I’ve used many blog platforms.
My writing started when I was set up on WordPress by my father. I didn’t write much, but I was set on a journey; from being the only kid in class with a homework blog and MacBook, to developing websites for clients and working at a technology company.
Since WordPress, I moved platforms a lot. Many1 aren’t even mentioned here; Exposure, Medium, Blot, Posthaven, Typepad, WordPress, Ghost, and now, Buttondown.
I offer a small requiem, to the platforms of my past.
Most of those platforms made accessing my writing challenging; requiring an account to view,2 or relying solely on RSS to receive updates to a feed.3
For the sake of accessibility, I realised a simple newsletter was essential to sharing writing, especially for family.
RSS is great, but my family doesn’t know what it is… And I don’t really want to be on a platform, where I have to compete with other users to get a brief moment of attention.
Substack has taken off, but also takes anyone’s money, doesn’t use markdown and is full of features.
A friend named Dan currently posts daily updates on WordPress with a newsletter.
Another friend named Peter, used to send out a Word document to his friends and family every now and then through email.
Out of all the platforms, Buttondown is cool, not very mainstream, cheap enough and restricts design (at least on the free plan).
I used to backdate posts because I thought my writing was only relevant to that day.
In truth, I needed to be better at finishing my thoughts.
In practice, just make it a newsletter, for a newsletter requires sending.
There is no plan. All I know is that something within me needs to write. I aim to be short enough, or short and sweet. Maybe I’ll work on long and literate.
September 2024