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Comment by sunday_serif | Hacker News Reader

Writing blog posts and being ok with them not being perfect.

I often have an idea for a post that would be interesting, but then as a learn more about the topic in order to write, I start to realize how much I don’t know. At this point, the post either dies or I spend way too long learning every irrelevant detail until I feel like I know enough.

So I think the skill I am trying to learn is writing as a non-expert. Learning to write in a tone that makes it ok to not know everything. Writing in a tone that conveys my experience and understanding, but doesn’t try to be an authority on the subject.

Writing is a tough skill!

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Who is your blog's target audience? I write https://www.curiosities.dev/ for myself. I'm a non-expert in all of the posts.

When I revisit old posts, I digest the information differently and add more explorations/questions. It's much easier to build upon scaffolding that's already there. Maybe in N years, I'll have something insightful to say about X, but I don't have to hold off writing anything until then -- incomplete notes and rephrasing of other people's ideas already benefit me now.

I’ve been working on writing this year. It’s hard. I have countless posts or ideas for posts sitting there because I don’t like them for one reason or another.

For me I don’t collect metrics or really try to think that anyone might read a shred of it. I think that’s been helpful. And also just publish it. In the grand scheme it’s for you anyways to enjoy and develop. One piece of advice that I’ve gotten, is to commit to your points or idea. I think that’s can even include committing to uncertainty. You might need to revise it later, but done thoughtfully if you have readers, they should respect that. If not, well, without comments and metrics what does it matter?

Over the holiday break I’ve migrated to my own blog instead of a platform. So I’ve certainly found it enjoyable even if frustrating!

Personally I think that even if you don't know everything, just make clear what you are certain and uncertain about.

You probably know a lot, and what you write is still good as long as you don't spread misinformation. I have issues trusting most sources that are not clear about what they are uncertain about, cause most people are not experts.

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