pubdate: Sat May 21 13:25:37 UTC 2022
title: new blog
slug: newblog
summary: being a post about this new blog; motivations, plans, et cetera

I made a blog. I haven't had one in years. When I did it was mostly for dream logging and poetry. I was always pretty self conscious about what I put there. I published my town `feels` posts as a "blog" for a while, but that never felt right. My `feels` content was overly personal, diaristic, and vulnerable. I used to think you could either be authentic (vulnerable to a fault) or inauthentic (crafting a personal brand), but now think often of a phrase I heard an actor use in an interview about learning to be "private in public." I interpreted that as being forthcoming with yourself in the public eye -- which we're all in, now, thanks to the internet -- but being defensive about what you share.

Another reason I'm making one of these again is self-actualization. Historically I've thought very poorly of myself and agonized over anyone actually caring what I posted. Now, I'm just excited to share whatever I'm excited about or mentally chewing on, not out of self-aggrandizement, but because the stuff I find interesting is interesting because I find it interesting. It's a very cozy tautology. I'm not interested in building a following or crafting a brand: just sharing what inspires me in an honest way while still keeping some of myself to myself.

Finally, I like to mark time with the discovery of artifacts. I'm always hunting for inspiring things--books, sites, objects, people--and feel an urge to catalogue them so I can be re-inspired in the future. I post on social media about these things sometimes, but social media is uniquely unsuited to reflection and later perusal. I liked Tumblr for this to an extent but never got comfy posting there; too many numbers and buttons and noise there for me to feel like I could collect my thoughts or feel like I was posting for myself instead of a hypothetical audience that might "like" something. I also don't like being beholden to (LINK https://twitter.com/nate_smith corporate platforms).

Some initial posting fodder:

* Going through a decade's worth of unsorted bookmarks and posting interesting finds
* Reporting on 1990s primary "cyber media" that I collect like academic books on hypertext and trashy web magazines
* Project ideas that I'll never get to
* Project ideas that I have gotten to
* My "religious" interests in Discordianism and Hermeticism
* Fiction/poetry/essays 

Technically speaking, this is all powered by some markdown files with custom metadata embedded in it, a <100 line bash script, and a Go program for handling a little linking macro. I wanted to be able to author links in a consistent way but have sensible renderings in HTML, Gemini, and Gopher. All of this, including posts, can be found in (LINK https://git.tilde.town/vilmibm/blog this repository). I considered a static site generator...but I prefer scripting my own thing wrt blogging. It keeps me humble and I find that I don't use most of the features of off the shelf things.