Explain Like I'm Roman

My favorite parts of the internet are little niches. One such niche is folks who “Work with the garage door open”. There seems to be a sizable overlap between this group and “Writing is the thinking” adherents. I unfortunately, have no exciting work to show off to my internet neighbors. But I’m often thinking, so for a small while I will try writing with the garage door open. I really quite admire and enjoy these spaces (such as Maggie Appleton’s Digital Garden), and so one motivation of this blog is to contribute to this world.

Another motivation is quell my rambling to others. After parties, the parts I most enjoy in a moment yet regret later, are deeply explaining my hyperfixations to friends and strangers. This includes the history of the UC system, zettelkasten note-taking, and the difference between cut-and-sewn vs. loopwheeled t-shirts. It sure would be easier to save these people from my rants and let the interested come here instead. For even more efficiency, expect snack-sized posts of passing interests or lists of links in the style of Tyler Cowen or Robin Sloan.

Lastly, I think often we won’t know what a thing will be until we start doing the thing. The most current example of this is AI chatbot use. Lots of “what’s it for” questions, no better answer than experimenting with them consistently for one’s self. To bridge AI to this particular experiment, Sam Altman recently explained well in his interview on “How I Write” that for him, ChatGPT is not really replacing his writing because he’s not writing to communicate. He’s often using writing to think. I’m not sure yet what I’ll think until I write, so I’m excited to see what’s to come.