10 years ago today I first started this blog. I guess at this point it might be the longest running ‘thing’ I’ve ever done. Back then I had never been on an airplane, but since then I’ve blogged from every continent except Antartica.

Although blogging isn’t nearly as cool as it used to be, and twitter has largely replaced RSS, I’m happy to say it’s still going strong and it’s still fun!

I had some of my most read posts this year, but sadly I noticed that there’s a very obvious correlation between popularity and writing somewhat low-effort opinion pieces. My most popular post was pretty much about how I hate LinkedIn, which got around 23000 page views. Articles like that completely drown out the ones I actually care about, but on the upside, that particular post actually got me 4 new customers for my freelance work.

Technology wise I’ve gone from a custom solution, to Habari, eventually landing on Github Pages + Disqus. Disqus has become more and more social media and less ‘comment box’ and they added some dark patterns, so if you have a different recommendation I’d love to hear it! Especially if I can import from Disqus. But I love Github pages (except when they upgrade jekyll and throw non-descript errors). The static markdown approach to blogging makes so much sense, but I miss scheduling posts in the future.

Since this year this blog is also running on HTTPS via the HTTP/2 protocol. You gotta practise what you preach after all! This is provided via Cloudflare, which is a nice service and free if your needs are simple.

Anyway, one thing I have to say is… I’m extremely happy that I’ve started this all this time ago. Twitter is nice, but my blog archive gives me an awesome archive on what things interested me over the years. The blog has opened many doors, including jobs and gigs and sometimes just getting the benefit of the doubt.

It’s by far been my most useful career development tool.

Note: This post was written and was supposed to be posted on the 25th, the actual birthday of this blog, but in an ironic twist of faith, github pages decided not to publish it with a cryptic error.