I’ve been writing and developing Static Made three years this month. Before that, I was publishing a less-focused personal blog. And before that, I had a fairly-well-read lefty political site. If we go all the way back, a Geocities page for emo show reviews got the whole thing rolling for me.

When I stop and really think about it, I’ve been making stuff for the internet my entire adult life. Lately it’s art + tech projects or blog posts, but at times it’s been music, video or political opinion. I guess this is natural for creators — evolving, shifting, moving forward.

People always ask me, when such great off-the-shelf tools exist for internet creators, why I continue to put so much time and attention into a freestanding personal website. I then typically launch into a diatribe about how it’s important that we participate in the open web and publish content that’s independent of platform-specific silos. And while that’s part of the reason, it’s not completely true.

The real reason I do this is because no one else will. This site is an extension of me. If I want the logo shifted over 5 pixels, I’ll do it. If I grow tired of the color pallette, I’ll change it. If I want to blow the whole thing up and start over, I can and I have. If I want to publish a piece no one will read about my motives behind making this site, there’s no one stopping me.

Dave Winer believes a good blog exists independently of people reading it. I agree. Readers are important, and I certainly appreciate each and every one of you who reads this site, but I’d continue to write if the Static Made readership vanished overnight.

My objective here has nothing to do with what happens after I’ve published. It’s about the creative process. My mission with this website is to create a place where I can grow artistically and professionally; workshop some crazy thoughts in varying states of undress, and leave a semi-permanent marker of those ideas that can live on indefinitely when I’m gone. Hopefully that’s not any time soon.