Why This Blog Exists

I have natural tendencies toward daydreaming, procrastination, and perfectionism. This means I come up with lots of big plans that I rarely start and never finish. To wit, I couldn’t tell you how many times I’ve planned to start a blog.

So how did this blog finally reach the internet? Well, I suppose it’s an experiment aimed at mitigating my perfectionism. I’ll worry about the daydreaming and procrastination some other time.

At the heart of this experiment is an attempt to change how I think about “publishing”.

To “publish” something is, quite literally, the act of releasing it to the public. It is traditionally a singular and definitive event. You’d better get it right on the first try, because you can’t change the book once it hits the shelves, or the newspaper once it hits the streets. Digital publications are no different, even when corrections can be swift and ubiquitous. You hold your breath as you press “send”, knowing full well that the die is being cast. The internet never forgets. And it might laugh at you. Which makes it hard for someone like me to ever press “send”.

As a metaphor: Publishing might be easier for me if pressing “send” felt less like igniting a rocket and more like nudging a fledgling out of the nest. When it’s time to fly, you only get one shot with a rocket. But a fledgling can try again after receiving further attention. No one cares if it starts out all gangly.

So how can I make myself feel like it’s okay for my blog posts to begin as little fledglings? My best answer, at this moment, is what I’ll call “transparent versioning”. If someone bothers to read one of my posts, I want them to be able to easily see how the post has evolved over time. I want the post’s messy past to feel like an essential part of the post. I know this is not a new idea, and it seems related to a concept I recently encountered called “digital gardening”.

I’m not yet sure how to accomplish “transparent versioning”, or how well this plan fits with my desire for a static blog. Something like Git, or even a Wikipedia history page, is far more complicated than what I have in mind. I might start with simply displaying links that allow you to cycle through a post’s major revisions.

In any case, I expect this post to change over time.