POSSE

an overview of the content syndication strategy for starbreaker.org 🤮

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For your reading convenience, I also provide plain text.


POSSE is an IndieWeb concept. The idea is that you should publish on your own website first, and then syndicate your work to other platforms. Sometimes this can be done automatically. More often, it is done manually.

My syndication strategy is to provide full-text and headlines-only web feeds in Atom format, styled with CSS for readability in browsers. You can bookmark them in your brower. You can subscribe to them yourself. If you run a non-commercial social platform or aggregator, you are welcome to pull my feeds on a reasonable interval, such as every 24 hours.

I do not currently run a newsletter or syndicate to other platforms, aside from sharing links on the 32bit Café Discourse forum. I have not wanted to, because I think that since I provide feeds I have done my part. Furthermore, the major platforms to which IndieWeb people have devoted so much effort to interoperate plainly do not want people sharing hyperlinks that lead out of their virtual panopticons. Most importantly, if you think I’m a dick here, you should see me the next time I create a throwaway account on Reddit and go on a shitposting bender.

Nonetheless, I am considering syndicating a monthly digest to Bear Blog, write.as, or Buttondown. I may return to the Fediverse, but if I do so it might be by syndicating to write.as instead of bothering with Mastodon and friends. Dreamwidth might also be a good fit, even though I had missed out on the original LiveJournal. It would give people who want to post comments a place to do so without cluttering my main site or depending on third-party services like FastComments or Disqus.

Under no circumstances will I join Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Reddit, TikTok, YouTube, Threads, Medium, Instagram, or Substack. Twitter and Substack in particular are Nazi bars. Facebook, Instagram, and Threads are out because Mark Zuckerberg was a mendacious little creep when he almost got booted out of Harvard because of FaceMash, and he has not improved a bit in the intervening decades. Medium is aptly named; the self-help content and Silicon Valley self-congratulatory material are neither rare nor well-done. Reddit is 4chan with pseudonyms, and /u/spez (CEO Steve Huffman) is an asshole. YouTube and TikTok are right out; I have a face made for radio.

Speaking of radio: Madam Catastrophy will most likely have me assassinated if I start a podcast, and not merely because I have a voice made for print. There are plainly too many dudes with microphones who should be blogging instead; I at least can read faster than these clowns can talk.