So what is cryptocurrency exactly?

Most people have heard about Bitcoin or even cryptocurrency, but it's not easy to find a simple definition of what it is. Its main goal, in most cases, is really the same as regular currency (gold, cash, etc) - to transfer value, but built into it is the ability to guarantee the validity of ownership. Currently, banks & credit card companies are largely responsible for doing that; they keep a ledger of who owns what and handle transferring money from person to person. At the core of most cryptocurrency is open source code, meaning anyone can view or contribute to it, which does a bunch of crazy complex stuff to make guarantee authenticity and provide security.

Bitcoin is just the first established cryptocurrency to make it into the mainstream. There are now thousands of other currencies, or "coins". If you care to dive a little deeper into how it all works, this is a great (26min) video that describes it in an easy to understand way. I'd recommend this if you just want to watch one video that gives you just the right level of overview.

That's my novice understanding of it anyway, although apparently, it also makes Even Smart People Feel Dumb. Ultimately this technology is like a new born baby; it still has a lot of growing up to do. Since it's so easy for people to publish their opinions, as I am doing, there are a lot of "experts" out there who really don't know much more than you or I do.

What are the implications of all this?

I'll start by sharing some examples of what cryptocurrency is already doing in society at large.

• Enabling oppressed societies to store & transfer wealth to avoid government corruption (can't find link)
• Allow corrupt people to do the same things on black markets
• Basic international commerce while avoiding middlemen's fees (like credit card companies)

There are obviously pros and cons of all of this. As my high school technology teacher once said, "Every new technology introduces new problems." Hopefully, the good use cases will outweigh the drawbacks of some of the negative ones.

The crazy thing is that since it's still so early on, we might only be seeing the tip of the iceberg. When computers came around, few were able to envision being able to stay in touch with friends across the world (Facebook), access the world's encyclopedia (Wikipedia), buy nearly anything you need and have it shipped in a day (Amazon). Optimists feel cryptocurrency could bring similar innovations to the world, while pessimists view it as nothing more than a mere novelty.

What is Mining?

I don't believe understanding mining is necessary to have a broad understanding of cryptocurrency, but it is one area that my friends and I are particularly interested. Basically, you buy and put together computer parts that are particularly good at running the complex math needed to verify and facilitate cryptocurrencies' transactions. Graphics cards are really good at this kind of math, so it's like building a regular computer but with all the power focused on GPUs. Hobbyist "rigs" typically range anywhere from ~$600-4000. Built into the code of these currencies is logic that basically rewards people who run these computations with portions of the currency they are mining.

During the peak of the craze, you could spend $1700 on a rig that could make you nearly that much every month. However, the more people that are mining means less of the computations to go around, so the difficulty number goes up, which means you make less money. We happened to get into it on the other side of the peak, so it might be close to a year or more that we make our money back, depending on what prices of these currencies do. It's generally not recommended to get into unless you enjoy learning about how all these pieces fit together and are willing to get your hands dirty, especially at this point.

There are also specialized ASICs (application-specific integrated circuits), or basically, computer hardware manufactured just used for mining a specific currency which produces a much higher rate of return but can take businesses years and hundreds of thousands of dollars to create. Sometimes they sell these to hobbyist to use, but it's generally in their best interest to just mine with them themselves until it's less lucrative, then sell them off.

Other cryptocurrencies I am personally interested in

Like I said, there are thousands of other cryptocurrencies. I could even make my own Mead Coin. What typically turns them into something people care about is when they are listed on an exchange where you can trade it for other currencies. We have obviously been in a bit of a bubble, just like the dot com bubble early in the 2000s, where there have been illegitimate currencies and "ICOs," like an IPO but for a cryptocurrency, that have either been outright scams or just a currency with no real value. I tend to avoid these because I know I don't know enough to discern the legitimate ones.

Just like with stocks, don't invest money you can't afford to lose. This is especially true in these markets where there is essentially no regulation. My personal interest is basically spreading a bit of money across a wide range of currencies that are super early in the hopes that just one explodes in value. It's likely safer to just put some money in something like Ethereum which seems likely to at least double in the coming years, but it already has a market cap of $27 BILLION dollars at the time of writing this. As a side note, market cap means the same thing as is it does in the public markets, but it remains to be seen what principles from public markets apply in these.

So all that being said, here are some coins that seem to have some potential and real value behind them to me. I'll include prices on the day of writing this (8/13/2017), and basic information about how they work. I've "invested" a couple hundred bucks spread out through some of these.

1. Siacoin: ($0.0075/coin, $216m cap) - You know iCloud, Dropbox, etc? Siacoin basically does the same thing but for a lower cost because it allows anyone to run their network. Bits of your files get stored across different systems and put back together when you need to retrieve them. This also allows people to make money by opening up space on their computers to host said bit of files.
2. Basic Attention Token: ($0.20/coin, $202m cap) - The goal is to provide content creators (bloggers, media sites, etc) the ability to make money without having to litter their content with ads. Users who sign up and commit a certain number of BAT to be spent on sites they browse the longest to be given to those content creators. This is cool because I may not want to spend $9/mo on a NY Times membership but I wouldn't mind paying a quarter for an article I spent an hour reading, something currently impractical paying with a credit card.
3. TaaS: ($3.44/coin, $28m cap) - Basically a mutual fund for cryptocurrencies. They have a team of "experts" who invest in other currencies. The cool aspect, that I think will become a more common model, is that every quarter I believe they pay out 50% of profits to shareholders with 25% going back to the team and 25% back into the fund. I don't have the time or expertize to research these new currencies, but allegedly at least, they do :).
4. Steem ($1.24/coin, $296m cap) - Think of the website Reddit but where you can earn money for submitting upvoted content, or for curating content that others like.
5. Golem ($0.29/coin, $239m cap) - Basically creates a supercomputer from all users running their network on their computers. Then, gives people access to run programs on the super computer, at hopefully a lower price than other offerings than ones from the big companies like IBM.

All of these will have two uphill battles, not only making good use of cryptocurrency technologies but creating a legitimate business behind them. They won't all succeed int he long term on hype alone, and they'll likely be competing with legitimate businesses that aren't also running a cryptocurrency as well.

I was excited when my friends, Page and Amber started a Facebook group for their friends to do 30 day challenges at the same time. I finally posted that I was going to wake up at 5:30am each day before I could wuss out. Now I have my wife, and this whole group to motivate me to stick with it.

I chose this challenge because I've been kind of overwhelmed by all the little stuff im supposed to do lately. Half-assing a bunch of different things and not really doing any of them well.

I think the discipline from waking up early will trickle down and help me get just get stuff stuff done. Working out (just joined the Y last week), sticking to my daily Bible reading, chores around the house, getting in to work early, etc.

Also I'm going to experiment with how I wake up. Much to the dismay of my wife, I typically snooze my alarm about 4 times before finally getting up, waking her up each time in the process. I want to get out of bed when I set my alarm and not just browse the internet when I'm supposed to be getting ready. I'm going to try setting my phone away from the bed so I have to get up to turn it off.

Below will be random updates and thoughts on the challenge throughout the month:

Day 1, Jun 5th - I almost immediately regretted my decision upon waking up. Thankfully my wife had to get up for work around this time as well so it was a little easier. I'm thinking the phone away from the bed may not last that long as it was like torture knowing I immediately had to get out of bed and walk over to the dresser. If I don't go to bed at the same time every night, this is probably a bad solution as some days I may be in deep sleep, causing me to be more tired when I wake up and throughout the day. I'll have to think about this on, maybe I'll need to add going to bed at 10:00pm to this challenge.

Day 2, Jun 6th - I think I need some kind of sleep alarm device. My alarm went off right in the middle of a dream and I was really tempted to just shut it off and go back to sleep. I have Sleep Cycle on my iPhone, which will wake you up within 30 minutes of the time you set based on the stage of your sleep, but you have to have it on the bed with you.

Day 5, Jun 9th - Woke up when alarm was going off, and next thing I knew alarm stopped going off and it was 6:30am. Easy to feel like I broke the chain, but it's better to slightly break the chain and keep going than to get down about it and give up.

Day 9, Jun 13th - It's hard to wake up this early when you don't also go to bed earlier. It's hard to go to bed before 10pm and have a social life often times. I was out of town for a wedding, and the lack of sleep was really starting to take a toll on my body. For the sake of my health, I woke up at 5:30, got out of bed like I was supposed to, read for a few minutes, then got back in bed to give my body some rest. Like taking a nap, just 10 minutes after I woke up!

Day 16, June 20th - Same as above. If I can't stay healthy while I do this then I won't keep it up, so I think I will need to occasionally catch up on sleep somehow.

Ah, the start of a new NBA season. This one seems to be one of the most anticipated seasons yet. There hasn't been this much parity in the league for a long time, with superstars on new teams like the Cavs, and the return of teams that have already proven themselves like the Spurs.

Even though I won't be buying it, I like the idea of picking 5 teams for the cheaper plan of NBA League Pass. League Pass is an overpriced package you can buy to watch a lot of NBA games you can't get over the normal cable networks.

All of the normal big name teams like the Bulls, Lakers, Thunder, Cavs, etc. will be getting plenty of nationally televised games so I won't be picking those teams While you generally want to avoid just plain terrible teams, terrible teams with exciting players is actually good here. The young guys will have a green light to showcase their athleticism and skill.

Here are my top NBA League Pass teams:

1. Minnesota Timberwolves - I love watching a great point guard more than anything else, and getting to see Ricky Rubio throwing some crazy passes to some of the most athletic talent in the league (Andrew Wiggins, Zach LaVine) sounds thrilling. Plus, Andrew Wiggins is Andrew Wigggins.
2. Milwaukee Bucks - Great talent on bad teams doesn't necessarily make for good
3. New Orleans Pelicans - They're worth watching just for Anthony Davis alone. He's already up there as a best player in the league after two seasons on a crappy team. They may not make the playoffs, but they have some talent and will play some good games.
4. Charlotte Hornets - Charlotte's the local team, got the new branding (which is amazing), but they've also got a team with a lot of personality. Kemba, MKG, PJ, and others all play with a lot of grit. I've always enjoyed watching Kemba play ever since that 6 OT game at UConn. They finally have some more talent on the offensive end with Big Al and Lance Stephenson.

Other decent choices: Orlando Magic (lots of lottery talent), Phoenix Suns (Goran Dragic, lots of athletes), Washington Wizards (could finish 3rd in the East), Utah Jazz (lots of talent on a bad team), Philadelphia 76ers (especially if Embiid plays).

"If you're not embarrassed of the first version of your product then you've launched too late."

I guess I haven't launched too late!

I made it through my first 30 day challenge, a pretty simple method of achieving some short-term goals. I wanted to commit this past month to learning the MEAN web stack, javascript on the front and back end. I made my intentions public with friends/family and committed to showing my work at the end of the 30 days no matter what shape its in.

Here's what it loooks like: Photo Battle

I really like the idea of the 30 day challenge to do things you always think/talk about doing. One month is enough time to get familiar or even proficient with something new, but isn't too aggressive where it feels insurmountable like a new years resolution. In some ways it feels like creating a budget for your time, giving each day/month a job.

This was an effective method for me personally as I stuck it out by coding every day, with fear of sharing a complete piece of crap acting as a strong motivator. It wasn't nearly as easy as I thought it was going to be as I was fighting against a somewhat significant learning curve most of the time. I kept trying to boil the app down to a more and more simple version so that I could at least show the core idea.

App Details

The idea started as just an app where people can pick between two photos and the system would assign a rating to each photo using the ELO rating system to determine which picture in a subject was the best. Sounds pretty easy. When I started getting into it I realized it was too ambitious for my skillset so decided to focus on basically a standalone clone of a subreddit: photoshopbattles, and instead of uploading pictures, people would just add links hosted externally.

When it came time to pull two random photos from a "challenge," I again realized I was in over my head as implementing a ranking system like I did was not easy. Time to lower the scope again.

My final goal was to allow someone to create a new Challenge with a subject and source photo, and just allow people to upvote/like the individual photos and then rank them by upvotes. I ended up falling a little short of that, and didn't get to polish up the app like I hoped, but I am still pleased with where I got and still plan on trying to achieve the intial goal for the app.

Non-technical issues and what to do about them

Non-technically speaking, I had several roadblocks that threatened to prevent me from finishing this challenge. Focus, too big of scope, motivation, finding time

1. Focusing: I think I'm probably like most people: I sit down with good intentions of working on a task, think for a few seconds, open up a new tab, type in espn/facebook.com, and already I'm distracted. Learning how to focus deserves it's own post. I've noticed considerable improvement over the course of this month in how quickly and how long I can focus. My least product time was when I felt I had a lot of time to spare, or where I was trying to do too much and felt overwhelmed.
   Fear of putting out an incomplete product, and desire to finish something I set out to do was adequate in most cases to force myself to focus.
   Another huge helper was Stay Focused for Chrome where I'd block any site I could ever potentially drift off to. I noticed myself trying to go to those sites even though I knew they'd be blocked. Self-project-managing the work into small, achievable tasks was crucial as well.

2. Overzealous Scope: This caused me to lose focus and get stressed out to the point I was literally losing sleep. I wanted the app to work a certain way, but my skillset wasn't to the point where I could make progress in a reasonable amount of time. This caused me to go to bed feeling guilty and unsettled due to wasting a precious hour of time making no progress. I'd have been better off never trying it seemed.

3. Motivation: If you don't have a decent source of motivation it's nearly impossible to take on a task of more than a couple days. I've realized I have a legitimate fear of being someone who is all talk and never actually does anything. I wanted to prove to myself that I'm not. The accountability was pretty powerful motivation as well. I'd put off hanging out with friends and my wife on occasion with this challenge as an excuse. I didn't want everyone to thing I was just twiddling my thumbs that whole time.

4. Finding Time: Performing well at my day job, loving my wife, and being a decent friend takes up time. I want to do all of that and create/learn. This caused me to really look at what I was spending my time doing and it seemed the three places I could reallocate time from were: sleeping, watching tv/playing games, and idle "in-between" time. That last one mainly came from when my wife and I would be about to watch tv/go to bed, but we would just be fiddling around on the phone/computer waiting to actually continue on.
   I sacrificed sleeping-in and mindless entertainment, as well as making an attempt at being more intentional with our "idle" time to find chunks of time where I could code. Unfortunately when you are facing a large learning curve, you can't just hop on the computer for just 15 minutes and not change gears and hope to get things done. Finding this extra time is mandatory to make any real progress.

Technical Details

This is the part where my non-technical readers may want to be done reading this article. Here were the main roadblocks I had when it came to actually coding this app.

1. Using new technology is painful in the early stages. Since each part of the stack I was using is constantly changing, I never found a guide that was using 100% up-to-date code. On top of that, Javascript in general isn't known for having the most conventions. It's a flexible language as a result, but that's not always a good thing. In addition to code being out of date, it seemed each tutorial/blog post I found set up their files and wrote their code a different way. I couldn't figure out what the best way to do things was which caused me some big time "paralysis by analysis." I decided to say screw it and just write my code however I could get it to work so I could keep making progress.

2. Because of no. 1, simply setting up the structure of the app was painful. I went through ~5 different MEAN stack scaffolded apps, all with their own version of the file structure. I settled on Startup Weekend boilerplate link Github. This Node.js Hackathon starter is what I ended up settling on even though it ended up not having Angular

3. Setting up my schemas in Mongoose, especially across files. NoSQL is pretty confusing when you come from a relational DB background.

4. The trend these days is creating an API with your back-end then using a front-end framework like Angular to interface with the API. This makes it easy for front-end developers on large teams to do what they need on their own, and I think it's probably even more effective for individual developers. It took me forever to get basic API working for GET of database documents, and especially POST. Had to keep chipping things away that were causing me to make no progress, such as having Photos in a different schema. Not good practice but it got me to keep going

Still plan to:

-Add name to photos, add a source photo to each challenge

-Implement ELO-based scores for each photo in a challenge as opposed to counting upvotes.

-Refactor code, figure out better way to do the API. Some code should be separated out in different files. Don't feel like I should have separate PUT requests to upVoting and downVoting a photo. Not sure if /api/challenges/challengeid/photos/photoid is the best either.

Live, "Finished" app after 30 days: Photo Battle
View the code on my GitHub. It's not pretty, but it's something.

Some MEAN stack-related posts I used throughout this project

http://www.learnallthenodes.com/

http://blog.nodeknockout.com/post/34302423628/getting-started-with-mongoose

http://www.ng-newsletter.com/posts/beginner2expert-data-binding.html

http://scotch.io/tutorials/javascript/creating-a-single-page-todo-app-with-node-and-angular#frontend-application-with-angular

http://pixelhandler.com/posts/develop-a-restful-api-using-nodejs-with-express-and-mongoose

If you've made it this far and are interested in hearing more of my thoughts, and links around the web I find useful, subscribe to my newsletter

The sprint was modeled after Google Venture's design sprint but condensed into a day. I won't get into the details of it here, but basically it's a method for everyone involved to understand what needs to be focused on, and to create an actionable prototype that can be shown to potential customers.

We met once in person to work on the birdfeeder after the startup weekend, and emailed back and forth every once in awhile. Going into our time with DXLab, we figured the most important parts for us to focus on would be the product design (and how to do it affordably), and market positioning. We didn't spend much time on the pricing aspect, and we discussed market positioning. We spent the majority of the time on product design and branding. Here's what we got:

Votes on the higher fidelity logo possibilities

Some of the many product designs that we voted on

Final logo, awesome:

Final product design mockup to show potential customers:

I could go into all kind of detail about our time over at HQ Raleigh with those guys, but at the end of the day we got the help and motivation we needed to continue working on Paparazzi Bird Feeder in our spare time. It was incredible working with ~10 of the folks at DXLabs who were so talented. I've never been around such a creative team before. It was well worth the time to go work with them, even if it wasn't for the designs we got as a result.

#1 - Andrew Wiggins
THAT SUIT OH MY GOODNESS. Would actually fit in pretty well in Cleveland. They definitely need his defense.

#2 - Jabari Parker
Rookie of the year, he's an amazing all around offensive player on a bad team, he may be what the Bucks need to turn things around.

#3 - Joel Embiid
Unless they trade this, Philly is definitely tanking again this year

#4 - Aaron Gordon
I was hoping he'd drop to the Bobcats. Interesting fit on the Magic, I don't think the Magic will be making the playoffs this year, but they've got a really solid group.

#5 - Dante Exum
Jazz are probably thrilled Exum dropped here. I don't know a lot about him other than what I've read in some articles, but supposedly he tested off the charts on the mental/intangible test teams gave him. Supposedly he has the killer instinct like Kobe has. He's also supposed to be an amazing athlete moving right to left, able to get around the defense with ease and draw fouls, but vertically speaking his jump may not be as high as say Andrew Wiggins

#6 - Marcus Smart
Boston Celtics, he'll probably be a good fit here, him and Rondo will be a pretty scary back court, I guess he's going to play the 2 guard. Could be Dwayne Wade-esque. They're not going to have a lot of shooting, and I guess Avery Bradley is going to be a 6-man now.

#7 - Julius Randle
I'm sad that I have to start hating on Randle with him going to the Lakers. This is what they tanked for though and while hey may not fill Kobe's shoes, he's going to be at least an above-average PF in the league.

#8 - Nik Stauskas
I was thinking the Hornets might get him. His shooting would fit the Hornets very well, and I think he's going to be good to go from game 1 in the NBA. Not sure where he fits in with the Kings, but at the very least he can be a great 3-point shooter which there's alawys room for.

#9 - Noah Vonleh
A great steal with the 9th pick. Unfortunately the Hornets already used their 4th pick in last years draft on Cody Zeller after taking Bismack Biyombo with the 7th pick a year or two before that, and signing Al Jefferson on a big contract at the Center position. Not so sure how this is going to go, but Vonleh has a ton of potential.

#10 - Elfrid Payton (traded to Magic)
Big surprise here. Philly already has Michael Carter-Williams. I thought they were going to take Dario Saric, but with him signing that 2-3 contract overseas that may have scared them off. With them drafting Embiid already they were probably planning on tanking. MCW and Payton is a TERRIFYING back court though. Good luck to the opposing guards on offense against these guys.

#11 - Doug McDermott (traded to Bulls)
Traded to Chicago from Nuggets for the 16 and 19 picks. I think this is a decent deal for the Bulls, although giving up two picks is pretty steep. If they don't get Melo/LeBron or whatever, this will be great. They desparately need offense, but giving up two picks to get McDermott at 11 may be a little much. He must have had a great work out. I'm excited about him though as a Bulls fan.

#12 - Dario Saric (traded to Sixers)
This kid looks pretty awesome, but I'm confused as to why he signed a 2-3 year contract with his team overseas. It's concerning, but the Magic aren't going to be competing for a playoff spot in the next year anyway so maybe it's probably a good pick. Victor Oladipo + Aaron Gordon + Dario Saric + next years top draft pick is going to be a terrifying team in years to come.

#13 - Zach LaVine
Huge potential pick for the Timberwolves. He did nothing in college, but is crazy athletic. This pick's success will depend on what happens with Kevin Love. He doesn't seem at all excited to get drafted here though. He hasn't proved anything yet so he has no room to be cocky just yet. A solid building block for the potential post-Love T-wolves.

#14 - TJ Warren
I think he's in a fairly ideal situation being on an up-and-down team like the Suns. He's a unique player and doesn't fit into any traditional role in the NBA, but on the right team he could be a Manu Ginobli-type player off the bench right away.

#15 - Adrieian Payne
I thought he would have been a better FIT for the Bulls, but they traded their picks, and with the Hawks I'm not sure how he he fits with Paul Millsap there. I like the guy though I hope he gets some playing team.

Special pick - Isaiah Austin
He was diagnosed with Marfan Syndrome and can never play competitive basketball again. How many 7'0 people do you know that aren't playing basketball? He has a fanatastic attitude about all of this and is managing to glorify the Lord through such a tough circumstance. Great touch by the NBA to call him up on the stage even though he couldn't be drafted.

#16 - Jusuf Nurkic (traded to Nuggets
I haven't seen him play much, but he's a big guy who plays "below the rim" which seems like an odd fit for the Denver Nuggets who are typically a fast-break, up-and-down team. They'll have him play overseas for a few years most likely, so they may be different in a few years but he'll probably at least be a solid trade asset

#17 - James Young
I was thinking the Hornets could have potentially picked this guy. Marcus Smart + James Young backcourt is reallly solid for the Celtics. I wonder if they are thinking Rondo is going to leave? Has good size for a SG, don't think he will be a perennial All-Star or anything, but Boston should be excited about their picks.

I'm starting to stop enjoying the draft because I'm trying to keep up with this, so I'm just going to stop and update with a summary of the rest of my thoughts later

Post-draft Update

Note the notes above were live updates, so a lot of the players were traded around. I denoted them with a star but that's it

I fell asleep after the first round sadly. Here is just a list of some thoughts on the rest of the draft.

• I like Tyler Ennis, I hope he somehow gets playing time with the Phoenix Suns.
• Not super excited by the Mitch McGary pick by OKC. Never really care for him or his game that much, but he actually has some pretty solid potential. He'll probably fill Nick Collison's role nicely and may have potential to be a little better
• I'm upset the Hornets helped the Heat get Shabazz Napier, because I think that was good for the Heat, but if they were going to get him anyway, I'm glad the Hornets also got two second round picks in the trade. Either way, I'm thrilled about the P.J. Hairston pick, I would have been happy getting him with a top 10 pick in any other years draft. Getting him at #26 is fantastic. I think he'll fit the team's hard-playing personality and provide some great shooting. After all, Roy Williams said he was the best shooter he ever coached.
• Spurs do it again getting Kyle Anderson with the last pick in the first round. He's probably the closest player to Boris Diaw I've seen. He may not have done that on other teams that would force him into playing a more traditional role, but the Spurs will get the most out of his versatility. -Knicks and 76ers got steals with Cleanthony Early and K.J. McDaniels in the 2nd round. -Sixers had FIVE SECOND ROUND PICKS on top of 2 high first round picks. Wow. They're set to be just as bad if not worse than last years team with their first round picks not playing for anywhere between 6 months and 3 years from now. I was hoping this would be the Hornets' situation going into the rebranding season. I'm happy with where the Hornets, but wow this team's potential is HUGE, although they're at risk of some of those guys never playing.

• General Friends/Family - This group can be broken down into friends that share different interests of mine - Tech, sports, then anything else

• Professional Connections - Co-workers, people I currently know through "professional" events, and people I hope to meet/connect with later on.

I also wanted to blog about a lot of different things:

• Basketball

• Tech/Programming

• Random life thoughts

• Life in city/community I was currently living in

A typical blog isn't really suitable for all of these needs. One reasons I really like Google+ (my profile) is that I can reshare something, post 1 sentence, 5 paragraphs, or just a link about any of the above subjects, and choose which people will see what. Unfortunately there is a grand total of 2 people that I know personally that use it.

Instead, I chose to use Ghost as the platform for my site. It's a blogging platform but I'm hoping I can add normal content on here as well. It still doesn't solve the aforementioned problems, but I've been putting this off for several years so I needed to pick something.

I mostly chose Ghost because it's built on Node.js and is open-source so I can learn a little back-end Javascript. Also it's relatively new so hopefully there will be some opportunities to create plugins and contribute to the GitHub repo.

I think I want to have 4 areas of my site:

1. Typical "long-form" blog posts. I'll aim to keep everything at a readable level, maybe <500 words because I'm pretty verbose. Gotta work on that.

2. "Short-form" content like something I'd post on social media. I may just create a feed page that pulls all of my social media updates?

3. A web version of an email newsletter that I want to start sending out. It'll just be a ~monthly curated list of websites with a few things written about them.

4. Portfolio section of some sort, showcasing my web development creations, even the ones that are rough around the edges.