Why Do We Blog?
A few days ago, I was reading someone's blog (I don't remember who)* that was talking about the art and the "why" of blogging (or it might've been in a chat conversation, I'm not sure). I had been thinking of posting something about it, because when I told someone IRL that I have a blog, they asked me if I had monetized it, and my answer was, "Why in the world would I sell my soul and my readers for a few measly dollars a month?"
So, if money isn't the reason (and it really shouldn't be—it is the most servile motivation for doing anything), what is?
I think of the old adage of the mountain climbers: "Why do you climb?" The obvious response, "Because it's there!" As an old joke goes, when asked "Why do you do what you do?" the spelunker answers, "Because it isn't there!"
I think of blogging like spelunking: We look to what isn't there. We write what hasn't been written; we capture in a moment of inspiration words that have been waiting the entire age of the universe until now to be inscribed with pen, pencil, charcoal, or bytes for the betterment of all.
Now, the necessarily wizened among us would likely retort, "What do you mean, 'it hasn't been written yet'?!? It's all been written: by better authors, by AI slopvalanche, or if nothing else, The Library of Babel!"
True, true. But ultimately, I'm not competing with Borges, Shakespeare, Hemingway, an AI-automated room full of furious typewriter-pounding monkeys, or even you, gentle reader.
I am competing with me. To see if I can produce beauty from the ashes of life all around me.
And that is why I write.
Addendum
*Silly me, it was the excellent OrbitalMartian, of course!
100 Days to Offload 2025 - Day 48
My Approach to Online Notes
Note: When I say "Online" in this context, I literally mean "on a computer," vs. "on paper." This is the older, more classic meaning of the word, similar to "on-line documentation" (i.e., "on the computer," not "on the internet").
Background
I know a lot of folks like solutions like …
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A Fine Vintage of Sass
Just now, I was doing what all great bloggers do when they run out of (easily) actionable blog post ideas:
I got around to cruising my RSS feeds!
To be fair, there are many wonderful bloggers that keep up with their RSS feeds and dutifully read and comment on all …
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What is a blost, anyway?
Welcome to the PADDING.
This blost is a part of the interstitial spaces that make up my blog. It's here to support other blosts. Think of it as one of the glial cells supporting the superstructure of the twisted online brain that is https://rldane.space/.
Of course, that doesn't …
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A Toast to the Prolific ones
I wanted to take some time out today to acknowledge some folks on the fediverse that are remarkably prolific, just for fun.
Prolific blogger — Rubenerd
Oh holy moly. This fella has words. Lots of words. Many very fine words. Just look at bro's output for 2024:
~ $ curl -s https://rubenerd …
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Blog Questions Challenge 2025
I came across this set of questions from hyde (a.k.a. Lazy Bear)'s blog, and immediately loved it. It reminds me a bit of the kind of overly personal* questions that got passed between friends on facebook circa 2008, and email circa 2000.
* They didn't feel overly personal …
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100 Days to Offload — Kicking 2025 Off Right
After the enjoyable success of Writing Month last November, I feel like I want to start a new challenge for 2025: "100 Days To Offload."
I'm going to aim for 10 blog posts per month (which is an average of one blog post every 3.04 days), finishing on October …
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Goodbye NaNoWriMo, hello Writing Month!
FediFriend Amin wrote this in Early September:
Well, NaNoWriMo has made an official statement that they believe categorical condemnation of "AI" to be classist and ableist. I'm… I'm just done with them.
I used to overlook issues I was seeing with the organization behind NaNo, but… this is too much …
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A first foray into miniblogging: `blogme`
I've often enjoyed using my tootme script to easily toot from the command-line.
The reason I wrote this script is that the excellent toot utility which I had been using to toot from the command-line would just fail ungracefully if it encountered an error (like crossing the benighted 500-character post …
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NaNoWriMo Debrief
I've heard about NaNoWriMo going back at least eight years. I had classmates (back when I was a middle-aged college student ;) talk to me about it, but I always thought the 50,000 words goal was just unattainable.
This year, I finally stepped up to the plate and participated, although …
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