The Dent · The Web And I in 2023

The Web And I in 2023

I think I've actually lost track of the amount of times, since starting a form of this blog in 2018, that I've posted something along the lines of: "Next year I'm really going to focus on blogging, I'm going to stick with the host, I'm going to expand what I'm writing, blah, blah, blah". This post was actually conceptualised as yet another version of that. New year, new commitment to something I wont stick with.

As we thunder into 2023, like a bull on the run in Pamplona I am going to commit to not changing blogging platforms at least. This is an easy one to stick with. I'm currently using the excellent weblog.lol service and I'm paid up for over 10 years of service now. So, as long as Adam keeps this running, I'll be here. What I wont pretend I'll be doing is posting more. I'd often felt pressure, in the past, to post because I want more followers, or because I'm worried those I do have will stop doing so. If I've one positive takeaway from the Twitter mess this year, it's that I have a greater understanding of how fleeting, and easily destroyed / lost an online following can be. I was never blogging to make a living, thank goodness, but now even more so I've come to realise that anything I do in this space will be, and should be for fun and for me. If others want to tag along for the ride, all the better, but it's not a goal.

There's actually another positive to Twitter's inevitable demise, in that I've had my eyes opened to a more independent and open web and I've been having a real blast with it. I've been active on the excellent social.lol Mastodon network, which is another benefit of my subscription to omg.lol (full disclosure, that is a referral link). And I've been enjoying Pixelfed, a federated alternative to Instagram or Glass.

With my commitment to this blogging platform, and my expansion into a wider range of federated, or independent, services, I've tried to consolidate where I can be found a bit. To this end, I've created a bunch of subdomains.

All of the above are also available at the acn.lol domain instead, should you prefer the shorter name for any reason. My aim is for any new pages I create around the web to all be accessed in a similar way.

That being said, something else I'm looking to keep experimenting with in 2023 is Tumblr! Yep, Tumblr ... After getting a great username there I've been playing around and enjoying it quite a bit strangely. I've been using it to share all sorts of random things such as World of Warcraft screenshots, gaming stuff, photos, the occasional gifs, of course. It's essentially a bit of a brain fart location I've been using to avoid flooding Mastodon. It's a pretty spammy place, as you'd imagine, but with a bit of nurturing I think it's a pretty fun service and posting there via the iOS app is a breeze.

I'm looking to expand my usage of small / independent / federated services, but will do so with the understanding that many of these can, and likely will, close or be shutdown or disappear. All of my posts are being written in the excellent iAWriter, so the Markdown here will be fully movable if needed.

I appreciate anyone that has maybe found me since moving to Mastodon, or if you've even followed me around the million different blogging platforms and services I've used in the past. If you wanted to follow the site via RSS or an ATOM feed you'd be most welcome. I will keep that feed to blog posts only, so it will be very light. If you want the firehose approach, you can follow me on Mastodon, or even subscribe to the feed via RSS if you were a complete maniac! And, if you were feeling really crazy, you could follow my Tumblr also.

Cheers again for following on, and here's to some amazing independent / federated services like omg.lol. May it, and many others, flourish in 2023!

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This site is hosted by Weblog.lol, from omg.lol. Post written in iA Writer. Images hosted via bunny.net.