Howdy

I’m Jered Benoit.

This is my blog.

You may be asking: how do I comment on something Jered wrote? Short answer: blog about it, or use the contact page to send me an email. There are no comments.

It is not that I don’t like hearing from readers, I want this blog to be my blog. I have in past attempted to build community, but since the site carries my name, I think it should be mine alone, not a place where you come to read some cool comments.

John Gruber describes his blog Daring Fireball and that is how I want to see my blog:

I wanted to write a site for someone it’s meant for. That reader I write for is a second version of me. I’m writing for him. He’s interested in the exact same things I’m interested in; he reads the exact same websites I read. I want him to like this website so much that he reads it from the top to the bottom, and he reads everything. Every single word. The copyright statement, what software I use, he’s read it all.

If I turn comments on, that goes away. It’s not that I don’t like sites with comments on, but when you read a site with comments it automatically puts you, the reader, in a defensive mode where you’re saying, “what’s good in this comment thread? What can I skim?”

It’s totally egotistical. I want Daring Fireball to be a site that you can’t skim if you’re in the target audience for it. You say, “Oh, a new article from John. I need to read it,” and your deadlines go whizzing by because you have to read what I wrote.

If I turn comments on I feel like it’s two different directions. You get to the end of my article and you’re like, “let’s see if there’s anything interesting. Let’s see if there’s any names I know.” That’s really it. Sometimes a design decision is what you don’t put in, as opposed to what you put in.

New here?

Well, again, howdy and thanks for reading. If you are interested in learning more about Jeredb.com or Jered himself, this is a good place to start.

• If you want to learn more about what’s happened at jeredb.com, check out the archives. Please don’t mind the cobwebs
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I am perfectly described in a quote by Merlin Mann:

I lack core competencies in many important facets of life, but my coffee-making skills are tight.