If there's one thing we can rely on, it's that patterns repeat. Sometimes in small cycles. Sometimes in large. Well, the cycle is beginning again on this web site. It's about time. This web site, or this domain, at least, has been online for over 25 years. That is, like, hundreds of years in internet time! I mean, we're overdue for a makeover
Honestly, though, I don't know where to begin here. I thought I'd toss off a few witty comments, be self-effacing (as you're required to be these days), and we'd just get on with it, and figure it out.
I'm mostly sitting here with no real idea about how to begin.
I suppose I should ponder what it is the web site is going to be used for from here on out. I've literally thrown everything out the window. 25+ years of blog post and images, of an online presence that has, at times, been both noticeable and an abandoned wreck. I suppose if there is one overriding idea I keep coming back to, it's a simple one. I'm ready to break with the past. It's time to begin again.
So... what's the plan?
This web site began as a way for me to learn HTML code back in the late 1990s. I'm going back to that, for a lot of different reasons. Site security. Speed. And so on. But really, it's occurred to me that I'm mostly interested in slowing things down a bit. MySQL databases make it too easy to toss off a missive you might later regret. But if you're hand-coding the HTML pages, you're forced to take a different pace, because it takes longer to code. It turns every blog post or site update into a value analysis. Simply put, is this worth the trouble I'll go through to post it? Even if I initially think "yes, of course", once you start writing the actual code you'll begin to wonder... is it really?
So, essentially, this old school HTML coding will serve as a de facto filter. It'll cut down on my bullshit and keep me honest. Not every random thought or observation will wind up with a blog post. Which, of course, is the danger when you can toss of a blog post as easily as an email, and themes and the database take care of making everything look good.
Back in the old days before social media was really a thing (at least like it is now), your web site was the place
where you spewed your personal opions and angst. Now, of course, we vomit our opinions all over Facebook and Twitter
X. It doesn't really make any sense to keep all that crap on a personal web site. So... we won't.
Over the last four years or so I've been recording an album of original music, which will accompany a short story collection. I'm getting close to some of that material being released. That is what this web site will be used for. We'll be releasing a song each month during 2024, and this is how we're going to do it. Well, this and Spotify, and whatever other platforms my distributor can get them onto. This web site now serves that goal.
I honestly thought there'd be more here. I thought I'd talk some about how the internet and culture in general has changed since this web site first rolled out all those years ago. I mean, most of the images I've used on the web site so far are A.I. generated. There was no such thing is 1999, except maybe in laboratories. It opens up a lot of possibilities, doesn't it? How do we not explore that?
Of course, the more things change, the more they stay the same. While there are new techniques where web sites are concerned, most techology, including web sites and HTML, is little more than variations on themes from literal decades ago. HTML 5 looks much the same to an old-timer like me that HTML 1 did. Yeah, there've been tweaks here and there. Christ, I'm old enough to remember when style sheets were a new thing. So maybe I'm just waxing nostalgic about going back to the source code.
Anyway, there'll be more content here soon. I have some old stuff I want to retain. But in general I'm looking forward to a new start. No, I don't expect anyone to care. Hell, I can just barely give a shit myself. But I made a deal with myself back in 2019, after I decided I wasn't going to kill myself, but was rather going to find a reason to stick around. Well... this is part of the reason now.
Anyway...
“This web site began as a way for me to learn HTML code back in the late 1990s. I'm going back to that, for a lot of different reasons. Site security. Speed. And so on. But really, it's occurred to me that I'm mostly interested in slowing things down a bit.”
This is where the clever bits go. But if you don't have clever bits, you write about not having clever bits. Which isn't as strange as reading the clever bits where someone is bitching about not having any clever bits (I need a drink).
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