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Capsule Launched

We have liftoff

Created 2022-05-27

Here's the announcement I made on Wordpress:

Exciting stuff: I’ve managed to create a public-facing Gemini capsule. I have tested it over at an account I created at sdf.org. So everything checks out and should be working hunky-dory. Note that, for now, the site won’t be active 24/7. I’ll turn my server off at night-time, pending a more permanent solution.
Point your favourite gemini client to:
gemini://blinkyshark.chickenkiller.com
and have it! The domain name is a bit of an oddity, admittedly, but I’m using FreeDNS, so I’m kinda going with a name I can get.
The plan for the foreseeable future is that my blog will now reside on Gemini rather than WordPress. WordPress is a nightmare. The internet in general is a nightmare. I want to try out Gemini for awhile and see how I get on.
I won’t be abandoning the Interwebs permanently. I still need that for banking and stuff. Not to mention my favourite finance site: Stockopedia.

Choosing a subdomain was difficult, and I stuck with the first thing that

worked: blinkyshark. It is named after a user called "Blinky The Shark".

I did not know him personally, but I was aware that he posted a lot on

the alt.comp.freeware Usenet group. I used to frequent that group a lot,

and even produced daily digests, courtesy of a kind soul who

gave me an account on his aging Sun Unix machine. My apologies,

but I don't remember his name. I think his surname was Schmitt, and lived

in either Australia or US, if memory serves. He was a member of the

ACM, I think.

Blinky The Shark's real name was Lee Rizor. He passed away on

31 Jan 2009 (or the day after) at the age of 61. His username was based

on him hearing that sharks do not blink. (Apparently they do actually

blink). Blinky kept a small website of free software for some time.

So that's the story behind the name "blinkyshark".