April 12, 2022
Iāve been thinking lately about what I want the Ben Content Machine to be like.
I know thatās a bit crass and self-important, but itās an interesting thing for me to think about especially since Iāve started writing every day on this blog. Iām sorry for how it sounds.
I think Iāve got essentially three things that I could output content (bleh) to:
Twitter is where I post screenshots and videos of coding stuff Iām working on. I donāt have a ton of followers (271 as of this writing), but itās the most valuable āaudienceā that I own.
Essentially every programming work opportunity has come from people who follow me on Twitter because I post tidbits of my work. I am immensely grateful for that and donāt want to lose that outlet.
benborgers.com is this website that youāre currently reading this blog post on. 2Ā½ years ago I started posting blog posts on programming topics, with the goal that people would find them through Google search. I didnāt know what Iād do with a website that got search traffic (and still do not), but I thought itād be cool (and still do).
Then in January of this year, I started writing personal blog posts on another domain, and eventually migrated them here to benborgers.com.
Iāve really enjoyed the consistency of writing every day. I hope that it makes me a better writer, and I know that itās interesting to have a large pile of thoughts preserved. I donāt know whether daily blog posts will go on forever, but for now I really enjoy it and am too stubborn to give it up.
I also want to make my website have more stuff on it, like notes from classes Iām taking. I think itād be an interesting archive to look back on.
An email newsletter is an idea that Iāve been kicking around for the past couple of days.
Letās take a step back. I write stuff on the internet for two reasons:
It might sound like a joke (or maybe it doesnāt, if you have a certain impression of me as a person), but I donāt think I write this purely for myself. I like the feeling that other people care enough to flick through my blog posts every once in a while. It makes me feel heard.
Plus, the possibility that other people will read the things Iām writing is motivation to write every day. (Perhaps this is what people would call āaccountabilityā.)
So I guess to be very honest, benborgers.com helps with the first goal, and Twitter and an email newsletter (would) help with the second goal. Nobody writes an email newsletter for themselves and not for other peopleĀ āĀ that defeats the purpose of email.
But I donāt think thatās necessarily a bad thing. Iām imagining that my email newsletter would be a weekly update, just with a bit on what Iāve been up to and what Iāve posted on my website (new blog posts, new class notes, etc). Like a quick note from a friend, and an invitation to reply with what youāve been up to recently too.
The thing Iām worried about is having too many things. I donāt want to have to remember to keep up a Twitter, a blog, and a newsletter. I donāt want to add more things to my plate.
So my instinct is to make Twitter serve the same function as my newsletter. To post a bunch of little updates there.
But somehow I donāt think that it fits as well. The newsletter is more personal and intimate, while Twitter is more of just the programmer side of me. Twitter is more show-and-tell, and benborgers.com/maybe a newsletter are more longform-thoughts-and-feelings.
Plus, Iām already doing two of those things currently (Twitter and my personal website), so writing an extra thing per week seems doable.
So ā maybe Iāll start a weekly update newsletter. Just for fun. And if no one subscribes? Thatās okay too.