A Blog Post About Blogging
Someone in a Slack group I’m a member of shared recently shared a link to a post by Cory Doctorow titled The Memex Method. In the post he shares his opinions on blogging as a way to order your thoughts and ideas, somewhere between a sketchbook full of notes and a fully-formed essay. He writes:
The very act of recording your actions and impressions is itself powerfully mnemonic, fixing the moment more durably in your memory so that it’s easier to recall in future, even if you never consult your notes.
That’s certainly the way it works for me. I find the best way to learn about a technical concept is by writing about it. Often I’ll refer back to a blog post I’ve written in the past, to refresh my memory. Sometimes the act of writing itself is enough to preserve it in my mind.
I’d like to get more into the habit of blogging about interesting articles I read, or creative coding demos I come across. Often I’ll come across something on Twitter and retweet it, but I like the idea of having a place where I can easily go back and find the link, without having to scroll back for ages. Cory also writes:
Every day, I load my giant folder of tabs; zip through my giant collection of RSS feeds; and answer my social telephones — primarily emails and Twitter mentions — and I open each promising fragment in its own tab to read and think about. If the fragment seems significant, I’ll blog it: I’ll set out the context for why I think this seems important and then describe what it adds to the picture.
I’ve noticed a few other folks doing this: CSS Tricks often shares a link to someone else’s work, with a few paragraphs to explain what they found interesting. Bramus frequently does it on his blog. And I always find a bunch of hidden gems in Ana Rodrigues’s bookmarks, which she shares on her delightful blog.
Writing on this blog is the place I feel I can write freely about what interests me. I’m going to try to share a little more of the things that inspire me. And if you don’t have a blog yourself, I can highly recommend starting one.