journal entry
View Source, Stay Human
Why a hand-made site still feels more generous than an infinitely optimized profile page.
The older web had rough edges, but it also made room for personality. You could tell when a page had been made by a person rather than tuned by a growth team.
That is still the energy I want in a modern personal site:
- readable HTML and markdown
- a feed somebody can subscribe to
- URLs that can survive a redesign
- enough structure to publish often without turning the site into a product
My baseline checklist
If a theme claims to support the small web, I want to see a few boring, practical things working before I care about the screenshots:
- a feed
- clean permalinks
- an about page that can be edited without ceremony
- posts that are still readable after the decorative pieces are stripped away
The IndieWeb ethos helps because it asks practical questions. Can I own the URL? Can I move hosts without losing myself? Can other people follow this site without an account?
That little button is a shortcode, and this whole post is plain markdown. The fancy bits should stay optional.