- The blog is a genre of writing, and the best way to get better at blogging is to just do it. (This is the secret to getting better at almost everything.) Waiting to start a blog until you’re a good blogger means you may never start a blog. (Which is okay, too.)
- Here in the 2020s, few of us read traditional, ’00s-style blogs. The blogs that do get read are “newsletters.” So if you want to hone your craft in the relative quiet of the open web, set up a traditional blog. If you want people to read you, start a newsletter. Both are legit paths! (I’m sort of straddling both these days, writing here in the newsletter but archiving via a more classic blog.)
- If you’re going to blog via newsletter, consider avoiding Substack. It’s backed by venture capital and is pretty clearly aiming to capture long-form writing onto its platform. Staying off Substack means voting with your feet for the open web. Decent-to-great alternatives include Beehiiv (which I currently use), Ghost, and Buttondown. Deprive the beast of your time, labor, and community!
- Whatever you do, don’t refer to your blog as “My Substack”. That’s like calling your novel “My Microsoft Word”. F that.
- If you’re going to set up a traditional blog, a great, cheap, easy way is micro.blog. They have a $1/month option that is rather full-featured. Register your own domain, set up a micro.blog on it, and get blogging!
- If you don’t like browser-based interfaces for posting to your blog, and you use a Mac, consider MarsEdit, a native app that posts directly to micro.blog, WordPress, and other blogs via API. It’s great.
- Don’t expect that anyone will really care about your blog.
- But they might! Over here I sometimes get emails in response to my posts that put a smile on my face for the rest of my day. It can be someone I’ve never met, an old friend reaching out, or a nice note from my mom. Something about putting yourself out there in such an informal way seems to make people feel more comfortable reaching out.
- Get funky with the design! A big part of ’00s-era blogging was the janky web design. It should be a big part of blogging in the ’20s, too.
- Have fun!
- But also proofread.
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This archived Lightplay was sent on 21 December 2025.
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