Ok, all anniversaries are abitrary, but I stumbled across this blog post of mine from about a year ago (actually 13th February 2024):
And I thought, that’s interesting, stuff has moved on and it’d be interesting to just go over some of that stuff.
“My twitter experience is starting to reach the point where … well, it has no point.”
A year ago I disabled my twitter account, with the intent of letting it die. Well, my use of it did die. Didn’t take instantly, for a long time I had a burner account (useful because people would post links to a twitter post and you couldn’t read it without having a twitter account). The big worry is someone could nab your name to impersonate you, well, that’s been true of every digital domain ever – but no-one is sitting worrying about someone cybersquatting their myspace account.
In that time Bluesky has really taken the place of twitter for me. My follower count is way lower – 6k rather than the former twitter height of 15k, but happily there’s many of the old twitter accounts I follow now on bluesky, so it’s become my new dopamine hit. I do think at scale (once people are following many thousands of people) algorithmic timelines have their uses (say even a simple one where you always see people you interact with even if they’re posting in a timezone utterly outside your own) but they are the devils temptation for companies to think “oh wait, why don’t we charge for exposure” – so blueskys like of main algo feed is good.
Last year I also posted:
“I’ve been trying to get out and walk a bit lately, as you’ll be unsurprised to find out my physical fitness is just dreadful.”
Well, me and my mate Jim eventually went from walks where my legs were aching and me looking to burn a modest 250kcalories, to couch to 5k, and actually completing it, to running my first 5k and then sort of sliding a bit, we now do every few days a 5k walk/run, combo. Look, it’s better than where I was before! and it’s sustainable. Did the park run for a little while, but usually we’ll go for a run(run/walk) monday, wednesday, and friday. Typically burning 453kcal (though my target is 500kcal)
Really long term if that is my exercise regime, that’s pretty good (I’m 55! if I wasn’t going to be a runner in my twenties it’s unlikely now!)
“I’m wondering if we’ve finally reached peak enshiffication yet?”
No, no we hadn’t – in fact, I’d argue, now Trump is in charge of the States and Musk has been given full reign to turn the US government into a digital project we’ve barely scratched the surface, an entire country is about the be enshittified, and from there the entire world. So grim.
“It’s coming time to update my passport, and genuinely I’m considering getting an Irish one. “
Ah, circumstances forced my hand, youngest son and wife were going to Disneyland paris and my wife took a dizzy spell, leading to vertigo for a few weeks and my passport had expired, so I ended up getting an emergency UK one. BUT she’s now got an Irish passport, and at some point possibly this year, I’ll end up doing the same (though it’s better if the two passports don’t overlap in time, because this stuff is expensive!)
“Tomorrow, in my old man is falling apart adventure, emergency dentist appointment”
And that marked the last time I had an NHS dentist, my dentist went private and gave me an offer I couldn’t refuse (“go private or go without”)
Hate. Hate it. Now I pay monthly fee so I can see them and if I need work done it will cost a fortune, and given I’m the generation of sweet treats and free dentistry, I’m largely expecting this to cost me a LOT of money before I eventually succumb to the sweet embrace of toothless death.
Anyway. A better year lies ahead, I guess.