I write to deepen my own understanding. Explaining concepts to others forces me to organize my thoughts and fill in gaps I didn't realize I had.

It forces me to rotate the shapes of ideas; my beliefs become more durable when I'm willing to explore differing views through the act of writing (or it exposes how weak my initial take is)

I'm just getting started blogging despite having run sites since the late 00s.

I mostly want to blog to sharpen my writing skills, produce something useful that I can point to as mine (and isn't at the whims of a platform), and to have fun on the sysadmin side of running the VPS, domain, traffic, etc.

I started because I wanted to think about transportation policy but my work as a Data Scientist wouldn't let me. I continued because a colleague convinced me it could help position me as a thought leader and get me a new job or engagements. More recently it's been a way to complain about the absurdities of mega corp life, awful past coworkers and jobs, etc. without being too obvious about it (hopefully).

But also I have always enjoyed writing and producing. Just passively consuming the internet leaves me feeling a little empty. Also I hate the short, singular point of view, short attention span, social media, everything we say and write getting neutered and just made worse by communications and legal departments world.

blog: https://kennethswindow.com/

I blog to think more clearly.

It’s utterly pointless to outsource this to ChatGPT. I need to muddle through with my slow dumb human words trying to explain my thinking against the social pressure of not looking stupid in public. Only then do I truly battle-test an idea.

Two reasons: - It got me my last job, so I figured it might get me my next - I have fun doing it

Related:

Ask HN: Is maintaining a personal blog still worth it?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42685534

Why I still blog after 15 years

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41646531

Write the post you wish you'd found

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43154666

Blogging in 2025: Screaming into the Void

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46156379

I mostly write to do postmortems of the issues i faced while solving some problem. It helps because i tend to forget how i did something or what was the reasoning behind it.Sometimes i just write stories for the sake of writing they are not very good but they amuse me luckily it has 0 viewership (except me) so i am safe in venting whatever i want.

I used to think that blogging was a way to help me build a platform, get my name out there. Nowadays ... I don't know. Sometimes I have thoughts that interest me - but probably nobody else - so I'll craft a post around them and put the results online. Sharing my creations makes me feel happy. I'll spam a link to the post on Facebook in case any of my friends might be interested in reading it. Lately I've been spamming links to HN, Bluesky, etc because: why not?

Just for myself. Helps me consolidate my own thoughts and learnings. Sometimes I google something and my own blog comes up. That gives me a bit of a laugh (and is sometimes useful).

I like to share my ideas/projects with the world. Also, it helps me learn to express ideas and concepts. Bonus: sometimes you meet cool people interested in the niche you're exploring!

In short: For myself.

The question can be broken down as:

1. Why do you write?

> To collect my thoughts into a organized stream. So that I can forget the stream of thoughts and still have a place to recollect if needed.

2. Why write publically?

> Openness helps clean and calm the head further.

Better outside than inside...

It's a creative outlet where I can try out silly/unusual writing. Its a way to record useful how-tos so that I can refer to the steps in the future & help others. And it lowers the "activation enery" on getting curious/exploring: I am more likely to indulge in a deep-dive on a topic if I know at the end I'll "surface" from the dive with useful insights for others to read.