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Ask HN: Why are there fewer non-tech personal blogs? (athletes', architects')

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Re: Ask HN: Why are there fewer non-tech personal blogs? (athletes', architects')

#11

Post by TomMarius »

kernelsoe wrote: post #5
TomMarius wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These blog systems hosted by the news sites do not have FTP access, there is a simplistic web interface that you use to publish articles and set up categories/tags. There are "freehostings" that give you a 3rd level domain and FTP access to a LAMP server (in exchange for displaying an ad banner), but that's a different thing. I am not sure what you mean by your question, could you clarify?

Sounds like a blogger.com ... Sorry for the question. I mean, - the web has become easier to publish compare to past. (creating your own website) - in sheer number, the personal blogs of developers', programmers' blogs are greater and it is much easier to follow their RSS. - I really would love to read an Architect's personal blog or an local barista's personal one and could not find on the web? (do we lack a directo…

Yes, it's very much like blogger.com, but older.

What we have on 'our loca internet' is a few community hubs, one of them is a general one for all kinds of freelancers where they can put a link to their blog, and also the blog platforms have a general listing of blogs separated into categories that you can explore. I don't know of any such community hubs on the English speaking internet.

Re: Ask HN: Why are there fewer non-tech personal blogs? (athletes', architects')

#12

Post by kernelsoe »

unearth3d wrote: post #10

Depends how much people like to (or need to) reach out. I don't think it's mainly technical. I started late in my profession (land planning / ecology) while most started during uni so grew up with their network so they don't need to develop one - that's part of what I think is going on. Also I don't see many traditional professionals as wanting to reach out and I find it enjoyable, and remunerative. I have a wordpres…

"Also I don't see many traditional professionals as wanting to reach out" I agree.

If a young professional or a young kid read your blog on "Land planning/ Ecology" and inspire them to pursue career, it'd be great.

And that's what I'd like to mean, writing personal or technical blogs by all professionals to discuss, receive feedback.

Re: Ask HN: Why are there fewer non-tech personal blogs? (athletes', architects')

#13

Post by kernelsoe »

TomMarius wrote: post #11
kernelsoe wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds like a blogger.com ... Sorry for the question. I mean, - the web has become easier to publish compare to past. (creating your own website) - in sheer number, the personal blogs of developers', programmers' blogs are greater and it is much easier to follow their RSS. - I really would love to read an Architect's personal blog or an local barista's personal one and could not find on the web? (do we lack a directo…

Yes, it's very much like blogger.com, but older. What we have on 'our loca internet' is a few community hubs, one of them is a general one for all kinds of freelancers where they can put a link to their blog, and also the blog platforms have a general listing of blogs separated into categories that you can explore. I don't know of any such community hubs on the English speaking internet.

Love to hear that your local community has a place to explore other than mainstream social networks.

"I don't know of any such community hubs on the English speaking internet." - Is that what reddit or discord has aimed to become?

I'd also love to hear this kind of community hubs websites from others.

Re: Ask HN: Why are there fewer non-tech personal blogs? (athletes', architects')

#15

Post by sciencewolf »

I would imagine most people you know would have a difficult time running a website, even on Wordpress or something remotely technical. I used to work at a large website builder (think Wix, Squarespace, etc.) and it was shocking how many people hired out the drag-and-drop functionality for their sites!

Re: Ask HN: Why are there fewer non-tech personal blogs? (athletes', architects')

#16

Post by kgraves »

slightwinder wrote: post #14

Normal people don't care about walled gardes. They use facebook, instagram, youtube and discord to share their content. Writing blogs is mostly old-school for the strange dudes or those with real content.

This.

Now in this day and age nobody wants to pay for reading an unknown blog on Medium (unless it’s a very niche tech community)

They just go to Twitter instead.

Re: Ask HN: Why are there fewer non-tech personal blogs? (athletes', architects')

#17

Post by cyberdrunk »

> Why are there fewer non-tech personal blogs? (athletes', architects')

Tech is unique in a couple of ways:

1. It's a very young industry, so there are no set ways to do many things yet, which invites people to experiment and then write about it.

2. Unlike many other industries, in tech you can experiment using just your at-home equipment.

3. Older industries arguably expect their practitioners to be more mature, so you're less likely to see a structural engineer writing about his weird ideas on how to build support beams... Whereas in tech if you blog, even if it's BS, it is still welcomed.

4. There's plenty of money in tech and the blog can help you get to the highest paying roles. (whereas in for example architecture it's much more about just seniority and years on the job).

Re: Ask HN: Why are there fewer non-tech personal blogs? (athletes', architects')

#18

Post by kernelsoe »

cyberdrunk wrote: post #17

> Why are there fewer non-tech personal blogs? (athletes', architects') Tech is unique in a couple of ways: 1. It's a very young industry, so there are no set ways to do many things yet, which invites people to experiment and then write about it. 2. Unlike many other industries, in tech you can experiment using just your at-home equipment. 3. Older industries arguably expect their practitioners to be more mature, so…

I agree that tech has projects and ideas you could do yourself @home.

Now my question is ... why local structural engineers or other professionals rarely write a blog or an essay sharing their knowledge and experience or just normal expressive posts like you would see on mainstream social media?

Re: Ask HN: Why are there fewer non-tech personal blogs? (athletes', architects')

#19

Post by cyberdrunk »

kernelsoe wrote: post #18
cyberdrunk wrote: post #17

> Why are there fewer non-tech personal blogs? (athletes', architects') Tech is unique in a couple of ways: 1. It's a very young industry, so there are no set ways to do many things yet, which invites people to experiment and then write about it. 2. Unlike many other industries, in tech you can experiment using just your at-home equipment. 3. Older industries arguably expect their practitioners to be more mature, so…

I agree that tech has projects and ideas you could do yourself @home. Now my question is ... why local structural engineers or other professionals rarely write a blog or an essay sharing their knowledge and experience or just normal expressive posts like you would see on mainstream social media?

I don't think there's that much innovation in those fields (esp. on individual contributor level), so there's considerably less to write about. The old professions are standardized to a large degree and they're unlike tech where new approaches to literally everything are invented (or, should I say, unleashed upon the world) regularly.
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