Well, they’ve finally done it. Through raw force of will and more money than god, the nerds have finally done something that will “make the world a better place.” By that, I mean they’ve pooped out something will finally change the world in big ways, for better and worse.
As an early AI critic, I say this now, because the spicy autocomplete app finally excreted some text I could use, in the form of computer code that actually compiles. The AI hype prophesy made only five short years ago, that “it’ll be better tomorrow,” has finally come true.
Lately, I've been thinking a lot about how to unite two parts of my life that are seemingly disparate, opposite, irreconcilable, etc.
One is the fact that I've been working on a single endeavor, Write.as, for 11 years now — longer than I've worked on any single thing in my life. The other fact I'm trying to square is that these days, I spend a lot of time on things that have absolutely nothing to do with this, whether art, writing, photography, organizing meetups, or just grabbing a long lunch or taking the day (or three) off.
In a conversation with a friend last weekend, while I was in Brussels for FOSDEM, it finally clicked for me.
Hello again, from the Write.as office in New York. I haven't posted in a while, partly because I've been trying to fit my thoughts into a box of what I think people expect out of my writing here. To release myself from that, I figured I'd share a jumble of what's been on my mind lately.
It's been a while since I've really thought about what's most important for Write.as. It's been 10 years since we launched, and the internet has changed a lot.
As an issue that's top-of-mind for many people, I've seen privacy take a back seat to AI and its consumption of the web to feed the hungry models that will generate the digital slop of tomorrow.
What hasn't changed, and what I think will become even more important in this age, is our need for self-expression and forming real human connections.
So I'm orienting our road map around this: facilitating more writing, and helping people connect and build their own community.
Last year, I joined the crowdfunding campaign for a neat little 7-inch, open hardware laptop called the MNT Pocket Reform. After much anticipation, I finally got it in the mail a couple days ago, and absolutely love it so far. Here are some first impressions.
Last month I went to Brussels for FOSDEM, for the first time since 2020. While I didn’t go to many talks, I was able to connect with many people there, from WriteFreely users to old friends to many new people I met along the way.
It was late 2013 when I drove past a little dog head with big floppy ears attached poking out of the long grass in the backwoods of Florida. My girlfriend at the time said we had to go back and get him, so we did.
He was timid at first but friendly, and came right up to us when we approached. We took him home and fed him. I was reading a lot of Salinger then, so I named him Holden.
After taking a bit of a sabbatical in 2022, I’m back into Write.as and WriteFreely development. My views on the product naturally change over time, so I want to share where I’m at now.
