Hi, there!

Browsing the internet, I landed on the IndieWeb site and went exploring that philosophy. I wasn’t new to the concept, but up until then I hadn’t taken the time to dig deep and really understand what it was all about. I knew it had to do with microformats — conventional HTML tags bloggers use to annotate information on their sites — and POSSE — which in practice for me means posting here first, then syndicating to Mastodon. But beyond that, I didn’t fully grasp the point. So I grabbed a cup of coffee and dove down the rabbit hole.

When I first set up this blog I had big plans for it. I wanted to share my tinkering with technology and online privacy. The main goal was to educate and inform others. The first target was 10 articles in year one. I published 3. I missed the same goalpost the next year, and every year after. Why? Why can’t I write as much as I want? My High Bar # I’m not short of ideas. I have a stack of drafts sitting on the back burner — posts that didn’t make the cut. Wait, what cut?

When I first launched this blog, I wanted a short domain name for it. A name built around “ilyess”, which is the identity of this site. Obviously, ilyess.com was already taken. So I turned to the cheapest top-level domain I could get started with. After some promo hunting, I settled on ilyess.cc. It checked most of the boxes: short, centered around “ilyess”, and cheap. But this domain name is on an uncommon TLD and it’s not that “cool”. At least I didn’t think it was cool, and I still don’t.