When I began blogging exactly 10 years ago today, I didn’t have a goal or destination. I’ve just enjoyed doing it.

And I’m going to keep doing it.

Part of the reason is that I enjoy reading the blogs of others and I want the ecosystem to persist. Substack is fine, but it strips personality from content and prioritizes distribution. I similarly lament how Myspace, which allowed users to embed music into zany homepages, gave way to the more generic, distribution- and network-focused Facebook.

I also believe writing clarifies thought. Gymnastics are plentiful in the mind, but harder to execute on paper. And actually putting pen to paper reveals that.

Much of my writing is scientific. While worthwhile and important, it’s academic, rigid, and devoid of humor. Which is a bit of a shame, since I believe more academic literature would be read if papers were infused with some honest humor like dropping plates on the ground, animals escaping, etc. A blog imposes no such constraints, and so I can joke about leaving my infant daughter behind to go camping, or how my wife makes fun of dumb posts involving sanding a battery terminal. Laughter is immensely important in life.

Writing is also human. Note I didn’t use “was” here. The deluge of AI slop is only beginning, and it’s a bit sad to see it spread without care or consequence; it has completely taken over LinkedIn, for example. Dynomight sums up my thoughts on the role of AI in writing quite well. I recommend giving it a read. I too pledge that writing on this blog was and will continue to be free of AI. I realize this take may invoke the old man yells at cloud meme, but to be clear, I’m not against AI. I find AI quite useful. I just don’t like it for writing, and I don’t like reading it unless I ask for it.

Lastly, I hope this blog can help others. Perhaps set up a website of their own, configure a new computer, make better cold brew, negotiate a new car purchase, create a children’s book, or something else.

Here’s to 10 more years.

  |   Share on:

What do you think? Did I miss anything? Contact me!

This work by Derek Croote is licensed under CC BY-NC 4.0