Joseph

A year ago, I decided to listen to two albums a day. We live in a world that streams a never-ending torrent of music. I need to parameters to listen to music. Curated playlists and AI-generated playlists like Spotify’s Discover Weekly are a blessing. Still, I yearned to recapture the experience of being immersed in a musician or band for the length of an album.

I began keeping a list of albums I’ve always wanted to listen to, albums recommended by the various music blogs I follow, and albums friends tell me to listen to. Nerd that I am, I keep the ever-growing list in Drafts and have a randomizer function that shuffles the list. I always wonder what I’m going to listen to day to day. It would not be incongruous to hear a death metal album back to back with a country pop album.

I enjoy the experience. I’ve listened to some mind-blowing albums that have become new favorites. And some of the albums were a chore to get through. Most albums are a collection of songs, and few are artistic statements.

Stream here if you want to listen to what I listen to each day.

I’m thinking aloud about communication and the tools I use to communicate. I’m going to talk about Drafts, Ulysses, Obsidian, Micro.Blog, WordPress, Mastodon, and Twitter.

Communication

The heyday of social media has long faded, leaving behind a landscape as mundane as text messaging. It becomes a matter of selecting a platform that suits one’s needs. But why even bother with the act of communication?

My scribblings revolve around the banal facets of existence: fleeting thoughts, musical inclinations, and musings on media and popular culture. Why share any of it? I have just enough hutzpah to disseminate such trivialities across my social feeds.

As I write this, I’m reminded that when I began using DayOne as my journal, my more profound ruminations found solace there, leading me to relegate superficial musings to social media.

Tools

Anyone who uses Drafts will tell you, “Everything begins in Drafts.”

It’s true. I’m writing this in Drafts.

I use Drafts so much that I wonder why I use Ulysses. I’m not knocking Ulysses. I have subscribed to their services and have been a loyal user for years. However, increasingly, Ulysses is more and more the repository of my writing. While parting with its excellent functionality would be a loss, I’m convinced I could endure.

Obsidian fits in here somewhere, but I’m still determining where. I’ve been using it for nearly a year, and it’s a powerful tool. Over time I will evolve a system to use Obsidian much like I have with OmniFocus that meets my needs. I don’t think Zettelkasten is it, but clearly, a variation of a personal knowledge management is. And despite any criticism surrounding the graph view, it is invaluable for swiftly discerning connections and identifying topics that need linking.

Micro.Blog and WordPress

Just as I’m considering my use of Ulysses, I’m also considering the use of my WordPress blog.

Aside from the Soundwave podcast show notes I post to my WordPress blog, most of my writing takes place on Micro.Blog. While I won’t part ways with my WordPress blog—cherishing it as an archive of my shows—it seems prudent to integrate my Micro.Blog posts into my website. It merely requires rolling up my sleeves and taking action. And that’s the thing, it shouldn’t be a task. As easy as Micro.Blog is, I wish I could click a button and be done with it. Cross-posting remains an unresolved quibble, one I trust shall find resolution in due course.

I’m also using Micro.Blog to document the journey of publishing the Vikings vs. Samurai webcomic with my writing partner. Maybe someday we’ll move to WordPress but of now Micro.Blog does everything we need.

Mastodon and Twitter

Speaking of cross-posting, my missives on Micro.Blog is… ugh… tooted on Mastodon.

Mastodon has terrific potential, but I wonder if the platform is for me. We will see.

And Twitter? It’s incredible, but after being on the platform for over 15 years, I dropped it within six months of Elon Musk purchasing the company. I’m not laying the blame entirely at his feet. Twitter had already lost its luster for me. Musk soured the experience, but the final nail in the coffin was when he cut off third-party apps. I had been using Tweetbot for years, and once I was forced to use Twitter’s app, I found the experience so repellent that Twitter immediately became an afterthought. I check in occasionally to see if I have any mentions or DMs. Remarkable.

Conclusion

I don’t have any conclusions. As I said, I’m thinking aloud about why and how I communicate, and clearly, I need to streamline the process with Drafts and Micro.Blog.

I spent an hour updating the Vikings vs. Samurai website.

I’m on the Micro.Blog platform because it provides a seamless and user-friendly experience and its pricing model is fair. I’m using Matt Langford’s Tiny theme because I love its whimsical minimalistic aesthetics.

I still need to work on a slugline to encapsulate the essence of Vikings vs. Samurai. It is a task that requires the wisdom of both Odin and Miyamoto Musashi combined.