---
title: "💭 My approach to running a link blog"
description: "!https://simonwillison.net/2024/Dec/22/link-blog/#atom-everything"
date: 2024-12-23
published: true
tags:
  - blog
  - thought
template: link
---


<div class="embed-card embed-card-external">
  <a href="https://simonwillison.net/2024/Dec/22/link-blog/#atom-everything" class="embed-card-link" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">
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      <img src="https://static.simonwillison.net/static/2024/link-blog-card.jpg" alt="My approach to running a link blog — I started running a basic link blog on this domain back in November 2003—publishing links (which I called “blogmarks”) with a title, URL, short snippet of commentary and a “via” …" loading="lazy">
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    <div class="embed-card-content">
      <div class="embed-card-title">My approach to running a link blog</div>
      <div class="embed-card-description">I started running a basic link blog on this domain back in November 2003—publishing links (which I called “blogmarks”) with a title, URL, short snippet of commentary and a “via” …</div>
      <div class="embed-card-meta">Simon Willison’s Weblog &middot; simonwillison.net</div>
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  </a>
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I still cannot believe I thought I had such a unique idea with thoughts only to find out shortly thereafter that Simon beat me to the punch by about 20 years! 

Simon put a lot of work into this [post](https://simonwillison.net/2024/Dec/22/link-blog/<a href="/tags/thoughts/" class="hashtag-tag" data-tag="thoughts" data-count=2 data-reading-time=3 data-reading-time-text="3 minutes">#thoughts</a>.waylonwalker.com) please check it out.  Its not only filled with tons of little nuggets about blogging, it has just a ton of links to other posts I'm itching to read now.

https://simonwillison.net/2024/Dec/22/link-blog/<a href="/tags/thoughts/" class="hashtag-tag" data-tag="thoughts" data-count=2 data-reading-time=3 data-reading-time-text="3 minutes">#thoughts</a>.waylonwalker.com

## a linkblog proves that you read

Simon mentions it in the post as well, but one thing about having a link blog does is that it proves that you actually read articles that you share.  This is really more about proving to myself, and reminding myself that anyone else, it's a good feeling.

## Trying to add soemthing extra

* include names of people, and add tags for common people
* something extra - the whole point is to bring something to the post without stealing thunder, but rather linkbuilding for the author that put the hard work in.
* copious amounts of quotes
* It should bring the author up not put them down

## A post a day

_well .98 posts per day_

Simon mentions starting in Nov 2003, which puts that at 7722 days since then.  That is so close to a post a day for 21 years, even though they are often as short as one sentence that is impressive to keep up over time.

> So far I’ve published 7,607 link blog posts and counting.

## What's my rate

I just check and I am at 513 days in with 413 posts (0.8 posts/day).  Not quite up to Simon, but close enough to be proud of.  My only grief is that I didn't start sooner.

## My stack

I have a full post explaining more about how I do mine and the stack behind it here.

https://waylonwalker.com/thoughts/

## See Images **are** hard!

This is one of the main reasons that I built [dropper](https://dropper.wayl.one) for myself, and plan to include it in [fokais](https://fokais.com) as a product to help others with their blog.  This is definite evidence that I am not the only one with this issue!

## I've made images easy form myself

I've tried half a dozen or so easy techniques from obsidian to various github repos and none have really hit me with inspiration to really add screenshots like I do with [dropper](https://dropper.wayl.one).  I write all of my thoughts posts in a chrome extension drop down local first style and when i hit paste it uploads and gives me a markdown image link, it cannot be easier for me. 

When I store them I compress them and convert them to webp.  I serve them by streaming them out of an s3 bucket with fastapi and some very generous cloudflare cache headers, so I should only get a request for that image about once a year.

> Warning, I built dropper for me, no guarantees that it works forever, foakis will be for more users.

![image](https://dropper.wayl.one/api/file/2d54112d-b6c0-4f42-bbbb-eeb5fea133bd.webp)

## Bluesky does not penalize for links

I am loving bluesky more and more, learning this just gave it another level up.


---

## Series

I just noticed that Simon has Series on his blog in a very elegant way.  One I need to get back to blogging more, I did not do so good in 2024, and two this is awesome and I want it.

![image](https://dropper.wayl.one/api/file/ec59349e-cca7-4fa9-a57e-50cc442305db.webp)test


!!! note

    This post is a <a href="/thoughts/" class="wikilink" data-title="Thoughts" data-description="These are generally my thoughts on a web page or some sort of url, except a rare few don&#39;t have a link. These are dual published off of my..." data-date="2024-04-01">thought</a>. It's a short note that I make
    about someone else's content online <a href="/tags/thoughts/" class="hashtag-tag" data-tag="thoughts" data-count=2 data-reading-time=3 data-reading-time-text="3 minutes">#thoughts</a>