also like his style of blogging. In many ways similar to mine (and I'd be remiss if I did not admit that mine is somewhat inspired by his). I'd recommend him for sure.

But, there are too many people I absolutely adore and admire to list here. Some of which have already appeared in this series. Annie Muller, Rebecca Toh, Kurt Harden, my friend Jamie Thingelstad. Obviously also internet famous ones like Jason Kottke and John Gruber.

The wonderful thing about the internet and the resurgence of blogging is that there is an endless amount of great blogs and bloggers out there. There is something and someone for everyone. Google your interests and find your people.

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

Well, I'm writing this in the middle of a tumultuous time not just in my country but in my city and local community. It is the end of January in Minneapolis/Saint Paul and anyone reading this - even long after - need only google to know what is happening here. And, I can tell you anything you do see or read or hear about it is but one of hundreds or thousands of stories. In other words, my mind is a bit pre-occupied right now.

But what I do want people to know about that is that despite everything our own federal government is doing to our state, it is only making our local communes stronger. We are deepening our ties with our neighbors, developing mutual aid networks to ensure care for the most vulnerable, and building peaceful resistance rapid response groups on a hyper local level.

So this is what I want people to know: The worst of them is bringing out the best of us. The worst in them is bringing out the best in us.

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

Hi! I'm Eric Schwarz and my online "home" has been SchwarzTech. I grew up in Indiana in the United States and had a knack for anything involving computers from a young age. Although my first computer was a very-old Radio Shack TRS-80, I quickly shifted to an Apple IIgs and later playing with various used Macs. I really appreciated the intentional, but flawed aspects of Apple's products in the late-1980s and early 1990s. Despite my technology background, I went to college to work in media, especially audio/video production, but between the devaluation of a lot of creative jobs and the 2008 financial crisis/recession, I stuck around for more schooling, getting a graduate degree in Information & Communication Sciences, basically a mix of information technology, telecom, and a bit of business.

From there, I ended up working in higher education, moving through different roles in an IT department at a small college, the bulk of which involved network engineering. A couple of years ago, my now-fiancée and I uprooted for her work and I'm at a different university, still doing a variety of IT things. I really enjoy working on a small team because it means you get to a little bit of everything!

I've found that it's really nice to balance the structured, break/fix things from my day job with creative pursuits and projects outside of work. Like many that have been interviewed here, I dabble in photography, have done some various audio and video projects, and seem to be my friends' go-to for graphic design-related things.

Other than those, I appreciate a good TV show or movie, maybe satisfying my college-self a little bit. I've gotten into following the National Women's Soccer League (NWSL) as well as some of the minor-league sports that are in our city. I love trying new foods and visiting new places (as cliché as that sounds), just because there's so much of the world to explore and experience—I think that makes one a more well-rounded, empathetic person.

What's the story behind your blog?

I don't quite remember the origin story for the name other than that it was going to be the name for my software "business" (remember, I was kid!) when I was writing software on the TRS-80. None of that really lasted and I reused the name when I created a personal site on GeoCities. In the late 1990s, the Internet was a weird patchwork of personal sites, academic resources, and still rough-around-the-edges corporate sites. I think we were all learning what this could be used for as we went along and I was no exception. Initially, it was a landing page of sorts when I was writing about tech elsewhere, including Low End Mac and the long-defunct MacWeekly.

Eventually, getting a new iBook G3 and wanting to expand my topics led me to turning my site into a blog. I think that second-generation of the site was my attempt to compete with some of the larger players at the time, mixing in product reviews, longform opinion articles, news stories, and even a few guest writers. At that time, my family still had a big analog C-Band satellite dish at home and I was able to tune in to the live feeds of the Macworld Expo keynotes, so I could "live blog" those from afar, too. iLounge, MacOpinion, Think Secret, and TUAW were some of the sites I looked up to. By the time I was in college, it was a lot to balance courses, a campus job, somewhat of a social life, and the site scaled back a little, but was still very much a fun hobby of mine.

Like many other bloggers, my site's third-generation morphed into more of a format similar to John Gruber's Daring Fireball: longform articles mixed with linked-out items that have a couple of paragraphs of commentary (I call them "Snippets.") I liked the format, as it allowed me to share things I found interesting or worth talking about. However, I found that in recent years so much of the tech industry has started to feel like a parody of itself. I felt like I had to cover stories because of their importance, rather than because I wanted to. After realizing that, I've started to shift my content a bit and my goal is to get back to content that celebrates my relationship with technology and even things that can be more lasting. That might be leading to a "fourth-generation" of the site.

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

As I touched on a little earlier, I think my creative process got a bit hijacked by so much bad news around "Big Tech"—while I've tried to avoid my site becoming a cheerleader for Apple, that's the corner of the tech world that I've lived in for the past 30+ years (if you count the Macs and Apple IIs I used in school before I had my own.) Inspiration and sources come from a variety of areas: other blogs and things in my RSS reader, links on social media, tech stories from the larger media outlets.

I think for Snippets, it's something that I feel is important to share or that I have strong feelings for. Those are often a bit more off-the-cuff and get a quick proofread before publishing. If it's something longer-form, I'll take some time, edit as I go, maybe have someone look over portions if something isn't quite working for me, and then publish. In terms of research, I try to link to outside sources that can provide additional context, older posts of my own that can add some historical context, while still maintaining and assuming that most of my readers have an above-average grasp on a lot of the topics. It's a bit of writing-for-me and I hope others will join me on the ride.

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

While I'd love to say that I have a certain ritualistic place that I write, the truth is that sometimes it's just wherever I am. I don't love writing from my phone, but sometimes due to travel or between things at work, I might hammer out a quick post. I do think that I've gotten my home-office to be a comfortable place to sit down and focus on writing, with cozy lighting and everything set up. When I was working at my last job, I'd often grab a laptop or iPad and work from a nearby coffee shop—I think getting out of my then-apartment and having a more intentional time for writing with fewer distractions helped. Since moving, I haven't done that as much.

If I think of some of my favorite "let's go write" moments, it's often on a moody, rainy day where there's some ambient noise from outside while I work.

I have found that taking a break and letting something sit for a day or two has been a more important thing than location. Trying to force oneself to write when your head and heart aren't in it just doesn't seem to work for me.

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

I set up my site on WordPress about twenty years ago when I outgrew server-side includes. It took a little while to wrestle the templates to work like my previously-carefully-crafted stylesheets. In some ways WordPress has gotten really bloated for my needs, but it works well enough and I have yet to find something to easily replace it with all the random things I've bolted onto my theme over the years.

I'm in the process of re-evaluating some of my services, but right now I'm using IONOS (formerly 1&1) for hosting, which I had originally started with when they set up shop in the United States. My domains are with Hover at the moment.

As for what I use to create my site, I'm currently using a Mac mini (M4), iPad mini (A17 Pro), and iPhone 15. On the Mac, BBEdit or directly on the web are where I'll do my writing. On the iOS side, I do a lot of writing in iA Writer. I'm still using Panic's Coda an Code Editor (formerly Diet Coda) for a lot of file mananagement/coding. Considering how long both have been discontinued, finding suitable replacements for both at my desk and mobile are on my to-do list.

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

Other than the name being sometimes hard to spell, I don't think I'd necessarily pick something else. The beauty of it is that I'm not necessarily tied down to Apple/Mac-specific content and I can adapt it over time. I think of how many sites were Mac-something or iPod-something and then had to abruptly (and sometimes awkwardly) rename to fit the changing scope of content.

I think for a CMS, I might want something a bit "lighter," but WordPress has allowed me to adapt the site for my changing content numerous times.

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetising personal blogs?

I find it to be relatively inexpensive to run the site with hosting running me about US$100/year and then US$20/domain on average. I make some of that back with the single ad through the Carbon network, but I don't necessarily want to have more ads than that. Since it's a hobby for me, I'm not looking to make a lot of money, but I understand for folks who want or need to and don't begrudge that. I've toyed with the idea of letting people support the site, but I'm also not sure if it's worth the trouble.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

To try to avoid repeating anyone who has already been interviewed, I went through my RSS feeds to find a few that I immediately skip to when I see a new post:

Brent Simmons is behind NetNewsWire and I started following his writing soon after I discovered NetNewsWire years ago, and got to follow the story of how that piece of software changed hands numerous times.

Stephen Hackett is someone whose content and knowledge I can really relate to, so it's interesting to see his take on a lot of tech.

Matthew Haughey covers a lot of different topics, but manages to craft a post that is always so damn fascinating.

Mike Davidson doesn't blog as much these days, but he was another person whose work I followed way back in the mid-2000s and looked up to when I was interested in the convergence of traditional media and the Web.

Jedda, Keenan, Lou Plummer, Nick Heer, Riccardo Mori, and Louie Mantia were already in the series, but I always enjoy when something new comes along from them, too.

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

I have a few odds and ends that I wasn't quite sure where to fit elsewhere. First, I wanted to mention my side-project, The Chaos League, a blog that followed a similar format as SchwarzTech, but focused on the NWSL. This was a fantastic distraction coming out of the pandemic as it gave me an outlet that wasn't tech. Unfortunately, in the last few years, coverage from large media outlets and the public's appetite for short-form video content have kind of killed a lot of interest in bloggers covering that space. It's currently on hiatus and I'm not sure what the next step, if any, will be.

Other than shamelessly plugging what I’ve done, I wanted to comment that this was a really fun exercise to think over my place online and what it means to me—thanks again for the opportunity!

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

My name is Dominik Schwind and I'm from Lörrach, a small town on the German side of the tri-border area with Switzerland and France). I've been a web developer for a really long time now, mostly server-side and just occasionally dabbling in what is showing up in the browser. Annoyingly that's a hobby that I turned into work, so I guess that's ruined now. (Which doesn't stop me, though: I have too many half-finished side-project websites and apps to count.)

Besides that I also really like to take photos and after a few years of being frozen in place I started to travel again, which is always nice. I do like watching motorsports of almost all types, I can easily get sucked into computer games like Factorio and I like to listen to podcasts, top of them being the Omnibus Project, Do Go On and Roderick on the Line.

What's the story behind your blog?

I've had a website since before I had internet access - some computer game I had in the mid-90s had the manual included as HTML and I used it to learn how to make basic websites. The very first day my father came home with a modem, I signed up for GeoCities and when I found a webhost that would allow me to run CGI scripts, I installed NewsPro, an early proto-blog system before blogging was even a thing. And while these early iterations of my website(s) are long gone, I haven't stopped since.

The name came from an unease I started to feel in my final year of high school: once I finished school, I didn't know where to direct my energy and attention. That feeling hasn't really left since then.

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

Mostly there is none - when I think of something that I want to communicate to someone, anyone, I try to put it online. Quite often it ends up on Mastodon but I do try to put things on my blog, especially when I know it is something future me would appreciate.

A few years ago I noticed that I had neglecting my blog in favour of other ways of communicating and I started a pact with a couple of friends to write weeknotes. We're in our fourth year now, which feels like an accomplishment. I try to write those posts first thing on a Sunday morning, if possible.

I write most of my posts in Markdown in iA Writer, which is probably the most arrogant Markdown editing app in the world. But I paid for it at some point, so I better use it, too.

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

I basically only need a computer and a place to sit and I'm fine. I've tried to find ways to blog from my phone but in the end, I prefer a proper keyboard and a bigger screen.

While I never observed any difference in blogging creativity depending on the physical space, I actually quite enjoy writing in places other than my desk.

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

This one is actually pretty simple: I run WordPress, currently on a DigitalOcean VM. One of the points on my long to-do list for my web stuff is to move it to Hetzner, which probably would only take an evening. And yet, I procrastinate.

I've (more or less) jokingly said I'd replace WordPress with a CMS of my own making for years now, but at some point I've resigned, even though my database is a mess.

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

Probably not.

Ever since the beginning I wrote for two audiences: my friends and future me. I'm really happy when someone else finds my blog and might turn into an internet friend, but I wouldn't know how else to achieve that other than what I've been doing for all these years now.

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetising personal blogs?

.de domains are pretty affordable, so it is that plus the server, which is around €100 per year.

The blog doesn't generate any revenue, in many ways it's "only" a journal.

When it comes to other bloggers, I'd say: go for it if you think your writing (or your photography or whatever it might be you're sharing on your website) is something that can be turned into revenue, one way or another. In many ways I'm a bit bummed that Flattr (or something similar) never really took of, I would happily use a service like that.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

Of course I need to mention my friends and fellow weeknoters: Martin (blogs in German) and Teymur. (NSFW)

Three of the people whose blogs I read have been interviewed here already: Ahn (Interview), Jeremy Keith (Interview) and Winnie Lim .(Interview)

Some other people whose blogs I read and who might be interesting people to answer your questions would be Jennifer Mills, (who has the best take on weekly blog posts I have ever seen) Nikkin, (he calls it a newsletter, but there is an RSS feed) Roy Tang and Ruben Schade.

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

If you don't have one yet, go start a personal website! Don't take it too seriously, try things and it can be a nice, meditative hobby and helps against the urge to doomscroll. Also you might never know, your kind of people might find it and connect with you.

Let’s start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

I’m Stefano, I’m 40 years old, I live in Italy. I have three sons (the oldest turned 18 last week — happy birthday Ale!). I try to be a present and attentive father, and I believe I am, despite the compromises that come with divorce.

I discovered programming at 12 with a little book I found at the library featuring games in QuickBASIC… and I never stopped from there. Creating digital things has always been my greatest passion.

In my first year of university, I released one of the very first Firefox extensions, which was an immediate huge success: in no time, 2M daily users… and thousands were donating on PayPal! A huge thing for a 19-year-old. From that experience on, I kept recreating that recipe: building my own software on the web.

After many years in the web agency world, one of the many ideas I threw together in my spare time for fun, DatoCMS, was once again very successful. 10 years after the first line of code I wrote, the product continues to exist, grow, and be used all over the world. Today we’re about 15 people working on it. For me, it’s a true dream come true.

Apart from programming, which continues to be a fundamental part of my life in terms of fulfillment and satisfaction (perhaps too much so), I’m an idealist, a man of the left, and a great enthusiast of meditation, psychology, and personal growth work in general.

What’s the story behind your blog?

I’ve had various blogs in my life. The first one was as a teenager, in the full Blogger era (2004), to communicate and find friends. I even found my future wife and mother of my children there. The second was to find work and make myself known professionally (the articles are still on Github).

My current blog, squeakish, was born after a month-long vacation I took a couple of years ago in Brazil: disconnecting (for the first time in my life, actually!) from responsibilities for an extended period gave me the chance to think about many things differently. It inspired me and made me want to study and write again.

It’s called squeakish because I’m (proudly?) the exact opposite of a solid and confident person. I’m full of internal creaks, and my blog contains posts that represent “yieldings,” vulnerabilities that I feel like exploring and sharing.

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

Inspiration always comes from personal reflections that I feel the need to communicate. Often these are difficult things that I struggle to put out into the world. Of these reflections, only a small portion ends up on the blog. Most of them I feel are too personal in their details to be of value to someone else. This is perhaps the biggest block at the moment: understanding the threshold for when something should move from my personal journal to being shared on the blog. I should probably worry less about it?

My posts are always written in a single session — I want them to remain as authentic as possible to the moment they were conceived. I wait a few hours before publishing them, to be able to reread them and see if something can be improved, and then they’re online.

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

My creative process needs to be facilitated, first of all by taking dedicated time. This is the fundamental thing. Normally I’ve always written from home, in my usual “nest,” but lately (and even right now) I’m trying to change locations (bars, cafés). Surrounding yourself with different things helps you see things differently. I also try to avoid any kind of “aesthetic” distraction — I write in a notepad without any formatting (Paper), and only at the very end I copy on the CMS and format.

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

The site is in Astro and the code is available on Github: there’s a README that explains the details. I had fun learning and implementing webmentions, microformats, backfeeding from Mastodon, and I wrote a brief guide about it.

The content is on, well, DatoCMS. I didn’t want to invent anything new — it’s what I know like the back of my hand, and I know it already gives me everything I need and like, including easy image and video management.

The site is deployed on Cloudflare Pages, the domain is on Spaceship.

I tried to keep the layout as simple as possible, and even copied the Hey World layout. No distractions!

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

The first version of the site was in Svelte: working in the headless CMS world, in ten years I’ve really worked with all the available platforms, static site generators, and frameworks, and I’ve come to the conclusion that today Astro is the most suitable and versatile tool for producing content-driven websites. YMMV.

The name “Squeakish” still appeals to me — it has something playful about it and doesn’t take itself too seriously — but I’ve never been a fanatic about finding perfect names.

So yeah, right now I’m good with what I have!

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what’s your position on people monetising personal blogs?

The only cost… is for the domain ($30/year)? Cloudflare Pages is free, the DatoCMS project is on a free plan. Personally, I have no need to monetize my blog. With monetization automatically comes a sense of responsibility, and this is exactly the opposite of what I’m looking for.

I have no negative opinion about those who do it. The important thing is to avoid the enshittification that money normally brings. Personal blogs, as you well know, are the soul of the Internet, and we must try to preserve them free and sincere.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

God, there are so many! My feed reader is actually publicly visible at /news and at the bottom there’s the list of people I follow. Personally, I’d go with David Celis and/or Chris!

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

Having your own simple feed reader publicly available inside your own website is something I haven’t seen anywhere else, but it’s simple to build and I feel gives a nice high-level view into what one person is currently feeding himself with. I've actually wrote a bit about this.

I just watched a wonderful film, so I feel the need to share it: O Filho de mil Homens.

Finally, I’d like to use this space to offer my experience (personal? professional?) to anyone who might need it: if you’d like to have a chat, and you think I might be able to help you with something, reach out via PM on Mastodon and I’ll try to do my best!

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

I’m a Canadian blogger and entrepreneur. I started doing this back when I was in a totally different line of work. I was a surveyor for an engineering company, and where I live the industry slows down in the winter because of the harsh cold, so I began poking around on the internet a little more than usual. That led to discovering blogs, and the possibility of doing that for a living.

I had always been into writing, so having a way to publish my thoughts and for interested parties to read them and care was a revelation. That was 2008 or so, when the internet was a very different place. Social media was a niche and nerdy thing, big companies had no idea how to use the internet, and we were not all algorithmized. I miss that time.

Aside from what I write about (see below), I’m into indoor climbing, reading, religion, history, and lifting weights. I’m also into the idea of the “Oldschool Internet.” As you know if you’re over 30, the internet used to feel different than it does now. It was freer, more creative and weird, and less dominated by big platforms and algorithms. I have a deep, deep nostalgia for it and I wish I could recreate that feeling.

What's the story behind your blog?

When I was goofing around on the internet at work I found a blog about blogging for a living, and one day decided I would do that. I had always been interested in the inner world of the human being. I was always thinking about this conundrum of having mind and a body. You have no instruction manual, and you have to go and live a life and try to be happy. I sat down and listed like a hundred obscure ideas I’d been wanting to tell the world.

What I didn’t realize is that my obsession with the inner human world and managing the human condition was due to having undiagnosed ADHD, which made ordinary life stuff very complicated and difficult. My challenges led me to reading piles of self-help and spiritual-flavored stuff. A lot of it was crap but I did learn quite a bit about making the most of the mess that is human life, and shared what I found.

The blog I started was called Raptitude. It was just a made-up word, combining “rapt” and “aptitude.” The idea is that you can get better at appreciating life, at being rapt by the day-to-day experience of being alive. Many of my posts were little tricks I’d figured out for getting yourself to do things, not realizing it was coming from a rather crippling psychiatric condition. I finally got diagnosed at age 40, after twelve years of blogging.

I always tried to stay away from writing in the kind of mushy, therapeutic tone that dominates the self-help and spiritual space. I wrote about weird and hypothetical things instead, and I found an audience pretty quickly.

This year I launched a second site to help other “productivity-challenged” people. It’s called How to Do Things, and it’s more practical and less philosophical than Raptitude, and is aimed at adults with ADHD.

Today my writing is more focused, less wild. But Raptitude is the same blog it was 17 years ago when I first launched it.

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

I have ideas all the time and take voice notes when I’m out and about. If I’m home I just mind-dump into a text document.

Later I go through my ideas and find one I think I could actually write about. I play around with it, find an angle, and start typing. I do a lot of moving things around, cutting and pasting. Sometimes I’ll write 3 or 4 thousand words and end up with a 1200-word post. Sometimes I even delete the original idea and just riff on a tangential idea.

It is not an efficient or structured process, it’s just habit. I take forever to write posts, even now. I don’t do drafts exactly, I just barf out the idea, try to find a bottom-line point, then revise what I’ve written to point to that bottom-line idea. I do a couple of passes to try to shorten it, which just as often ends up lengthening it. Then I add pictures with funny captions so people don’t get bored and publish it.

I don’t involve anyone else in the writing and there are typos sometimes.

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

I have a home office and that’s pretty much exclusively where I work. Everything I need is there, my desk has a lot of space, I have multiple monitors. I play instrumental music. Classical or ambient electronic.

I’ve worked in coffee shops, and I do get inspired by being out in the world. But I always feel guilty about taking up their seats for too long, and the travel time seems like a waste so I don’t do that much.

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

I have always used WordPress, and self-host on BigScoots. I love the host and am so glad I switched from a large, well-known terrible company I will not name. WordPress is good and a lot less clunky than it used to be.

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

Today I would just do a Substack. I still might switch to Substack one day. It seems like a well-contained environment that takes eliminates a lot of technical and design considerations that can suck up writing time. You’re also built into a network of other writers and readers.

What I would do differently is learn to make a kind of content that doesn’t take long to make. I take forever to do one piece and it is still hard.

Another thing I’d do differently is define my topic more narrowly. I write about anything pertaining to human life, which makes it difficult to know what to write about, and difficult to do any marketing or intentional growth, because there is no identifiable crowd or demographic that I know would be into my “topic.”

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetising personal blogs?

It costs a fortune, all told, because it’s a business and not just a blog. Hosting isn’t bad – a few hundred dollars a year. I pay someone on a monthly basis to update and maintain the site and deal with downtime and crashes and other stuff that used to blow up my life once a year or so. I’m not a super savvy technical person so this is necessary.

The highest cost is the email management system, which is essential for the layers and layers of emails I send. With 40,000 people in the system it costs over $400 a month. There may be cheaper options but switching would be too big a pain. I also have tons of little subscription costs that have become necessary for product delivery (Dropbox for example). Altogether my monthly business expenses are more than my rent.

I make a full-time living from my blog by offering products to my readers. I also have a Patreon.

The whole operation would be way cheaper to run if I didn’t sell anything. I am all for monetizing personal blogs. Good content is hard to make and takes time, and if you want to offer something bigger than blog posts, you have to charge for it or it doesn’t get made.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

I am a fan of David Pinsof’s Everything is Bullshit and Scott Alexander’s Astral Codex Ten, both of which are Substacks now. Mostly I read books these days.

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

I just want to say this was a lot of fun. Not to be the old man in the room but the internet has changed immensely since I started in 2008. Part of what has dropped away (at least for me) has been being in the “world” of blogs. Answering these questions and reading other people’s answers on your site has reminded me that some semblance of that community spirit still exists. Thanks for keeping it alive.

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

Hello! I’m Frances, I live in the East Midlands in the UK with my wife, back in my hometown to be near my family. I like stories, spending lots of time outside, history, and being an aunt. Right now I’m into zines, playing more ttrpgs, reading lots of biographies, and am going to take some letterpress printing classes. This year I am looking forward to camping, more reading projects, outdoor swimming, and feeding all the neighbourhood slugs with my garden veg. Just generally I’m interested in creativity, learning, fun projects, and trying new things, then blogging about it. I work in the voluntary sector and adult education, and am training to be a mental health counsellor.

What's the story behind your blog?

In February 2025 I got into an enthusiasm about the indie web. I’ve been messing around on the internet since 2000 when I started making geocities sites. There have been many different blogs and sites since then but nothing for the past few years. I really wanted to get among it and I went from looking at some Neocities sites to having my blog up and running within hours.

Since then I've had fun adding more stuff to my site, and tweaking things, but no major changes. It took a while to settle into a rhythm - which is upbeat, chatty, 250-ish words, three to five times a week. Now I'm really happy with how it's going and it feels like I’ve only just gotten started. I love emailing with people, taking part in blog carnivals, and so on.

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

Mostly ideas come from or are about books I'm reading, little projects I'm doing, tv and films, other people's posts, conversations with my niblings, rabbit holes I'm going down, and stuff I enjoy. Writing helps me think, possibly writing is how I think. I try to stay positive and to write posts that are hopefully fun for other people to read.

It’s very off-the-cuff when ideas come up and I put them in a draft, even just a sentence of an idea. There's always a few posts on the go at any one time and they usually get posted within a week. I like a choice of things to be working on - which is true of most stuff, not just blog posts. Some posts like my link roundups or lists of things I've been enjoying are added to over time, then posted when they get to a good length. I've been experimenting with ‘theme’ weeks or series, which has been great fun so far.

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

I do think the physical space influences creativity. To keep my battery charged I need to be exposed to new ideas: reading, going to a museum, looking at art, doing things. I’ve spent years training myself out of the idea I have to be in the ideal creative environment or state in order to write. I'll write queueing at the shops or on the bus, perfectly happily. It’s more about being able to write whenever I have time or ideas. Ideally, I’d be in a field. I am almost always listening to music though.

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

There is deliberately very little in the way of a tech stack. I use Bear Blog, which I love very much. My domains are with Namecheap. That’s it. I didn’t want anything to complicate getting started when I was in that enthusiasm. I’m mostly on my phone or tablet so it was essential I could write, post, and fiddle, really do everything, without needing my laptop. I don’t even draft elsewhere - I write directly into the Bear Blog editor because I believe in living dangerously. No backups, we die like men.

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

Honestly, no. I made decisions - the platform, to use my name - and I could have made them differently but I stand by them. Those are just details - writing, thinking, sharing, contributing, and connecting with people are the real focus.

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetising personal blogs?

I’ve got an annual paid plan for Bear Blog which is about £40 a year plus my domain name is about £12 a year. It does not generate revenue and I don’t want or need it to. People can do whatever they like with their personal blogs and I will contribute to a tip jar, buy people’s books or zines, and so on, whenever I can.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

This is the toughest question! So many great blogs. Just a few, and I’d love to see any of them interviewed: mɛ̈rmɛ̈r, Sylvia at A parenthetical departure, Ruth at An Archaeopteryx, Ním's memex, Paul Graham Raven at Velcro City Tourist Board, Gabrielle de la Puente and Zarina Muhammad at The White Pube, and Paul Watson at The Lazarus Corporation.

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

I’m just a big fan of everyone out here rewilding the web with fun blogs, sites, and projects. Including everything you do, Manu, with your blog, People and Blogs, and Dealgorithmed. Thank you for them, and for having me here. Another cool project: Elmcat made an interactive map of the TTRPG blogosphere. Not only is this an amazing technically but it's so inspiring to see the community and all the connections.

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

I am from Siberia. I studied CS there, got my first job in IT, and moved to Germany in 2018. Apart from programming, I am passionate about movies and filmmaking, UI design, experimented with standup, play badminton.

What's the story behind your blog?

I started writing in LiveJournal when I was still in uni, found a very nice Russian-speaking FP community there. Had a lot of eye-opening and often very heated discussions. Experimented with publishing in collaborative blogs (Habr, approximately Russian dev.to) but felt that author’s identity gets lost there.

Personal blog was my attempt at reaching a wider English-speaking community. Livejournal was already dying by then, and I was smart (lucky?) enough to not choose Medium (TBH, it looked very promising in 2014).

I am pretty happy with that decision. The older you get, the less you believe any startup has your best interests at heart. This leads to the only possible conclusion: self-hosting. It is hard to start but once you get your core audience there’s no limit to your growth.

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

I usually collect ideas for a while (pictures, phrases, links, thoughts). This happens in the background and can take years. Once it reaches critical mass, I sit down to organize it all in a coherent whole.

I don’t do separate drafts; it’s more like a pile of ideas — first pass — reflection — reorganization/cleanup — review — publish.

A mandatory part of the reflection phase is questioning myself: why am I writing this, nobody is going to read it, this is stupid/silly/trivial/too complicated. That’s how you know you are writing something truly great.

I usually ask a friend or two for feedback, Grammarly/ChatGPT/built-in Apple AI to do proofreading.

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

I can only write in Sublime Text because it’s a tool I use daily for coding and it has become second nature to me. I feel very uncomfortable in any other tool when some minor detail behaves slightly different from what I am used to. iA Writer is fantastic and I tried to reproduce it as close as possible, its only downside being not being Sublime Text.

I recently bought a NuPhy keyboard (Air60 v2 Cowberry) for my PC because of its compact size and cute looks, but was surprised that it sounds amazing and now I am addicted to typing on it.

Apart from that, no: any place, any time, any device. No sounds, no music, as I find both distracting.

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

I used to use Github pages but got tired of Ruby/Jekyll local installation breaking on macOS every year or so. I don’t blog often, so it’s the worst: you come back to your blog once every few months, completely without context, and you need to spend hours just restoring it to the status quo. Wrote my own engine in Clojure and has been happy ever since.

For some reason I didn’t go with the static generator route. I do a good old CGI style approach, with an actual server rendering your pages. It’s more fun that way, and allows for more interactivity, although I didn’t explore it much yet.

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

No, I am totally happy with where I am.

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetising personal blogs?

Server costs €35/mo, but I co-host a lot of other projects there. Domain is €25/year.

I used to have Patreon, but it was not just for blog, also for my open-source projects. I never tried monetizing writing, not sure how well that would go, but I have nothing against it.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

Off the top of my RSS feed:

• Jamie Brandon https://www.scattered-thoughts.net/log/
• Rakhim Davletkaliyev https://rakhim.exotext.com/
• Marcin Wichary https://aresluna.org/
• Ilya Birman https://ilyabirman.net/meanwhile/

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

Fira Code is a nice programming font you might like.

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

Hey there, I'm Ryan. I'm originally from South Jersey (as in southern New Jersey) but live now in Northern Virginia with my wife, two kids, dog, and rabbit. I'm well out of school by this point, but I was a computer science major over half a lifetime ago. I've been a web developer for many years, though my current professional role is less well-defined for various reasons.

I've built fun little projects on the web since 1994, most of which were pretty low-key or niche. A couple got some nice acknowledgement in large media outlets or went mildly viral for a bit, but my favorites have always flown under the radar and garner just the rare "thank you!" email.

I'm passionate about genealogy/family history, the personal web (duh!), music/movies/books, radio archiving, personal preservation, running, animal rights, and trying to be less of a jerk each day.

What's the story behind your blog?

I launched my first personal web site on my college's server in December of 1994 (only the second student to have done so), but my first blog post, of sorts, was on April 20, 1998 shortly after I'd moved to a proper web host and my own domain. I had a changelog for a while with updates about the site, but then I started a page with a changelog for my life--a blog, though the word wasn't widely used at that point.

The blog grew more important and eventually got its own name, "twist of fait accomplis." It ran through 2020, though slowed down quite a bit in the mid-2010s. Over that time, I did a lot of personal blogging (the type of stuff that would later be appropriate for social media), linkblogging, commentary, and longer essays. I had a few posts gain traction over the years, somewhat unexpectedly. Like the one where I wrote about seeing The Maury Povich Show in person and watching Maury embarrassingly misgender an audience member. It blew up when people got to the post through Google and thought that I was Maury and started telling me their life stories in the comments (often with PII). That post got over 700 comments before I had to turn them off. Sadly, Maury himself never reached out to do a collab. laze x Povich could have been great.

In 2020, I was using a Wordpress security plugin that was (ironically) compromised and ended up injecting sites I ran with malware. I got fed up with Wordpress and had already been growing weary of the state of the personal web, so I pulled my site down and replaced it with a single, unindexed web page that I would quietly update every few months.

By 2024, I started re-engaging with the IndieWeb (or whatever you want to call it) and felt a hankering to bring my site back in some way, so I did. Since then, I've fallen back in love with blogging and tinkering with my site. The current incarnation features selected posts going back to 1998 from assorted sites I've run over the years as well as a nice dose of new posts.

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

I've decided that in the current iteration of my site, I'm simply letting my interests guide me. Sometimes, that means I'm writing a post about an album I've been listening to, other times responding to someone else's post or writing about a project I've been working on or a topic that's been interesting me. Sometimes I just write about my experience getting older.

Some of the posts (like one I wrote about heart disease and lipoprotein(a)) I put some time into researching, which can make the process a bit slow. I've got one post about a pretty esoteric piece of train history that I've been working on-and-off for months on because I feel like there's more good info out there I need to find before I can hit publish (even though only ten people will end up reading it).

I have a Writing folder in Joplin where I keep all my drafts. It's a nice way to write, as I can switch between a rich text editor and straight markdown, and then copy the markdown directly into a micro.blog post when I'm done. I do any proofing and corrections myself before posting and inevitably even more after posting. I try not to be too precious about it, though. It's my site and though I don't want it to feel sloppy, I'm human and make mistakes. I'm at peace with the occasional typo or awkward sentence.

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

Like most people, I like to have a quiet space to think and write, perhaps accompanied by some non-vocal music. I do most of my writing in my home office/guest bedroom looking out the window on my small backyard. It's quite pleasant during the summer to see all the greenery, but even during the winter months, I appreciate the light that comes through. Writing on the front porch in nice weather or by the fireplace in the winter are nice alternatives when I need to mix things up.

I don't have as many "I'm going to sit down and write for 30 minutes"-type moments as I'd like. More often, it's "I can probably snag ten minutes now for a paragraph or two." I take what I can get, which can result in fragmented prose that requires a good deal of massaging before it's ready for public consumption.

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

I've gone through so many blogging platforms and web hosts over the years, but laze.net is currently hosted at micro.blog, which I use more as a traditional CMS than as a microblogging or POSSE service as it was intended. It's Hugo on the backend and deploys as a static site, which I like.

I'm at the point where I don't want to worry about managing deployments, updating software, configuring servers... none of that interests me at this stage. I find more joy in thinking and writing than I do in tinkering with what's running the site.

(I run other sites where I'm more involved technically, but we're talking about laze.net here.)

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

I've started and restarted too many blogs and where I've settled is this: I aim to keep things as simple as possible (while also appreciating a degree of flexibility) with a well-designed CMS on the back end that pushes out a static site on the other. I'm happy with the way things are now.

I love that there are so many options out there now, whether it's micro.blog, Bear, Pika, or any of the other services Manuel outlines on his blog platforms page. There's a service out there for whatever level of involvement one might want to have with their site's appearance or functionality.

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetising personal blogs?

I'm on the micro.blog premium plan, which is $10/month. My email is hosted at mxroute, which I subscribed to a while ago for some deal, so let's call that a buck or two a month since I host other domains' email there as well. The domain registration costs about $13/year. So, I'm able to run the site for around $15/month.

I don't monetize the site. Nothing against anyone who does with theirs, though.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

Some of these folks may have been featured here before (and indeed this may be where I found them).

• Paul - I've known Paul online since the early-90s (GEnie!!) and we still keep in almost daily contact. His blog is always a good read. He's the writer I wish I was. Interview him!
• Chris - Chris is a blogger I met back in the early 2000s only to find out he lived a block away (I knew he was local but not that local). He's been in the game forever and has always been a great example of what the indie/personal web is about. Interview him, too! (Already did!)
• Alex - Alex's series on Tiny Archives and recent three-parter on personal social media archiving are some of my favorite things of the last couple of years.
• Katherine - I feel like everyone probably knows about Katherine's site at this point, but I tell you... what a delightful web presence.
• Grizzly Gazette - This group blog on Bear has been a good read since it launched this year.

I have a proper blogroll, too, that I'm always adding to.

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

I've always got a few side projects going on. I've got one dedicated to a pet cemetery in the Nevada desert. I do a good bit of radio archiving (and wholeheartedly support unimportant archiving). I've also got a digital garden dedicated to genealogy, but it needs some tending. And a pal and I have a very slow joint blog where we post once a year, alternating years between us. Anything new (or old) that I may be up to, I try to add to my "projects" page.