This past week was the 75th anniversary of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings. I found this article “Hiroshima” on the New Yorker that goes into detail about the actual experiences of survivors in the days and weeks afterwards and it’s sobering. Not just because of single event, as they’re all sobering, but the sheer volume.

It’s a long read (~100 pages) and well worth your time. What’s more is that it’s not based on long-ago recollections. This article was originally published in August 1946.

I rarely finish books that I start reading. Usually I’ll get what I need out of it, plan to finish it, and start a new book in the mean time. Some may shake their heads in disbelief, but I don’t think this is a problem.

While I feel like retain “a lot” of what I read, a few months down the like and I usually only remember the gist. I’m wondering if I couldn’t retain more details if I were to take notes when I read. Writing down notes physically on paper is an option, but transcribing them so I can easily reference them becomes a burden. My handwriting is also horrible as I write with paper so rarely.

One thought that comes to mind is to setup a personal wiki where I can just store anything and everything, including notes on book and articles that I read. I could easily link/categorize content. I don’t necessarily want to make everything I read and write fully public and managing which page are private, which are public could become a chore.

The other thought is, I have this blog why don’t I just write what I learn here. Start interspersing notes about books / magazines that I read here on this blog. It should help me retain more of what I read as well as help people discover new and interesting topics.

Podcasting is perhaps the last bastion of the open web. Where the distribution system isn’t centralized into a single large tech company’s systems. Yes, those big tech companies run directories, but they’re all powered by the same open technology under the hood – rss. Which is quite surprising as Podcasting was popularized by Apple and the iPod. One might argue that the Apple of the early 2000’s is different than the Apple of today and they’d be right. But despite the podcasting boom, they don’t seem to have any interest in closing the podcast kingdom.

I want to help the health of the open web with the next service that I build. While I try to figure exactly what that service will be, I do what I can to help by blogging and mostly syndicating what I write to social media.

Building a service around podcasting or starting a podcast may seem like the simplest way to help reinforce the open web and build a fun new service. But I’m not a podcaster and, most importantly, the world needs another audio blog by a white 30-something software engineer as much as I need a poke in the eye with a sharp stick.

But the open web doesn’t need a new service to make it strong again. It’s easier today than ever before to setup your own site using open source software and start publishing. What it needs is more people participating. More people. Writing more. In more places.

Blogs didn’t die because Google killed reader. Blogs died because people starting posting their content on social media and not their own site.

And so, to help the web, I’ll continue doing what I’ve been doing this past year. I’ll think. I’ll read. And I’ll write. But under my own domain.