Like lots of people at the moment I’m thinking about the future and, in what are uncertain times, I’m trying to work out what to do next. Seth Godin famously said we should blog every day. He argued this is a way of sense making, of developing your thinking. Perhaps most interesting in the midst of covid, he thinks of regular blogging as an exercise in mental health. So, as I’m thinking about my own future and work, I’ll use this space to share the things I’ve found interesting. I’ll share what I’m finding useful as someone who works in and around civil society. And maybe it will be my exercise in mental health.
One of the first questions I’m asking myself is whether my skills and tools for making sense of the world are still relevant and useful. I thought that blogging has become a bit outdated, but there are still 70 million people plugging away on WordPress each month. Are linkblogs still a thing? I still enjoy sites like Daring Fireball and The Overspill for insight.
Maybe I should be thinking about something else. In spite of the shift to Teams and Slack, actually is the next big thing for sharing insights an email newsletter via Substack? Are podcasts now what consume people’s ‘download’ time? I don’t know. I’m also conscious most people aren’t on twitter, where I share lots of the stuff I find. So maybe one of the things I’ll do here is talk about what tools and tech I’m using to keep up to date and make sense of what’s going on.
One thing I will end with though. I’ve just started using an RSS reader again for the first time in years. I’d forgotten what a joy they are for keeping up to date with the things I’m interested in. Sadly not all my favourite websites have an RSS feed any more, but a reader is well worth trying out. I’m using Reeder. Best fiver I’ve spent in a bit.