Wow, two posts in a row. That's some kind of record for me. I also probably should've made this yesterday.
Why make the switch?
I've been getting busier and busier. As mentioned in my previous blog post, I've been juggling 4 different jobs of varying importance so I'm starting to no longer enjoy fiddling with GitHub and glitch to host my site. I like glitch and will keep using them as a sort of landing page until I'm ready to switch, especially since it's the URL on all my resumes.
Why Mataroa?
Before I chose Mataroa, I considered both bearblog and delivering my site via GitHub pages. Previously I've used tools like zoner for making my blog and RMarkdown.
I didn't choose GitHub Pages because I didn't want to run into errors that meant my site couldn't be updated via Visual Studio Code's git integration, which is something I experienced on neocities unfortunately. I don't mind pushing from the command line, but it makes things a bit annoying for me when I do all my writing in VSC.
I didn't choose bearblog because I tested it for a friend recently and helped them customize their CSS. While this was fun, I knew that I would end up getting stuck in this process over and over to make my blog visually perfect when I need to just focus on writing. I also wasn't interested in the discover feed on bear, as nice as it is, because the Trending page usually shows a lot of the same ideas over and over again. I still check the Recent posts, but I'm not really seeking that much connection on this blog. The centralization of bearblog means that people are always subjected to others opinions, and it causes some of the same feedback loops that I've seen before on Twitter and Bluesky...which isn't the experience I'm looking for from my blog. Mataroa's integrated comments, something bearblog lacks, is about enough interaction I'll desire honestly. Lastly, I needed something minimal and frictionless, which is what Mataroa is.
Mataroa also just works by offering so many fantastic features for free, and I'm particularly biased to the affordability of the premium tier and the platform's commitment to CO2 reduction.
What does this mean?
- Maybe more frequent updates!
- On my end, I can focus more on writing instead of organizing my blog.
- I'll still be using glitch since it hosts my resume and some other important files like this poster:
- I might redirect the blog link on glitch to Mataroa once I'm ready to update things.