I want to be a content creator

I want to be a content creator. I don't know exactly what form that will take. It could be blogging. It could be a YouTube channel. It could be authoring books. There's a lot I'm not sure about. But, creating content is something I want to do.

I know that I enjoy learning new things. I also know that I enjoy sharing what I learn. So, why not focus on doing that.

This isn't the first time I've had a goal like this. I've tried to do this before. But, this time it will be different. This time I have a plan.

My previous attempts, I now know, started backwards. I started with the publishing side. I would learn all I could about blogging. I would buy all the gear I needed to make videos. I would read about how to self publish books. I was more interested in the output than the process.

That's what I'm changing this time. This time I'm all about the process.

I still don't know exactly what I'm going to put out there but I have a process to figure that out. Here are the main points:

1. Research anything that seems interesting.
2. Take notes on everything.
3. Make connections between those notes.
4. Use those connections to make insights.
5. Share those connections and insights.

This isn't going to be a quick process. But, the fact that this time I have a process is a big change. This time I know more than how to put the content out there. This time I have a process for how to develop that content.

On Social Media

I've been listening to Digital Minimalism by Cal Newport. While I think calling myself a digital minimalist is a stretch, I was surprised to see how many of the recommendations that Cal makes I was already doing.

It was probably around 5 years ago that I decided to make a change. I decided that, for me, a cellular hotspot and a dumb phone was a better option than having a smart phone. You see, I had recently invested in a Chromebook and installed Linux on it making it a machine capable of doing all my computer tasks (besides gaming). But smart phones at the time often did not have the ability to be a wireless hotspot and, if they did, you had to pay your cell phone provider extra for that privileged. This meant that I would need to buy and expensive phone and pay my cell provider extra just to connect my Chromebook to the internet when I didn't have wifi. It was cheaper to get a dedicated hotspot device and a cheaper dumb phone than getting a smart phone.

Before doing this I honestly thought that I wouldn't miss the smart phone. Sure it was convenient to play games on it but I didn't really need that.

What I didn't expect was to suddenly realize how much time I was using that smart phone to scroll Facebook. I hadn't realized that I was using my smart phone to scroll my Facebook feed any time that I was even slightly board. But, without the ability to do that any more, and instead having to start up the hotspot, pull out a computer and turn it on, I just didn't use Facebook as much.

This lasted for about a year and a half. That time changed how I used social media. I now do it much more intentionally.

For Facebook, I almost don't use it at all. I have it around but I almost never just look at the feed. Instead I only use it when I have a specific person that I want to talk to and Facebook is the only way I have to reach them.

I do use Reddit now. But even that I do with a certain amount of intentionality. I skim it a couple times a day mostly when I need a boost of joy from cute animal pictures.

So, if you asked me if I would recommend going without a smart phone—probably not. But, would I recommend dropping it for 30 days like Cal recommends in his book. Yeah, I think most people would probably benefit from the insights that would provide.

GUI? I don't need no stinking GUI

There are a number of hobby programming projects that I have been wanting to do. My problem usually comes down to the complexity of making a GUI combined with a pickiness on my part. I'm familiar with HTML/CSS/JavaScript development and there are some great tools like Electron that allow me to use those skills to make a desktop application. The issue is on the JavaScript framework side. I can't find an actual MVC framework to help me make the GUI I want. All the “MVC” frameworks for JavaScript that I look at aren't actually MVC.

This morning I came to a realization: these hobby projects do need a UI but they don't need a GUI! I work all day long with command line applications in Linux environments. I've also put some effort into making sure I always have a Linux environment close at hand. I can totally just make a command line interface to do exactly what I need.