For some people, attending church on Sunday morning is the spiritual space they need in their lives. I have never been one of those people, but I am someone who needs quiet, reflection and beauty to feel spiritually fulfilled. I find my spiritual space in the nature.
This morning, as the church bells atop North Park rang to signal 8am, I started out on the Green trail. It was foggy and humid, but once I got into the woods, the fog added a layer of mystery to the familiar trail.
As I moved from the Green trail to the Orange trail, I passed a father and young son just starting out on a Father’s Day hike. They were the only two humans I’d see on the trails this morning.
I love solo runs like this. They ground me in a way I presume church or religion does for others. I listen closely to the sound of my breath and the non-rhythms of my footfalls. My mind wanders wherever it wants to wander, much like my body in these trail running moments.
After an hour or so in this zen-like state, I emerged from the woods into the church parking lot refreshed, aware and at ease — a spiritual space those now entering the church will likely have in about an hour.
It’s been several months since I stopped using a smartwatch to track health and exercise metrics, and it’s an understatement to say this simple act has fundamentally altered my mental state in the best possible way. The shift has completely changed my perspective on the purpose of maintaining good health.
Before I made the switch, I could classify my metrics gathering into two buckets:
general life metrics like sleep quality, resting heart rate, and daily steps
workout metrics like pace, weekly miles, and elevation gain
My assumption going into the experiment was that the general life stuff would be easier to let go of than the workout metrics. But to my surprise, I don’t miss the exercise metrics at all.
In fact, not having pace and miles strapped to my wrist – or the pressure to stack miles week over week – allows me to be more present when I’m out there on a run or ride. Not knowing exactly how fast I’m pacing lets me truly listen to my body for cues about when to go harder or when to back off. I can feel my fatigue in greater fidelity, if that makes sense.
For example, I wasn’t feeling 100% after starting this morning’s run, so I decided to power hike the steep inclines of North Park’s South Ridge. In that moment, I thought to myself, “You would never let yourself hike these hills if you had pace on your wrist.” Hiking would slow down my overall pace too significantly.
It’s liberating to be able to run fast when I want to and throttle it back when I feel like I need to. Similarly, it’s refreshing (and sort of weird) to have no idea exactly how far I’m running.
When I returned home from this morning’s run, Jilly asked how far I ran.
“I’m not quite sure,” I told her. “I ran through the woods for about an hour and fifteen minutes, so that’s maybe six or seven miles, but I don’t know for sure.”
She didn’t quite understand why I would run if I wasn’t paying attention to how far I ran.
I think all of this boils down to the phase of life I’m currently in. I’m getting older and I’m okay with that. I’m not chasing paces anymore. I’m not chasing mileage volume. I’m not putting pressure on myself to progress at all costs. I don’t get upset if life gets busy and I don’t have time for my daily run. There are no ultramarathons on my docket.
Things are different now.
These days I’m chasing experiences – I want a unique one with each outing, and that’s only possible if I am fully present during each outing. These days I’m chasing future experiences and a level of fitness that will keep me on this planet for a bit longer so someday in the not-too-distant future I can be active with my grandkids.
That’s a different kind of ultra, but it’s the one I’m training for these days.
I dream of a web that’s small and strange and wonderful. Where personal websites grow like gardens – each one unique, crafted by hand, reflecting the beautiful weirdness of its creator. Where the web feels big because it’s made of small, individual voices.
I dream of a web where people own their words. Where our thoughts live on our own property, not rented from a company that can disappear voices on a whim. Where writing exists because you have something to say, not because the appetite of the algorithm demands it.
I dream of a web where linking is loving. Where hyperlinks have power, where blogrolls make comebacks, where discovery happens through human curation rather than manipulation by machines. Where following a thread of links can lead down rabbit holes of genuine fascination.
I dream of a web that respects our attention. Where websites load quickly because they’re not bloated with tracking scripts and surveillance infrastructure. Where reading an article doesn’t trigger an onslaught of analytics events and cookie consent banners. Where the interface serves the content, not the advertiser.
I dream of a web that’s accessible to everyone – not just those who can afford the latest devices or fastest connections. Where sites work on old phones and slow networks because the creators remembered that the web is for everyone, not just the privileged.
I dream of a web where communities form around shared interests rather than shared platforms. Where discussions thrive, where posts feel like letters from friends, where feeds let you choose your own reading rhythm instead of surrendering to an infinite scroll.
I dream of a web that’s built by humans for humans. Where the goal isn’t to automate away human expression through artificial intelligence, but to amplify the unique perspectives that only humans can offer.
I dream of a web that moves at human speed. Where conversations unfold over days and weeks instead of milliseconds. Where depth matters more than virality, and reflection is worth more than reaction. Where you can disappear for a month and come back to find your community still there, still talking, still caring.
I dream of a web where silence is golden. Where not every moment needs to be documented, shared, or optimized for engagement. Where digital sabbaths are respected, where being offline isn’t a productivity failure, where the most profound connections happen when the screens are dark.
I dream of a web that doesn’t just connect our devices, but connects our souls. That doesn’t just transfer data, but transfers meaning.
My friend Rob calls it my “no excuses jacket.” Every time I show up for a run when the weather is doing its worst—sleeting, pouring, or threatening something even more unpleasant—I’m wearing the same beat-up, greenish-yellow Marmot Precip jacket that’s been my constant companion for years.
It’s not the most technical piece of gear, and it’s certainly not the most stylish. But it has one quality that matters more than anything else: I trust it completely. Through Christmas Eve runs at -11 degrees, winter solstice adventures on the Rachel Carson trail in 18 inches of snow, and just last week when sheets of summer rain turned my morning neighborhood run into an impromptu swimming session, this jacket has never let me down.
The durability isn’t just about the fabric—it’s about the memories woven into every mile. This jacket has been with me through breakthrough runs and breaking points, through moments of clarity on quiet trails and the grinding determination of longer efforts. It’s become more than gear; it’s become a symbol of showing up.
But here’s what I’ve realized: the real power of the “no excuses jacket” isn’t protection from the elements. It’s protection from my own resistance to discomfort.
Weather is just the most obvious form of resistance we face. The cold whispers that it’s too harsh to go out. The rain suggests that maybe today isn’t the day. The wind argues that conditions aren’t ideal. My jacket doesn’t eliminate these conditions—it just gives me the confidence to move through them anyway.
This same principle has started showing up in other areas of my life, particularly in those moments that require a different kind of courage. Like having uncomfortable conversations with team members about performance issues. Or pushing back on a decision I disagree with in a leadership meeting. Or admitting I was wrong about a product direction we’ve been pursuing for months.
These situations don’t require literal weather protection, but they need the same kind of shield—something that helps me face discomfort rather than avoid it. Sometimes it’s preparation that serves as my jacket: spending extra time thinking through a difficult conversation before having it. Sometimes it’s a mindset: reminding myself that avoiding hard truths doesn’t make them disappear. And sometimes it’s simply the accumulated confidence that comes from having weathered difficult moments before.
This isn’t about toxic productivity or grinding through everything that feels hard. There’s a difference between productive discomfort and destructive suffering. The “No Excuses Jacket” philosophy is about being brave enough to engage with the things that matter, even when they feel uncomfortable. It’s about recognizing that the best runs often happen in the worst weather, and the most important conversations often happen when they feel the hardest to have.
The jacket reminds me that I have more capacity for discomfort than I usually give myself credit for. That the anticipation of harsh conditions is often worse than the conditions themselves. That showing up consistently, regardless of circumstances, builds a different kind of strength than any training plan could provide.
There’s something grounding about having a piece of gear—or a practice, or a mindset—that you trust completely. It becomes an anchor point, a reminder that you’ve faced uncertainty before and made it through. My beat-up Precip has become a tangible representation of the principle that we’re more resilient than we think, and that the best version of ourselves often emerges not in perfect conditions, but in spite of imperfect ones.
I’ve been ending one-on-one meetings with members of my team the same way for a long time: “Do you need anything from me?”
It felt like the right question. Open-ended, supportive, putting the ball in their court. I thought I was being a good manager by making space for them to voice their needs. But recently, I started paying attention to what actually happened after I asked it.
Mostly there was uncomfortable silence. Maybe a polite “No, I think I’m good.” Sometimes an occasional request for something trivial. The conversation would wrap up, and we’d both walk away feeling like we’d checked the box on our weekly one-on-one without really accomplishing much.
The problem wasn’t their response—it was my question.
“Do you need anything from me?” puts the burden on them to identify, articulate, and essentially justify their needs. It’s reactive. It assumes they have a clear sense of what I could help with and the confidence to ask for it. But that’s not how most people operate, especially with their manager.
When someone asks if you “need” something, there’s an implicit weight to that word. Need suggests dependency, maybe even weakness. It’s the difference between someone offering you food and asking if you’re hungry. One feels generous; the other feels like you have to admit to a deficit.
So I changed the question: “What’s the most important thing I can help you with this week?”
The shift in responses has been really interesting. Instead of polite deflections, I get real answers.
“I’m stuck on the technical implementation of that new feature and could use your perspective on the trade-offs.”
“I’m not sure how to approach the conversation with marketing about our timeline.”
“I’ve been spinning on the user research findings and need help thinking through what they mean for our roadmap.”
The language change did something I didn’t expect—it changed the entire dynamic of the conversation. Instead of me offering help and them having to admit they need it, I’m positioning myself as their partner who’s actively looking for ways to contribute to their success.
It’s the difference between “Let me know if you need anything” and “How can I help you win?” One is passive availability; the other is active engagement.
This small reframing has made me more aware of how language shapes power dynamics in leadership relationships. When we ask people what they “need,” we’re inadvertently creating a transaction where they have to justify their request. When we ask how we can help with what’s most important to them, we’re creating a partnership. We’re collaborating.
The best part is that it’s changed how I show up as a manager. Instead of waiting for problems to surface, I’m proactively looking for opportunities to add value. Instead of being a resource that gets activated when someone pulls the right lever, I’m engaged in their ongoing success.
It’s such a small change—eight words instead of six. But it’s shifted entire conversations, and honestly, it’s made me a better leader.
My son is having a birthday and graduating from high school in the span of five days, so Jilly and I thought we’d do something special and get him a joint gift to celebrate both occasions. He’s very much interested in photojournalism and will be entering university in the fall to study communications. We thought a nice DSLR camera would be a the perfect gift.
I don’t know much about cameras or lenses, so I asked Claude for some help. My initial prompt:
I want to buy my son a DSLR camera for his birthday/graduation. You are an expert in photography and photography equipment. Could you help me select the right camera, lenses and bag? I’d like to spend about $X total.
Claude and I then chatted about my son’s photographic interests, his current level of expertise, and several of my purchase preferences/requirements. The output of this conversation was a tight list of three potential camera bodies w/ corresponding lens pairings.
I then asked Claude to find the best deals for two of the options and it returned the top three online retailers for both based on price, service and customer reviews.
After validating some pricing details, I made the purchase. In total, I estimate this approach saved me several hours of research and analysis paralysis, which I am known for when making purchases like this.
The camera kit arrived two days later, we gave it to him on his birthday and he used it for the first time last night to cover his school’s WPIAL title baseball game.
Note: This post is part of an ongoing series called How I Used AI Today, inspired by friend and former colleague Beck Tench who does something similar over on LinkedIn. I’m starting to believe the thinking and narrative around generative AI is becoming too binary. The intent of this series is to keep me publicly honest and intellectually responsible with my use of this emerging technology.
Pittsburgh-based nonprofit news outlet PublicSource is experimenting with a new printed edition, although not the typical format for which legacy media is known. Taking a page from the underground publishing playbook, PublicSource is releasing neighborhood-focused zines intended to meet communities where they are – at coffee shops, community centers, their neighbor’s home – and create a hyperlocal publication with impact.
Zines are independently published, noncommercial publications that are often handmade and focus on very specific subject matter. They carry a storied history, with some scholars tracing zine lineage back to Thomas Paine’s political pamphlet Common Sense in 1776. The modern era of zine culture in the U.S. was ushered in during the late-19th century’s amateur press movement and carried through the 20th century with help from the Harlem Renaissance, science fiction fandom and punk rock movements.
PublicSource’s foray into zine publication is in the spirit of these previous movements, but also brings with it a reaction to the digiral culture of our day. Halle Stockton on the rationale:
We intentionally chose the zine format: a small, printed publication you can hold, flip through, pass to a friend or tuck into your bag. It’s low-tech and high-touch. It slows you down just a little. It doesn’t ping or scroll. And it doesn’t require an algorithm to find its audience.
There’s something profound in Stockton’s phrase “high-touch.” The tactile experience of paper creates engagement that’s very different from media that’s mediated through a glass screen. The physical act of flipping pages, the inability to hyperlink away to endless distractions, the constraint of finite space – these aren’t limitations. They’re features. They force both writer and reader into a more intentional relationship with the stories.
I think this is an interesting move for a media outlet like PublicSource. Journalism needs to become more local. It needs to connect with people on the issues that directly impact them, their neighbors and their neighborhoods. It’s smart PublicSource considers the zine project to be one element of a broader strategy to “inform and inspire the Pittsburgh region through the power of deep, independent journalism,” because the artisanal nature of the format does raise questions about scalability.
While most of our information these days arrives through algorithmic feeds and endless scroll, there’s something quietly revolutionary about a folded piece of paper that exists entirely outside that system. PublicSource’s zine experiment reminds us that sometimes the most innovative approach is also the most ancient one: putting words on paper and handing them directly to your neighbors.
Whether this model can scale remains to be seen, but perhaps that’s missing the point. Zines were never about scale – they were and continue to be about connection, community, and the radical idea that everyone has a story worth telling. Maybe what modern journalism needs isn’t more reach, but more touch.
Retail Brew analyzing how REI is doubling down on diversity, equity and inclusion:
While REI is affirming its values now, the company, by its own admission, betrayed them earlier in the current Trump administration.
Full disclosure: I work for REI and what follows is my personal view from the inside.
Earlier this year the Co-Op signed on to an outdoor industry letter sent to The Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources supporting the nomination of Doug Bergum for Secretary of the Interior. Many REI employees were left confused, upset and feeling somewhat betrayed by a company whose primary purpose was to protect our public lands and work tirelessly to ensure the outdoors is accessible for all. We felt the letter was in direct conflict with the values that drew us to work at REI.
Since that letter was published, REI has a new CEO. In one of her first public statements as CEO, Mary Beth (MB) Laughton announced clearly and transparently that it was a mistake signing the letter:
Signing that letter was a mistake. The actions that the administration has taken on public lands are completely at odds with the long-standing values of REI…I’m here to apologize to our members on behalf of REI, to retract our endorsement of Doug Burgum, and to take full accountability for how we move forward.
At REI’s annual member meeting held on May 8th, MB made another public statement affirming REI’s commitment to DEI, even in the face of mounting pressure from the current administration:
In a time when our public lands and values like diversity, equity and inclusion are under threat, I want you to hear from me that REI believes these are essential to our business.
I feel like this is the kind of leadership REI needs right now. Admitting mistakes, owning the accountability for those mistakes, and charting a path forward honoring the core values that make the Co-Op a special place work. Most of us who work at REI don’t work there because we love selling tents. We work there because we love the outdoors. We want to protect it. We want to ensure people of all backgrounds and abilities can experience it. We want to make a positive impact in the world. With leadership like this at the helm, I still believe all of that is possible.
The retail industry is tough business. It’s even harder when the political current is working against company values. As I survey the room of other retailers and notice their actions related to the politics of the day, it’s very easy to see which companies are willing to sell out for political favor. I’m glad REI is not one of those.
As a pre-teen in the early ’90s, few things lit me up like the newly emergent Seattle grunge scene. I had been playing guitar for several years by then and most of those early years were spent idolizing hair metal shredders and learning Guns N' Roses solos note for note. But then at some point in 1991 I heard the four-chord intro to Smells Like Teen Spirit and my life changed.
Those four chords showed me that music was meant to move you. Forget formality. Forget the polish. Those four chords opened up a new world of bands who wrote songs with raw emotion and intensity. One of those bands was Pearl Jam.
The first Pearl Jam song that hooked me was Alive. That intro lick was (and continues to be decades later) so fresh. Shortly after hearing it, I bought the Ten cassette and played it on repeat. It was in the walkman. It was in the deck of my parents' 1988 Dodge Caravan. I played it in my room over and over and over learning the hard-panned guitar parts played by Mike and Stone. Pearl Jam had become my favorite band.
When the lineup for Lollapalooza ‘92 was announced, with Pearl Jam playing in the 2nd slot between Lush and The Jesus and Mary Chain, I knew I had to find a way to be there when the tour came to nearby Scranton, Pennsylvania. Being only thirteen, getting there would not be easy. I had no friends that could drive and my parents were not keen on the idea of dropping their thirteen year-old son off into a grungy mosh pit.
I’ve written before about how supportive my dad was in my musical endeavors. After weeks of badgering him to go to the show, he relented and agreed to go with me. It wasn’t the coolest thing to go to a rock show with your dad, but nothing would stop me from being there.
Long story short, the concert was located at Montage Mountain Ski Resort in the Pocono Mountains and the parking situation was a nightmare. We couldn’t park near the venue and needed to park several miles from where the concert was taking place. Concert organizers were bussing attendees from remote parking locations up to the base of the mountain where the bands were performing. It took us several hours to get from where we parked to the location.
As we stepped off the yellow school bus at the base of the mountain, I heard in the distance the familiar sound of one of my favorite Pearl Jam songs, Porch. They were already playing. Back in those days there was no setlist.fm so I had no idea how far the band was into their set. Turns out, they were pretty far into it. By the time we got to a vantage point of the band, they were well into Rockin’ in the Free World, which would be their final song. I was bummed to miss most of their set, but to this day I feel extremely fortunate to have caught a glimpse of their brilliance at that stage of their career.
Fast forward 33 years. Between 1992 and 2025, I never had the chance to see Pearl Jam again. I continued to follow and admire the band, but getting to a show just never worked out. That all changed last Sunday night.
Earlier this year when the band announced a pair of Pittsburgh dates, I made it a mission to attend. The tickets were hard to get (thanks Ticketmaster) and a bit pricey, but I would not be denied. I scored two upper level tickets, and Jilly and I circled the date on the calendar.
To say Sunday night’s show was worth the wait is an understatement. It was the final show of their Dark Matter world tour, and the band blew the roof off PPG Paints Arena to a more-than-capacity crowd. The air was electric – a mix of die-hard fans who’d seen them dozens of times and people like me who’d waited decades for this moment. You could feel the anticipation building as the lights dimmed and the crowd roared.
Early set highlights included an urgent & powerful version of Why Go that folded perfectly into Deep, two of my favorite tracks from Ten. Elderly Woman… was amazing as well, especially when Eddie turned over vocal duties to the crowd for the outro. Hearts and thoughts, they fade away. Chills. As expected, Even Flow whipped the crowd into a frenzy for the remainder of the first set, which culminated in a frantic rendition of Rearviewmirror that left the crowd dizzy.
The band left the stage for a few minutes and came back to play a 10-song encore that included unexpected songs like Hunger Strike (dedicated to Chris Cornell) and Crazy Mary, setlist staples like Alive, Lukin and Yellow Ledbetter, and covers of Rockin' in the Free World and Little Wing, which closed out the night.
Eddie’s voice was so good and the band was super tight, seemingly firing on all cylinders. The energy was electric. It seemed like they were actually having fun. That’s rare to see in a band nearly four decades into their run. Pearl Jam is something truly special.
Reflecting back on this experience, I think it was worth the wait. It’s pretty cool that 33 years after I first saw the last bars of Rockin' in the Free World at Lollapalooza, I got a chance to see the full version at a distinctly different stage of life. I lost my dad a long time ago, but Little Wing was one of his favorite songs of all time and I can’t help but think the universe was smiling at me at that moment. He would have loved to hear Pearl Jam’s version.
I’m not sure if I’ll get the chance to see Pearl Jam again. To be completely honest, I’m not sure I want to. The experience from Sunday will be a lasting memory and part of me wants to leave it at that – captured and catalogued alongside the 1992 memory for decades to come.
Few things in life are actually urgent. True emergencies do happen, but hopefully they are rare. The urgency I’m referring to is fabricated. A modern myth.
Our culture has evolved to value instant gratification, instant response and instant turnaround for most things. The faster your synapses get feedback, the better.
It doesn’t need to be this way. In fact, this faux urgency creates conflict with several of the personal pillars I hold dear: care, craft and quality.
Caring about something requires that you get to know it over time. A relationship is necessary for care to exist, and relationships don’t take shape instantly. They’re built on connection, trust and empathy – all elements difficult to nurture quickly.
Likewise, craft requires practice. And by definition, practice is working toward perfection over time. A craft is not developed overnight, but over years. Sometimes decades.
I think quality is the summation of care and craft. A thing of quality can only be the result of time spent caring about an outcome and crafting a response to that care.
All of this requires that we slow down. Turn off the firehose. Preference the signals that matter. Notice the details. Ask nuanced questions. Make space for diverse perspectives. Take on difficult conversations. Become intentional about our actions. By living this way, we’ll be able to center the care and craft required to deliver the quality the world deserves.
The social web is at an inflection point. After years of centralized platforms dominating our digital lives, we’re witnessing a resurgence of alternatives built on open protocols. I believe this is something to celebrate, yet I’ve noticed a recent rift of technologists, developers, and early adopters engaging in debates about which approach is more “pure” or “truly open.”
The Mastodon/ActivityPub camp points to federation and existing implementation. The Bluesky/AT Protocol proponents highlight architectural advantages and planned interoperability. They’re both right and each side has compelling arguments, but they miss a fundamental truth: the web was never meant to be a monoculture.
The early web thrived because it wasn’t beholden to a single implementation or approach. HTTP, HTML, RSS and other foundational web technologies weren’t prescriptive about how they should be implemented. They simply defined interfaces that allowed different systems to communicate. This protocol-first approach created a healthy ecosystem where experimentation was encouraged and diversity was a strength, not a liability.
If today’s web is built in the spirit of the web we were given by its creators, platforms simply shouldn’t matter. Protocols should.
When Tim Berners-Lee gave us the web, he didn’t dictate which software to use or which browser was the “true” implementation. Instead, he offered protocols that allowed for interoperability while encouraging innovation at the edges. The result was a renaissance that transformed human communication. The web we knew and loved.
The challenge we face today isn’t deciding which social platform is more ideologically pure. It’s building systems that return agency, privacy and control to users while maintaining the convenience and network effects that drew people to centralized platforms in the first place.
This isn’t a zero-sum game where one protocol must “win” while others fade away. Let’s take email as an example. Email has thrived for decades with multiple protocols working in concert. Different implementations serve different needs, and the ecosystem is stronger for it.
The real metric of success shouldn’t be which protocol gains dominant market share, but whether users regain control over their digital identities and social connections. Can I own my data? Can I choose which clients I use to access the network? Can I move between providers without losing my social graph? These questions matter far more than whether a particular implementation uses federated servers or a distributed approach.
As someone who’s been thinking about the intersection of technology and human experience for years, I’ve come to believe that technical debates often obscure the more important human questions. In reality normies don’t care whether their social media runs on ActivityPub or AT Protocol — they care about connecting with friends, sharing ideas, and being part of communities.
Perhaps what frustrates me most about the current discourse is how it forces people to choose sides in a battle that shouldn’t exist. The brilliant minds crafting today’s open web are wasting energy fighting each other rather than working together to build alternatives to the centralized offerings from big tech.
What if, instead, we embraced a both/and mindset? What if Mastodon/ActivityPub and Bluesky/AT Protocol were seen as complementary approaches, each with strengths and weaknesses, each contributing to a richer, more resilient social web?
It’s already this way for me. By leveraging the POSSE (Post on your Own Site, Syndicate Everywhere) philosophy via Micro.blog, I am able to post & reply on both Mastodon/Fediverse & Bluesky without ever seeing or touching either platform. Because the underlying protocols for each are well architected and documented, Micro.blog’s creator Manton Reece can build his platform above their protocols. The Ghost blogging platform is heading this direction too. This is the future.
The path forward isn’t choosing between competing visions of openness. It’s embracing the plurality of approaches while insisting on core values of user agency, data ownership, and interoperability. In that spirit, let’s redirect our energy from debating protocols to building the web we want to see — one that’s truly open to everyone, regardless of which particular technical approach gets us there.
We had a wonderful day honoring and celebrating Jilly. First, we made our way to the South Side to check out the Neighborhood Flea. There were tons of vendors and people out and about, largely due to the splendid weather. I scored some artisanal Ginger Beer and the Jilly scored some prints from a local artist.
Next, we took a ride on The Gateway Clipper. We’ve been living in Pittsburgh for 25 years and have never done it. It was fun, and again, the weather was absolutely perfect. As we were deboarding, we even saw a beaver on the river bank. All the years I’ve been running through the woods, I have never crossed paths with a beaver. But the first time I take an urban cruise, there he is. Super cool.
We closed the day with a fabulous meal at Nicky’s Thai Kitchen. Pineapple Fried Rice for me, Pad See Ew for Jilly and Thai Fried Rice for the kids.
I envy product thinkers who operate within the context of a lean and born-digital startup. Product strategy is never easy, but building technology in this environment becomes fairly straightforward. Write code, test, deploy. Rinse and repeat. Or some variation of this. But try bringing that same approach into a complex physical environment like a retail store, and suddenly you’re not just a product manager – you’re part ringmaster, part therapist, and part exorcist for technology that seems possessed by real-world demons.
I’ve spent the last two decades building tech designed to be used in physical space – first in museums, then in retail organizations – and if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that the gap between the digital roadmap and the reality of the floor is extremely wide.
First, there’s the idealism divide. Most technologists think about users as disembodied entities who interact with software in predictable, often ideal, ways. This is the happy path mentality. Meanwhile, most retail associates are often juggling many scenarios at once: a customer who’s trying to return a swimsuit they bought 6 months ago, a thief trying to steal an expensive piece of outerwear, a random question about product specs, or a manager who’s just informed them they need to be cross-trained on a new area of the store – all while attempting to use enterprise systems on six-year-old hardware.
Then there’s the physical environment itself. That sleek tablet kiosk we designed? It’s now positioned directly under an HVAC vent that drips condensation like a leaky faucet. That in-aisle digital display meant to guide customers? It’s been commandeered as a support pole for seasonal decoration. And the once-white customer-facing payment terminal now bears the fingerprint smudges of a thousand customers.
Let’s not forget connectivity. In the product requirements, the system requires a stable internet connection. In reality, we’re dealing with large-scale Faraday cages that create spotty Wi-Fi at best.
The gap between digital intention and physical implementation creates a special kind of cognitive dissonance. Most product managers are trained to think in terms of user journeys and personas, only to watch customers use the self-checkout as a surface to scratch off a lottery ticket. I’ve grown to love this dichotomy over the years.
Within this chaos lies a peculiar beauty. Unlike purely digital products, retail tech exists in a messy, human world – one where success is measured by metrics, of course, but also the absence of complaints. The most elegant product isn’t the one with the cleanest code or the most impressive AI; it’s the one that works when the Wi-Fi doesn’t, when the user hasn’t slept, and when reality refuses to conform to a carefully plotted customer journey.
I’ve found the best retail tech product managers develop a kind of zen-like mindset. We learn to let go of digital perfection and embrace analog reality. We don’t build for the ideal conditions of the demo environment. We build for the beautiful disaster that is actual retail.
So the next time you’re struggling to operate a seemingly simple piece of technology in a store, know that somewhere a product manager is observing, taking notes, and going back to the drawing board to try once again to bridge the gap between the binary code and the bricks-and-mortar – one humbling iteration at a time.
Over the past few years, I’ve developed an essential daily practice I call the Elemental Hour. The idea is simple – I commit at least one hour each day to being outdoors, regardless of weather or circumstance. No phone. No music or podcasts. No technology. Just me and whatever elements nature decides to serve up that day.
Sometimes I run. Sometimes I bike. Often, I simply walk. And some days I might just sit on the grass in my backyard, watching clouds drift or rain fall. The only condition that blocks me from the Elemental Hour is active lightning – a concession to safety that I’ve only had to invoke a handful of times.
This daily hour began as an experiment during a particularly screen-heavy period of work and has become an essential part of my wellbeing. It represents a small grounding, a deliberate step away from a technology-infused world. It creates a space where my attention isn’t fragmented by notifications, where success isn’t measured in metrics, and where presence isn’t mediated through a screen.
I can feel the benefits. Physically, my body moves in ways that feel natural and intuitive. Mentally, my thoughts have room to untangle themselves. And the practice has reconnected me with a direct, unfiltered experience of the world around me.
I think there’s something transformative about feeling rain on my face. About the absolute frozen bones after an hour sitting still in sub-zero windchill. About noticing the subtle transition of seasons. About navigating by landmarks and intuition.
When you’re standing in a downpour or navigating a snowy trail, the present moment demands your full attention. The future (how much longer will this last?) and the past (why didn’t I check the forecast?) become irrelevant. There is only now – this moment of being fully alive in the natural world.
I’ve been thinking a lot about this current and pivotal moment we find ourselves in. You probably are too. The world seems to be unraveling at an unprecedented pace. It’s impossible to ignore. Even if you’re mindful about how and where you spend your time and attention, there’s no escaping the onslaught of negativity swirling around us.
Violence and hate have been normalized. Basic human rights are being taken from marginalized people with each passing day. Isolation and nationalism pit global allies against one another. And it costs us all more to make ends meet for ourselves and our families.
Left unchecked, I can’t see how this all ends well. For anyone.
It’s obvious the goal of this whirlwind is to flood the zone and make us feel helpless. It’s working. I feel extremely helpless at times. Today is one of those days. But for me, the first step toward turning helplessness into something positive – something helpful – is to acknowledge the feeling, understand why I’m feeling this way and sit with that feeling for a moment. This post is essentially me sitting with the feeling of helplessness.
The second step I can take toward helpfulness is to make a commitment to do something – anything – that helps others. None of us individually or alone can end hate or reverse the downward trend of the economy. But we can all do our part and I believe one helpful act from one individual can scale up to many helpful acts across dozens, hundreds, thousands of people.
Here are a few things I’m committing to in order to become more helpful:
Talk openly, honestly and politely with those who disagree. We’re all too dug in and unwilling to interact with opposing views. This needs to change. I will never argue with a Nazi, but short of that, I will make an effort to talk openly about my belief system with others in an honest and approachable way. I will lean into empathy and humor (where appropriate) to deflect and connect with those who hold opposing views. I will do my best to communicate why I believe the things I do. I will remain proud and undeterred.
Support the businesses of my (marginalized) neighbors. I’ve seen a number of locally owned businesses close their doors permanently in recent weeks. Economic turbulence affects everyone, but I think local independent businesses that operate without economies of scale take the brunt. And local businesses owned by people in the cross-hairs of society feel the pain even more. To that end, I will spend my dollars at the establishments owned and operated by my marginalized neighbors wherever possible. From food to clothing to services, and everything in between, I will opt to shop small over corporate options.
Do not fall into the trap of contributing to divisive narratives online. It’s sad, but I feel like factual truth has become obsolete. The echo chambers are real and they’re here to stay. Too much of what I see online is about fact checking things that are blatantly false. In the context of a social network, who does this help? Whose opinion do we hope to change with that post? I believe nothing helpful can come from quote posting or clapping back online. We need more substantive dialogue on issues and social platforms offer none of the substance or depth required for meaningful change.
Volunteer at least once per month at a social service nonprofit that aligns to my worldview. Like you, I have a lot going on in my personal life. A demanding job and family responsibilities consume most of my days and evenings, but I think it’s important to contribute to causes I believe in. I will make a point to find time each month to volunteer in person at local nonprofit organization that assists some of the people and groups currently threatened by systems and policies that have emerged in recent days.
I’m curious if this sentiment resonates with you. If it does, what are some things you do to transcend this helpless feeling? I’d love to hear about some things that are working for you.
In The Ordinary Sacred, Joan Westenberg examines the alternative to a hyper-connected and ultra-performative lifestyle:
We live under systems—economic, cultural, digital—that demand we strive to be impressive. Inspirational. Aspirational. Permanently visible. Permanently performing. Eternally, achingly unsatisfied. We’re trained to ask, before doing anything: Will this make good content? Will this signal something useful? Will this get me closer to who I’m “supposed” to be?
I feel this sentiment in my bones. In my core. It’s a tension I feel pulling at me in surprising moments. Joan’s piece is a longer read, but worthy and relevant one – for me, and I suppose some of you who think similarly about digital culture.
Things have been quiet on the site lately and the reason is due to some professional news. A couple weeks ago I transitioned into into a new role at REI: Manager of Product Management for Front of House Technology. That’s a mouthful, but basically this newly-created role expands my responsibility beyond my current domain to include leading the product strategy for almost all the technology employees use to keep stores running smoothly and customers use to shop with us. Think point of sale & checkout systems, bike and ski shop services, apps that power sales floor workflows and our growing Re/Supply business.
The new role is a “player-coach” position and it feels like a natural extension of my work over the past few years. I’ll continue to have hands-on product management responsibilities, while taking on the added responsibility that comes with being a people leader. I now lead a team – and while I’ve done this in previous roles – it’s a new realm for me at REI.
I’m approaching this shift with open eyes and open ears. Good leadership isn’t about having all the answers, but about understanding what you don’t know, asking the right questions, listening with empathy, and creating space for honest conversations. It’s with this spirit that I plan to lean into leadership.
We have a lot of work ahead of us. What really gets me hyped is how these interconnected front of house systems — from browsing to checkout to services — have the potential to create a cohesive, amazing experience for our customers, members and employees. We’re not there right now. But we will get there eventually.
The retail technology landscape shifts quickly, and the boundaries between digital and physical experiences continue to blur. At REI, we’re embracing this head-on while staying true to our core mission of connecting people with the outdoors. In many ways, this parallels my own journey of finding balance between technological innovation and mindful living – my personal and professional sweet spot!
As with any new challenge, I’m approaching this role with both excitement and vulnerability. There’s so much to learn, systems to understand, and relationships to build. Things may be quiet around here for a while longer, but I’m super grateful for this opportunity, eager to continue my work with REI, and committed to leading with wholeheartedness. And as capacity allows I’m looking forward to sharing this journey as it unfolds.
Our world is complex. It’s messy and laced with nuance. In this context, I believe subtlety matters. Thoughtfulness matters. Depth matters. Now more than ever.
Show me a problem that can be solved over a couple hundred hastily typed characters and an angry button tap. Or a cynical, irony-infused dunk. What progress have you seen come out of that? Increasingly, we are bringing megaphones to tasks that require honest, substantive, personal interactions. Inside voices, please.
Bring the whisper.
Soundbite culture doesn’t allow for the holistic understanding we need right now. Nor the empathy required to take ground on the change we’re working toward. With most things, answers don’t lie on the fringes. They can be found somewhere along a spectrum and the key to winning in this endeavor is to slide people along that spectrum toward you. That’s not possible through anger and shouting into a megaphone, which only digs people further into their trenches.
Bring the whisper.
Speaking with nuance and empathy does not mean deferring to or submitting to or normalizing conflicting perspectives. In fact, the opposite. By offering an empathetic ear we can understand why people believe the things they do and offer the alternatives in which we believe. I think this is best done face-to-face. In real life. Where nuance can be addressed.
Bring the whisper.
It’s not easy. These are uncomfortable, difficult conversations. They can be painful and depressing at times, but occasionally you’ll see someone inch toward you. A pondering look. A slow nod in the affirmative. An honest question about your thought process. These are windows into progress.
Bring the whisper.
Some might think I’m naïve in this approach, and that’s OK. I might be. To those who might write this off as a futile tactic I’ll ask, how’s that megaphone working out?
Millions of whispers in unison can be extremely loud. Bring the whisper.
My father would have turned 73 years old today. In July it will be 15 years since we lost him. Since then, I don’t think there has been a day that I haven’t thought about him.
Like many dads out there, he was one-of-a-kind. I can’t help but see parts of him reflected in the man I’ve become. Some things are obvious. The receding hairline and similar smile are easy to see. Other traits – the more important ones – I hope are evident to those people in my life that mean the most.
The term ‘lifehacker’ gets used a lot these days, but I think my dad hacked life long before that term existed. Whether it was dabbing our Space Derby rocket with a bit of liquid silicon so it was the fastest on the track or being able to talk himself out of any tricky situation, he was able to figure out angles on things and exploit situations in creative, non-malicious ways.
From my earliest memories, my dad was always my biggest supporter. We didn’t have a lot of money, but he did what he could to foster creativity and encourage me to pursue my passions. Early on for me, that was music.
He gifted me a secondhand guitar at the age of 8, which set off a lifetime of interest. I played that first Alvarez acoustic until my fingers were raw. Day and night, shredding in my room. My dad would come in and he’d just want to listen to me practice. I remember my first guitar instructor giving me a lesson that included an intricate waltz designed to improve the technique of my picking hand. It was called Sailor Dance. My dad loved that song for some reason and would regularly ask me to play it for him, even into my twenties.
I started my first band at 14 and booked my first gig shortly after. Scarlett O’hara’s in Bethlehem, PA. One of those pay-to-play joints where you needed to sell a bunch of tickets in order to get on the bill. A real hell hole. We sold our quota and got a slot on a Saturday night. Being underage and without a driver’s license, my dad offered to serve as van driver and roadie that night. Anything to get me on stage. He helped carry amps and stood in the back as we played a fine selection of Sex Pistols and Pantera covers. I still remember the wide-eyed smile on his face, even as the skinheads in attendance heckled us.
On the way home, we talked about perseverance in the face of obstacles and holding strong to artistic integrity, even when it’s not the most popular thing to do. He had a great way of connecting life back to learning opportunities. I hope that part of him is in me and I can do that for my kids too.
His level of enthusiasm was not entirely fault-free. One Xmas shortly after that first gig, one of the gifts under the tree for me was a frilly pirate shirt. Like the one from the Seinfeld episode. My dad thought I’d look good wearing it on stage. It was a very Fleetwood Mac vibe. I smiled and thanked him, never letting on that by then I was trying to look more like Kurt Cobain than Lindsay Buckingham.
I never did wear that shirt on stage.
I’m not sure why I’m writing this. Is it an act of remembrance? A subconscious documenting of the fact that I still miss him? A public, fleeting hope that I’ve become a fraction of the father he was? Probably yes to all of that. Maybe though, it’s nothing more than a simple birthday card sent into the ether where memory meets reality. Happy Birthday, Dad.
I’m posting today with some exciting family news: my son Elliott has been accepted to the Donald P. Bellisario College of Communications at Penn State University where he’ll study journalism starting in the Fall of 2025.
The timing of his entrance into the field of journalism and media couldn’t be more important. We’re living at a time when the very nature of information sharing is being reshaped by technology, economics and politics. That change is coming from all angles. While traditional newsrooms and media outlets are facing unprecedented challenges, the need for skilled, ethical journalists who dedicate themselves to telling the truth has never been more vital to society.
As Elliott gets ready to join the class of ‘29 at Bellisario, I’m thinking a lot about the journalists who helped shape our understanding of the world and how he might join their ranks - from Woodward & Bernstein, to the emergence of cable news networks in the ’90s, to the more recent work of born-digital outlets like 404 Media that are reinventing the industry through revolutionary journalistic operating models. Each of these examples require skilled journalists willing to dig deeper, ask tough questions, innovate in the face of obstacles, and be brave when telling truth to power.
The challenges facing modern journalists are daunting and real. Misinformation. Media silos. AI slop. Economic and political pressures. It’s going to be hard, but seeing Elliott’s passion for this field gives me hope and fills me with pride. I’ve always tried to leverage a mindset where challenges present opportunities, and I hope I’ve instilled that in him. His generation understands intuitively how digital information flows, and it’s exciting to me that a new guard will be equipped with tools, instincts and ingenuity to flip these current challenges into opportunities that will benefit society.
To all the current and future journalists out there: keep asking questions, keep digging for truth, and keep telling the stories that need to be told. The world needs the next generation of journalists and I’m so proud Elliott will be among them.
Fifteen years ago, one of my favorite writers Robin Sloan wrote about the concept of “stock and flow” as they relate to digital media. His metaphor, borrowed from economics, distinguished between the ephemeral stream of updates (flow) and the durable lasting content (stock) that builds value over time. I stumbled upon this post again this week, probably through a bit of Mastodon flow, and reading it among today’s modern context feels both prescient and incomplete – prescient because Sloan astutely identifies the emerging tension between immediate engagement and lasting value, and incomplete in that he couldn’t have predicted how dramatically over the coming decade the pendulum would swing toward flow.
The intervening years have seen the rise and dominance of algorithms, short-form video, and endless streams of ephemeral content. These are the feeds we come to know and love1 . We’ve optimized our digital lives for flow to an extent that would have been hard to imagine in 2010. The “treadmill” Sloan described has become a high-speed conveyor belt, perpetually delivering new content while whisking away anything more than a few hours old.
I’ve noticed something interesting happening, though. As our digital lives have become increasingly dominated by flow, there seems to be a growing hunger for stock – for content with permanence, depth, and lasting value. You can see it. You can feel it. I don’t think it’s just a notion of nostalgia from elder millennials like myself; it’s an emerging & collective awareness that the endless streams often leave us feeling empty and disconnected from what matters. Even my Gen-Z kids tell me this.
In my mind, the open web is the natural home for stock media. While social platforms optimize for ‘engagement’ (read: time spent scrolling) and viral spread, the open IndieWeb creates space for content that develops and appreciates over time. Take this post as an example. It’s referencing a blog post from 15 years ago! When you own your platform, you’re free from the tyranny of flow. Your words can find their audience through myriad entry points, through intentional discovery, through the slow build of genuine connection rather than viral mechanics.
This matters because stock isn’t just about content strategy – it’s about how we think, how we create, and how we build understanding over time. When everything is flow, we lose the ability to develop ideas fully, to let thoughts mature and evolve. We sacrifice depth for immediacy, wisdom for novelty.
The open web provides the much needed infrastructure for digital permanence. Through evergreen protocols like hyperlinks and technologies like RSS, we can create connections between pieces of stock content that grow stronger over time. Unlike social platforms where old content effectively disappears, the open web allows ideas to find new audiences months or years after publication.
Now, we can’t reject flow entirely. As Sloan noted as early as 2010, we need both. But these times call for us to consciously rebalance. We need to recognize that some ideas need time to develop and that some conversations are worth having at a human pace rather than an algorithmic one.
I’ve personally experienced this rebalancing since moving my writing to this self-hosted corner of the internet. Free from the pressure to feed the algorithm, I find myself thinking differently about what I create. I’m more willing to let ideas develop over time, to revisit and refine thoughts, to build a body of work that has coherence and permanence.
The economics of stock and flow have shifted too. While flow still dominates attention economy, I think stock increasingly drives genuine interest and lasting value. In a world of generative AI, thoughtful, accurate, nuanced and human-created stock content has (and will) become more valuable, not less.
I believe we are entering a renaissance of stock media on the open web. As more people grow weary of the endless scroll, I think they’ll seek out spaces for deeper engagement and lasting connection. The infrastructure exists – through the basic building blocks of the open web. What’s needed now is a shift in how we think about creation and consumption.
Sloan was right about the importance of balancing stock and flow. What he couldn’t have predicted was how corporate flow would have evolved over those years. He also couldn’t have predicted how the open web would persist over the decades as a natural home for stock, providing both the technical infrastructure and the cultural space for media that endures.
Jake in the Desert reminded me earlier that it was Bandcamp Friday with 100% of company proceeds going to LA fire relief, so I picked up a couple things I’ve been both anticipating and eyeing for a while.
First, I grabbed the new release from FACS, Wish Defense, which dropped today. I absolutely love this vibe and FACS has been in heavy rotation into my earholes for a while now. This new record picks up where they left off and I recommend it if edgy, angular art rock is your thing.
I also picked up this record from Neighbors Burning Neighbors, a politically progressive post-hardcore outfit from Rotterdam, Netherlands. Completely digging the layers, texture and intensity on this one.
Lastly, my boy JV turned me on to Ligatures, an energetic and mathy post-punk outfit featuring x-members of some influential Pittsburgh bands like Crucial Unit and Pressgang. Their latest full-length A23a is very good and brings me my fix of palm mutes and riffage.
Props to the folx over at The Iconfactory on the release of Tapestry, a unified feed reader that brings together open social platforms like Mastodon and Bluesky, with other sources like RSS and YouTube. The concept of a unified reader like this is interesting to me, but after trying Tapestry, I think I want my social feeds quarantined from my blog/website/RSS feeds.
Simply put: I read Mastodon for a completely different reason than I read RSS.
In Mastodon, I want to favorite, boost and reply to friends, learn what they’re up to and what they think about things. This is done in short order. I’m usually in and out quickly, never spending more than a few minutes cruising the feed. When I come upon an interesting link that requires more time and attention to read, I save it for later in my feed reader of choice Reeder.
Conversely, when I open Reeder, it’s usually for a session. I do this once in the morning and once at night. Blog posts and website articles by nature are longer than social posts, so reading RSS is a conscious decision when I have the capacity to dedicate to longer reading. Even thought Reeder has the ability to unite RSS with open social feeds, I do not utilize this feature.
For me, social feeds are for interaction, while RSS feeds are for deep thinking.
Again, kudos to Tapestry and Reeder for experimenting with feed unification. Perhaps as the feature set grows in each app I will consider migrating over, but for now I will keep my feeds separated.
This post is part of the February 2025 Indieweb Carnival, where Joe Crawford invited us to share personal affirmations - the sayings and mantras that help guide our lives.
Be Here Now. Three simple words that have carried me through the darkest valleys and highest peaks, both literally and figuratively. This mantra, popularized by Ram Dass, has been my companion through unthinkable loss, through ultra-distance runs, and increasingly, through our algorithm-infused world.
I first encountered these words during a period of profound grief, when the weight of loss made both past and future unbearable. The past was too painful to revisit, the future too uncertain to contemplate. Be Here Now became my anchor, a reminder that this moment - just this one - was all I needed to handle. It didn’t make the grief disappear, but it made it manageable, one present moment at a time.
Years later, I found myself returning to these words in a different context: ultra-running. When you’re 40 miles into an ultra, your mind becomes your greatest adversary. It wants to complain about every ache, project how much worse they’ll feel in 10 miles, replay every training run you missed, question every life choice that led you here. But none of that serves you. The only thing that matters is this stride, this breath, this moment. Putting one foot in front of the other. Keep moving forward. Be Here Now. The mantra becomes a rhythm, a meditation in motion, carrying you through the pain cave one step at a time.
Lately, I’ve found new meaning in these words as I navigate what the internet has become. The constant pull of notifications, the endless doomscrolling, the quantified metrics of our lives - they all conspire to pull us away from the present moment. They fragment our attention and scatter our consciousness, leaving us somehow both overstimulated and undernourished.
This led me to make significant changes: deleting corporate social media accounts, self-hosting my online presence, removing my fitness tracker after nearly two decades. Each change was a choice to Be Here Now, to experience life directly rather than through the lens of algorithms and analytics.
The irony isn’t lost on me that I’m sharing these thoughts on a digital platform. But there’s a profound difference between using technology mindfully and letting it use us. The IndieWeb movement itself embodies this distinction - it’s about being present and intentional in our digital lives, rather than passively consuming the algorithmic firehose.
Be Here Now isn’t about rejecting the past or ignoring the future. It’s about recognizing that the present moment is where life actually happens, where we have the power to act, to heal, and to grow. Whether I’m processing grief, pushing through physical or mental limits, or choosing how to engage with technology, these three words remind me to return to the only moment I can truly inhabit.
In a world that increasingly pulls our attention in a thousand directions, being here now is both a challenge and a radical act of self-preservation. It’s an affirmation I return to daily, a compass that always points to this moment, this breath, this now.
I really enjoyed reading all the blog questions challenge posts from a few days ago and while I was drafting mine it sparked an idea to kick off a new one. I follow a lot of music blogs and folx on Masto with a music bent, through which I’ve discovered some really great artists. I’ve grown to love this feed of music discovery; it brightens my day!
Shows and concerts are also a big part of my music adventures, so this challenge is to share your most memorable / favorite / epic concert you’ve been to. I’d love to read posts from Jake, Naz, Jason and Brad if they’re so inclined to share.
My Most Memorable Concert
The year was 1998. It was a different time. The internet had arrived, but it was still tangential to life. I was 19 years old and in my first years of undergrad at a rural Pennsylvania university. Back then, music was also a big part of my life and I was deep into the underground post-hardcore scene.
I was in a band at the time, and my friends were all in bands. We played anywhere that could hold a few dozen people and had electricity. One particular night in October, my friends in The Juliana Theory were playing a show opening for headliners Knapsack. There was also a band in between called At the Drive-In. I wasn’t familiar with At the Drive-In, but I was very into Knapsack’s Day Three of My New Life and I was always down to support friends, so I made a plan to check out the show.
The show was taking place at The Armburst Schoolhouse, a venue I had never been to and actually had never heard about before seeing it on the show flyer. Google Maps wasn’t a thing back then, so I MapQuested it on my school-issued desktop computer and printed out the directions. It looked to be in the middle of nowhere. Carless, I borrowed my buddy Todd’s Blazer and drove about 40 minutes to the destination, which in fact, was in the middle of nowhere.
I rolled up to a nondescript, abandoned one-room schoolhouse. A couple punks were smoking outside and there was a gravel lot with a couple tour vans and maybe a dozen cars. I paid my entry fee at the door (probably $5) and got one step closer to a blown mind.
The Theory’s set was solid, but what I witnessed afterward was like something from another planet. At the Drive-In took the stage (er, classroom?) by storm and blasted the fortunate few in attendance with a level of energy and intensity no one was prepared for. For about 30 minutes they crashed through most of the cuts from their most recent record, In Casino Out. Cedric and Omar were absolutely frantic and on fire, flanked by Jim on the other side as the stable anchor.
As a musician myself early in my journey, this performance solidified for me what live music should be. It should be a release of raw emotion. Movement through pulsing meters. Perfectly imperfect, with no regard for what may come in return.
Anyone who follows this scene knows that the rest is history for At the Drive-In. They went on to release Relationship of Command, tour with Rage Against the Machine, and spawned amazing projects like The Mars Volta and Sparta.
And even thought the internet was in its infancy, some forward-thinking saint was there with a shoulder-mounted camcorder to record the performance with no concept that it would live on in infamy on a thing called YouTube:
I saw this challenge making the rounds last week and thought I’d give it a go. Back in the day, challenges like this were really fun and helped draw connections between interesting corners of the open web. It’s also a productive exercise for me to reflect on blogging as a practice. From what I can discern, we have Ava to thank for kicking this off…so, thanks! Here we go…
Why did you start blogging in the first place?
I came of age during the dawn of the internet in the mid-1990s. At that time the web was like the Wild West. There was an energy about it. It was fresh and new and it was bringing people together in meaningful ways. I wanted so badly to understand how it worked, so I dove deep under the hood of my favorite sites to learn how semantic code generated pages.
From that point on I was hooked, and threw myself into creating my first site – on Geocities. Sunset Strip, represent! This was circa 1996 and blogs hadn’t been invented yet, but I did publish my writing on the Geocities site, so I do consider this my first blog.
What platform are you using to manage your blog and why did you choose it?
I currently use Micro.blog to power StaticMade.com. I’m very happy with it and think Manton does a great job developing it.
When I was looking for a platform upon which to relaunch my personal website last year, one of the most important elements for me was to find a platform that embraced the open web. Micro.blog’s simplicity and flexibility, combined with robust feeds integration and on-board syndication to several Fediverse platforms make it the perfect fit for my needs.
Have you blogged on other platforms before?
Having written on the web since the ’90s, I’ve used my fair share of blogging platforms. To the best of my memory, here they are in chronological order: Geocities, Blogger, Tumblr, Ghost (self-hosted), raw dog HTML files, Ghost (hosted), Micro.blog
How do you write your posts? For example, in a local editing tool, or in a panel/dashboard that’s part of your blog?
Most of the time I use the Micro.blog editor, either on my laptop for longer posts like this one, or in the Micro.blog for iOS app on my phone for shorter or image-based posts. Sometimes I get workflow envy when I read about how some folx have sexy workflows that publish static pages, but writing in the browser gets the job done for me quickly and efficiently. These days I don’t have the time to reinvent my publishing workflow process.
When do you feel most inspired to write?
Inspiration comes at the strangest times, doesn’t it? I’ll often see something online – a post or an article – and that can spark the muse. That’s the way this post originated. Other times, posts come from deep reflection about something going on in my life. And yet some other posts are completely spur of the moment. I use those posts as a way to document meaningful or intersting things in real time.
Do you publish immediately after writing, or do you let it simmer a bit as a draft?
I always tend to post immediately after writing. I’ll read it over a few times, to catch typos and tweak wording, and then tap publish.
What’s your favourite post on your blog?
One of the first posts I published after relaunching this site in August 2024 was Death to the Algorithm. It’s a manifesto of sorts. I think it does a good job summarizing why I do this and why it’s important.
Any future plans for your blog? Maybe a redesign, a move to another platform, or adding a new feature?
I’m happy with Micro.blog and I don’t have any plans to migrate elsewhere, but I’m always tweaking things. Most recently I added a ‘Reply via Email’ button to all posts, as well as a cool feature in the footer that displays the song I’m currently listening to. So I’ll probably continue to ship things like that, along with incremental design updates. The web is never finished!
Jared White articulating quite clearly the biggest obstacle facing the Open Web:
…never before has The Indie Web been such a glorious platform for building anything you might dream of and sharing it with anyone you like, yet never before has The Corporate Web been so awful and damaging to the body politic. I wish I knew how to deal with this cognitive dissonance, and how to convey to mere mortals out there that the The Indie Web is alive and kicking, and that The Corporate Web doesn’t have to define their experience of being online.
The Open Web has a messaging and onramp problem. There’s no shortage of brilliant technical and engineering minds working on it, but where are the designers and product strategists who might craft the ‘easy enough’ onramps for those who don’t really give a shit about ActivityPub and just want a healthy, constructive and friendly place to share online? Who is communicating the value of the Open Web in compelling ways and using language non-nerds can comprehend?
The recent growth of Bluesky is proof of a collective appetite for something more. Full disclosure, I don’t think Bluesky is the answer, but they definitely understand the onboarding assignment of making the experience easy without introducing dark patterns (yet).
The foundation for a scalable Open Web is here, thanks to the dedication and great work of the developer community that’s gotten us to this point. But to truly realize the potential and impact a universal open web, we need to augment the engineering focus with two additional legs of the stool: design and product. Only then will we be able to understand the problems and needs of the users who aren’t yet here and build the open, accessible and welcoming web of the future.
In the shifting landscape of our digital commons, the words the leaders of these corporate social platforms use have become shapeshifters, their meanings bending like light through murky water. As we witness the transformation of our shared online spaces, I find myself creating a new dictionary for these times—a translation guide for what remains unsaid.
When they say “free expression,” I want you to hear “the end of community care.”
When they say “algorithmic neutrality,” I want you to hear “the automation of amplified harm.”
When they say “marketplace of ideas,” I want you to hear “a colosseum where truth wrestles with virality.”
When they say “content-neutral platform,” I want you to hear “we’ve chosen profit over protection.”
When they say “open dialogue,” I want you to hear “we’ve removed the guardrails.”
When they say “reduced content moderation,” I want you to hear “we’ve dismissed the digital gardeners.”
When they say “user empowerment,” I want you to hear “you’re on your own now.”
When they say “engagement metrics,” I want you to hear “behavior we can monetize.”
When they say “democratic discourse,” I want you to hear “the loudest voices win.”
When they say “digital town square,” I want you to hear “unmoderated chaos.”
These aren’t just semantic games—they’re the architecture of our new digital reality. Each phrase is another layer between what we’re told and what we experience, between the promise of connection and the practice of division.
I find myself returning to the early dreams of the web, when we imagined digital spaces as gardens to be tended, not markets to be exploited. It’s time to reclaim not just our platforms, but our very language—to speak plainly about what we’re building, what we’re breaking, and what we’re willing to sacrifice in the name of unconstrained growth.
The web I want to inhabit still has gardeners. It still has carpenters and caretakers. It still believes in the power of boundaries to create safety, and the strength of moderation to cultivate community. Most importantly, it still understands that true freedom comes not from the absence of constraints, but from the presence of care.
Each December as the year comes to a close, I find myself reflecting not just on where I’ve been during the past twelve months, but more importantly, on where I want to go during the next twelve. The past few years have brought unprecedented changes to how we live, work, and connect. I’ll be honest, I struggled this past year through a lot of it. I know I’m not alone in this admission.
Through it all, one truth has become increasingly clear to me: the quality of our lives isn’t measured in grand gestures or accomplishments, but in the small, intentional choices we make each day.
For 2025, I’m approaching my intentions with this notion in mind. Instead of a scattered list of resolutions, I’m focusing on a single theme: Living Well. This isn’t about perfection or hitting arbitrary numbers (though I’ve included some specific targets to keep myself honest). It’s about building a framework that feels both purposeful and sustainable.
My framework breaks down into four key areas, each with specific, measurable objectives that support the broader goal of living well:
Get Stronger
First, I’m focusing on getting stronger—both physically and mentally. On the physical side, I’ve set a few concrete goals:
achieving 100 good-form pushups in one rep
doing 25 proper pull-ups in one rep
advancing my bouldering ability from V2 to V4/V5
bikepacking the GAP & C&O trails from Pittsburgh to DC
These aren’t just about numbers; they’re about building a resilient body that can keep up with my adventures and ambitions.
Mental strength is equally crucial. After noticing how much time I spend mindlessly consuming content, I’m committing to two daily practices:
dedicated time for reading actual books (not just snippets and headlines)
actively catching myself when I fall into the doomscrolling trap
It’s about quality of attention rather than quantity of information.
Eat Low to the Ground
The second pillar focuses on nourishment—specifically, eating “low to the ground.” This means prioritizing whole foods and reducing processed ingredients. This isn’t about strict rules or elimination diets, but rather making conscious choices about what I put into my body. The goal is to make whole, minimally-processed foods the default rather than the exception.
Prioritize Quality
Quality is my third focus area, extending beyond just food choices. I’m being more intentional about the media I consume and the things I bring into my life. This means fewer impulse purchases, more thoughtful choices about what I read and watch, and a general shift toward “fewer, better things.” It’s about creating space for what truly matters by being selective about what gets my time and attention.
Actively Cultivate Relationships
Finally, and perhaps most importantly, I’m prioritizing relationships. The pandemic showed us all how easily connections can fray without active maintenance. I’m setting up regular check-ins with friends and family—not just through texts and social media, but through actual calls and in-person visits. These won’t be relegated to “when I have time” but will be treated as non-negotiable appointments with the people who matter most.
These objectives aren’t just items to check off a list; they’re guideposts for getting more intentional and aligned with my values. Some days I’ll hit all the marks, others I won’t—and that’s okay. The point isn’t perfection, but progression. And practice. Living well isn’t about dramatic transformations but about small, consistent choices that add up over time.
Thanks so much for reading and supporting this site in 2024. Your readership is important to me.
I thought 2024 was a fantastic year for recorded music. It seemed like every few weeks another absolute banger was released. As an avid listener, this year also saw my personal transition away from Spotify as a streaming source to a more intentional discovery and direct purchase model that I believe honors artists in a way streaming services don’t (or won’t).
In no particular order, here are the ten records released in 2024 I found to be my favorite:
Dulling the Horns by Wild Pink: I know I just said ‘no particular order,’ but this just might be my record of the year. The songs and texture are just so layered. Simply complex, in a way that’s refreshing. The title track showcases this effortless density and is a standout on a stacked collection of songs.
No Arc by Rave Ami: My local selection this year comes from rockers Rave Ami. These guys are tight, fun and bring some unique energy to their live shows and recorded releases. I sorta feel like they’re a bit overshadowed by bigger Pittsburgh-based bands, but for my money this record rips hard.
Evergreen by Soccer Mommy: Sophie Allison describes her music as ‘chill, but kinda sad’ and I think that’s right. I’ve always felt the best songs were the saddest songs. Evergreen definitely brings the emotion, but not is a way that’s trite or placating. I find the songs on this release to be honest, raw and forthright in a way that’s comforting but also challenging.
Lighthouse by Francis of Delirium: A friend sent me this record earlier in the year and it’s been in constant rotation ever since. Lighthouse has a little bit of everything – in a good way. Luxemburg-based Jana Bahrich writes grungy pop songs that you find yourself singing to yourself during those random quiet moments of your day.
All Pleasure by THUS LOVE: No frills, four-on-the-floor rock and roll from Vermont-based THUS LOVE. The thing I love about this record is the swagger the band brings. It starts out of the gate with the opening ripper On the Floor and continues for the duration. I think swagger is a lost art these days and it’s great to see a group that’s out and proud bring it unapologetically and full-on.
Where we’ve been, Where we go from here by Friko: What a freaking epic release from Chicago duo Friko. These songs wander and traverse genres like there are simply no boundaries. Part singer-songwriter, part noise art, part chamber orchestra. On paper, the math doesn’t appear to work, but on tape it’s genius.
Cool World by Chat Pile: This is definitely the heaviest record on my list. Cool World is intense and guttural. The whole thing is raw and throbbing with some killer breakdowns that are sure to open up the circle pit at live shows.
Second Dinner by slimdan: Another one that has been in heavy rotation for most of the year. I am in love with slimdan’s pop-driven songs. They’re smart and catchy, and carry melodies that seem both familiar and fresh at the same time.
for frank forever by piglet: A late addition to the list, I randomly stumbled upon piglet - a solo project from Irish songwriter and producer Charlie Loane – just a few weeks ago. for frank forever carries really interesting production and infections melodies. I’m looking forward to seeing how piglet evolves into the future.
Valentin Prince by Valentin Prince: A fantastic LP from Richmond-based guitarist and songwriter. Sorta jammy and sorta trippy, but the song structure and performance are on point. This is a free digital download on Bandcamp, so don’t sleep on it!
