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A Blogging Retrospective

As of last Saturday, I've been blogging consistently for two years.

When I started out I was writing about everything from how my week was going to new tech I found to music or games I was getting into and making that writing available exclusively over the gemini protocol. Not much has changed in the topics I like to write about, but last year I started making my writing available over the web in addition to gemini. At first I was using Neocities, but recently I migrated to my own Hugo static site in an effort to streamline my publishing process.

Here's some of the things I've learned and come to enjoy in my two years of writing.

What I get from it

As I'm sure most people who keep a blog will tell you, one of the big benefits is just having somewhere to organize your thoughts and solidify your ideas. I personally see it as an alternative to keeping a journal, which I've always been lousy at. Knowing my writing might have an audience, no matter how small, is a good motivator in keeping it up and thinking up interesting things to write about.

I've met a lot of cool people who have similar interests through blogging. Some of them have come through the gemini community, others through the fediverse, and some have reached out directly through the contact methods I list. It's been really fun chatting with people, especially since I intentionally make it difficult for myself to track how many visitors I'm getting. Though it's not why I write, it's nice to know people are reading and enjoying my stuff. And I always learn something new in the process.

It turns out that writing can be a good productivity booster for me. Publishing a quick post is often a good way for me to feel like I got something done which then makes it easier to tackle whatever is on my to-do list.

Some unsolicited advice

To anyone who's considered starting or restarting a blog...

What are you waiting for?
Don't stress over what to write about or whether people will find it interesting. I think that's the main reason I'm still at this after two years. I've had fun by writing primarily for myself.
The tech supporting your blog doesn't matter, so don't stress that either. Learning new tools can be interesting, but not if it gets in the way of the actual writing.
List some contact info if you feel comfortable doing so. I've only had good experiences.

Here's to another two years?

- moddedBear / 2023-02-06

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