Separating Permanent from Impermanent

David Lyons in It’s Okay Not To Keep Everything:

The iterations of my blog over the years have almost always had comments enabled. When I switched to jekyll I decided I didn’t want them anymore. I don’t want the visual clutter, the increased technical overhead, and now I don’t want the illusion of permanent record. I’m always happy to talk to people through channels meant for discussion, this blog just isn’t one of those channels.

We had a great discussion about all of this on our latest Flipping Tables podcast. The main idea is to own your own space for extended thoughts, projects, and the things that really represent your work online, but leave all the candid public discussions that don’t need to be recorded on other sites and social media channels.

I completely agree with Lyons, and though I still have comments enabled on this blog, they are part of the background, and do not need to be permanent. If I moved to a different blogging platform I would not waste any precious time trying to migrate the comments. UPDATE: I’ve removed comments from my site.

I have all sorts of conversations and debates on Twitter and Facebook and I don’t worry about preserving them any more than I would preserve a casual conversation with a colleague in a hallway or a stranger on the street.

Find me in the “public square” if you’d like to discuss or debate what I’ve written, but my website will contain just the cream of the crop, the things I want to represent as my work and not just my opinions and jokes.

You can strike up a conversation with me on Twitter.

UPDATE October 2017: I’m on longer on Twitter.

UPDATE October 2020: I’ve been back on Twitter for awhile now 😂