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Ask HN: What has your personal website/blog done for you?

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Re: Ask HN: What has your personal website/blog done for you?

#321

Post by tomwheeler »

tricky wrote: post #225
tomwheeler wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As soon as I read this, I knew it was St. Louis. A former co-worker used to have a shop on Cherokee Street about 15 years ago. He told me that a neighboring building had access to the caves through the basement, though its owner was too afraid to explore it.

Could that have been across from what is now Earthbound Beer? If so, they hand-dug all the debris out of the cave and you can pretty easily get a tour. The owner said the cave under the cave is off limits b/c they almost ran out of air while exploring it.

It probably was. It was definitely on the north side of the street and west of Jefferson, so that would be about right.

Re: Ask HN: What has your personal website/blog done for you?

#323

Post by dt3ft »

barbariangrunge wrote: post #319

I started blogging about writing and books and met a lot of other writers through it. I have people to talk to about the subjects I love, people to give feedback on unfinished work, and maybe even people to collaborate with one day. I learned a bunch about writing by exposure to their work as well! https://barbariangrunge.substack.com/

Getting feedback on unfinished work sounds great! I am writing a book about my personal experience as a 9 year old living through the 4-year long war in Bosnia back in 1992. I want my son to be able to learn about this war as it was experienced by me. It has been very difficult so far as it pushes me to revive those horrible memories, and getting feedback would mean a lot to keep me going.

Re: Ask HN: What has your personal website/blog done for you?

#326

Post by EamonnMR »

I mean, it's similar to a Google Doc or whatever for sharing ideas and tutorials, but I get a much prettier URL. And it saves me from writing the same post over and over on multiple forums. And I once helped someone find information about an obscure toy line.

Re: Ask HN: What has your personal website/blog done for you?

#327

Post by nsm »

It hasn't directly influenced my career, but hiring managers and interviewers certainly mention reading it and I'm sure it indirectly influences hiring decisions.

In addition the specific post about my ankle fracture is somehow one of the most popular when searching for "ankle fracture blog", and I've had at least one person reach out to me who also had a fracture and were comforted by my account.

Re: Ask HN: What has your personal website/blog done for you?

#328

Post by cushychicken »

lethain wrote: post #43

I've been blogging for about 16 years. Writing is an underrated way to cement what you learn any given day or year, and over time has made it possible to reach into any part of the industry and get an actual response. Writing is particularly powerful in combination with actually doing things that (are perceived to) matter; the credibility from doing both is much higher than doing either. Concretely answering the ques…

I try to read your new posts when I get the chance.

Half the time, I find them really interesting and an interesting perspective on corporate psychology.

The other half of the time, I read them and have no idea what you’re talking about, which leads me to worry that my trajectory in my engineering career is doomed to insignificance, because I never have any of these meetings with execs or high level people like the ones you describe.

Do you have any guidance for people like me, in the second scenario?

Re: Ask HN: What has your personal website/blog done for you?

#329

Post by scarface74 »

marmot777 wrote: post #314
Vibgyor5 wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I recommend it. Start a blog - on your own domain, on webspace that you control. Following up on this - any specific reason behind this? I am considering starting a newsletter soon to first gather audience and Substack looks like right solution for this without requiring much technical setup, esp. as a non-tech. Idea is to first start blogging, get into that mindspace, build an audience and then you can move it to…

Email is one of the last remaining things where your audience is directly yours and not part of a walled garden. So newsletters have made a come back.

Your audience can easily dwindle if Google or another popular email service marks your email as spam.

Re: Ask HN: What has your personal website/blog done for you?

#330

Post by lrhegeba »

airstrike wrote: post #313
abhaynayar wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's amazing how I'd never heard the word "spelunk" before today, and now in the span of the last few hours, I've heard it multiple times in three different contexts.

First time I heard it in English! Your comment made me want to dig deeper... It looks like it comes from the Latin "spelunca", meaning "cave" Curiously, in Portuguese we have "espelunca" which is more commonly used as a synonym for a seedy, shady place -- and now I know why!

in german "Spelunke" is used for a seedy, shady bar
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