My personal use of Obsidian tends to be simple. I build into it the tools that I need to get things done, to make things easier. There is a saying (which I can't locate, so I'll paraphrase) that a system should only be as complicated as needed, and nothing more. The idea is there is no reason to build a Rube Goldberg machine when all you really need is a wrench. That's the approach I take: use a wrench to bolt on a few tools, and tighten things up where necessary.

So, this article will walk through how I work with things now. This system has evolved a bit over the last few weeks, and is likely to evolve further. But the primary idea is, and will remain: keep it simple, but make it useful.

Planning

When I switched from WordPress to write.as, the biggest thing I “lost” was having a way to plan the articles that I wanted to work on. Obsidian recently added a feature called Bases that made it simple to set up a table containing all the articles for all three of my sites:

View of the main planning table. Unpublished articles blurred—no spoilers! ;)

The simplicity here is that the table quickly lets me see which articles I have published, which are in the planning / drafting stage, and the scheduled date for the articles. But, looking at a table this big could be tricky to navigate. Fortunately, I have a couple of alternate views available:

The Plan / Draft view lets me see just the articles I am working on.

And the Published view lets me see what I've already posted.

There are two “genius” parts to this system. First, all this information is part of the article, it's not some extra information that I need to keep track of. Second, I can update the “Published”, “Scheduled” and “Status” fields from this list without having to open the specific post. How is this done?

New Post Drafts

Every time I have a new idea, I create a new document in the website's folder, and insert a template:

Blog Template is for website posts, CMP Template is for my archived podcast posts.

Once the Blog Template is inserted, the document shows up in the Planning table. After the template is inserted the document looks like this:

Template inserted in document, with Properties for the Planning table circled.

You might notice there is both an Untitled field, and a Title field. Untitled is Obsidian's filename for the document, whereas Title is the actual article title. Why both? Obsidian places some restrictions on the names of documents. For example, the character : isn't allowed in an Obsidian filename, but there are times when I need it in an article title.

From here, writing is dead simple…

Writing In Obsidian

The full writing environment, with a few highlighted items.

Now it's just time to write. The majority of the screen is dedicated to the editing window where I can work on an article. If I have images (like this article) they can be drag-n-dropped into place. To the left is the Navigation panel, with my folders on the top half, and the files in the selected folder on the bottom. To the left of the editing window is the version control panel for the current article (I'll explain my choice in the next section).

When I am done with the article I export it to an output directory. The export process converts any Obsidian specific markup (such as using wiki style links) to standard Markdown formatting, and places all the attachments (images) in a folder with the article. This makes it dead simple to upload to write.as.

Obsidian Plugins

I have a selection of Obsidian community plugins that I use for working in Obsidian as can be seen in this image:

Image: screenshot of installed community plugins.

The most important of these are Harper and LanguageTool, both of applications these plugins call are installed locally on my system as I have a slow internet connection, and prefer to have my tools running locally. markdown export is the export tool I use for blog posts. Notebook Navigator enhances Obsidian's built-in navigation panel a ton, I've barely scratched the surface of what it can do. Outliner provides better list handling, allowing drag-n-drop of items, folding, and more. Typewriter Mode is really only used for one feature: highlighting the current line I am editing. (I have been doing this for 40+ years as it helps with my unique form of dyslexia.)

Remotely Save is the tool I use for syncing my vaults between systems. Version Control is a simple built-in version control system. The advantage to using it over git or another external version control system is that the versions of my documents are synced with Remotely Save. This removes the need to synchronize a git repository separately from the vault.

Zotero Integration allows me to search and insert bibliographic references when I need them. Alas, write.as doesn't support reference links, so I have to do it inline, instead of in end-note style.

Safi Site Audit is a tool that is unique to this vault for me. It's used to check the health of my sites, and catch any major issues, like broken links, missing alt text, and so on. I don't run it often, but it's good to be able to check and generate a report once in a while.

Conclusion

Obsidian, between it's recently added Base feature and a handful of plugins makes for a great writing environment for me. The ability to track the status of the posts I am working on, have version control over the documents, and have some additional tools that allow me to customize the environment to my liking.

I know there are a lot of evangelists of Obsidian out there, and their enthusiasm and overly complicated setups can make Obsidian seem unapproachable. Personally, I've found that it is excellent if you tailor it to your specific needs. And that is what is most important, and makes me most productive with a tool: doing what I require in the way that I need.

This wasn't too detailed in terms how I actually tweak things (like key bindings for certain tools). Hopefully it gives you some insight into my workflow. And maybe it will give you some ideas about how you can refine your workflow.

Categories: #HowTo Tags: #obsidian, #tool, #writing, #blogging, #configuration, #workflow License: Copyright Unattributed. Licensed under Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 4.0.

I feel fairly certain in saying the author of the post 5 Albums meant no harm. Even the prompt: Introduce yourself with five albums that have shaped you seemed quite innocuous. And I thought: “Cool. I can write a response to this with one hand tied behind my back, and three of my fingers broken”. Part way in, I decided to throw a curveball: I was going to list ten albums. Actually more than ten because my list had multi-volume sets in it. I reject your rules and substitute my own! Take that!

As I worked on my masterpiece, I inserted a couple of snarky little comments between the first and second half that were intended to be humorous about me breaking the rules. Those comments used words like “reductive” and “de minimis”. That's when I realized I was falling into a trap: the clickbait trap. Then I had a further realization: this wasn't just a list, it wasn't just clickbait, it was worse.

So now, after defending writing and blogging metas, I run the risk of being labeled a hypocrite in order to explain why these types of articles are not the silly puff pieces they appear to be. But rather, they are precisely the kind of thing that should be avoided. And, I even have a some potential fixes for what I see as the biggest (but not only) issue.

The Problems

Personally, I see three problems with these kinds of posts:

First: they don't say anything about the author. At least they don't say anything useful, other than being a list of objects. But there is no context to those objects. The author hasn't given the reader any insight into why those objects have meaning. You might think they are objects the author likes or loves, but is that necessarily the case? Aren't you just as “shaped” by the things that you don't like, the things that repulse you, or you are indifferent to?

Second: The author of such a post is opening themselves up to be judged, and conversely putting their audience in the position of being judgmental. What does this accomplish? Nothing useful as far as I can tell. A larger portion of the social issues we have today are based around people being judgmental without having any real knowledge of the people they are judging.

I've read or heard numerous accounts from people that have found their way out of cults or hate groups that are surprised when they realize that whatever they hated was just not worth it. They often don't realize or understand the people or things they hate because they judged them solely on the few things they thought they knew. Things that were regularly misrepresented, or twisted to cause them judge people hatefully.

I'm not saying that judging someone based on a silly list of five albums is on the same level as someone in a cult or hate group. But they do share a small similarity in that they invite judgment based on what is, at best, superficiality, or at worst a potential misunderstanding.

Third: These lists play to some of the trickiest and most difficult aspects of our personalities to navigate. They play to our ego, pride, superiority, or inferiority. This was what happened to me, I realized, when I was writing my snarky comments. I take pride in the fact that I have a wildly varied taste in music, and my ego wouldn't let me just produce a list of five pop/rock albums when there is so much more music out there. That's why I expanded my list (and, in reality, ten entries still weren't enough to encapsulate my listening, and all the recordings that have shaped me.)

The Fixes

So, having talked about the problems, what are the fixes?

First: don't make it a call to action. “Introduce yourself…” is a call for responses. This puts the reader automatically in the role of judging the list and the person that wrote it. If there isn't a call to action, it removes some pressure to judge. There is still some likelihood the reader will judge the list. But it's less likely they will have to navigate their ego or pride while reading it.

Second: The more obvious option: provide context. Tells us a bit more about yourself by telling your reader why these particular items are significant to you. Was it a recording you bought with your first paycheck? Was it playing when you proposed to your spouse? By doing this you invite your readers to relate to you on some level. Their responses can focus more on similarities or differences. This, in turn, may evolve into a sort of blogging based dialog between you and your readers.

Third: Don't write a list. Okay, this sounds like I'm being pedantic. But, really, I have a better idea: take your list and turn it into a series of essays. Write 300–600 words about each of the list entries. Recall stories about them. Explain where they fit into your life. Talk about the things that you like about the item, and even the things that you would change about it if you could.

This is the kind of exercise that can be beneficial in so many ways. You may find new ways of expressing yourself. It can allow you to explore your relationship with the subject. Your readers may see the item in a new light. As with the second entry, responses to your post might be about the similarities or differences between you and your audience. Or, your audience might write about things that hold a similar place in their lives.

Conclusion

When I started writing my response list for the 5 Albums post, I thought it was just a little silly toss off article. But then I quickly threw out the original rules, and having done that, discovered there were bigger issues with this kind of post. The issues are they don't provide any context, and therefore no real insight into the author. The second is that they are a call to judgment. The author is judged, while the audience is being judgmental. Finally, they play to some complicated aspects of our personality (such as ego and pride). Indulging in these complex aspects of our personalities isn't always healthy.

So, I set about suggesting some fixes. The first is to not have a call to action. That will somewhat minimize the judgment aspect. The second is to provide context. Let your audience in on your relationship with these items. Third suggestion would be to write a series of articles instead. Explore more of your writing skills, and let your audience focus more on what's important t to you, instead of the object.

So am I a hypocrite? Maybe partially. But, I am calling this out because I think we can do better. I think understanding when something is a bad idea, and why it is a bad idea can lead to us finding better ways to accomplish the same objective. I have little doubt that the original author of the post intended to make a positive contribution.

We see these kinds of articles all the time. I've even participated in one myself (see: The Shellsharks Music Quiz Challenge). But, I can say at the time I was just trying to get myself writing again. And, this was actually a quiz that was more extensive and open-ended than the “5 Albums” post. Looking back on it, if I were to take it again, a lot of my answers would change.

In the end, this is all just my opinion. Hopefully it has been food for thought, and it may do some good.

Now, if you'll please excuse me, I have a series of articles to start writing… ;)

Categories: #Writing Tags: #blogging, #lists, #context, #judgment, #clickbait, #meta, #metas License: Copyright Unattributed. Licensed under Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 4.0.

Fri, July 3rd, 2026: All of these articles were in the Top 12 on Bubbles this morning: You Don't Have to Blog Like Me, Stop Writing for Bubbles, Re: Your Metablogging is Lame, Your Metablogging is Lame as Hell. If you went further there are a lot of similar articles, especially articles talking about blogging platforms. Yeah, so there is a writing obsession running through the Bubbles community. Well alright! Time for me to get on this train to fun and profit!!

Okay, okay, I'm joking. Mostly. Kinda. Definitely.

I agree with the sentiment that writing about writing, and writing about blogging platforms is (potentially) weak content. And that writing targeted simply to get clicks / become popular is lame. Do you know what is even weaker than those styles of content? Yup, you guessed it: complaining about those styles of content.

Metas in the world of writing have existed for just about forever. Longer than any of us have been around. And, guess what? There will continue to be metas in writing long after all of us have joined the ranks of a million monkeys banging on keyboards in another world.

Metas are something that come and go in communities, they are like the waves: sometimes larger and sometimes smaller but if the tides stopped completely we'd be in an even worse situation. Want to achieve low meta-tides? The best solution is to ignore them.

In my experience the thing that matters the most is having your own reason and purpose for writing, and not deviating from it. It's too easy to get distracted by the meta high tides. It can make you want to jump aboard that wave and ride it as far as you can. But in the end you are just left standing on the shore looking for the next big wave to ride.

I'm in the middle of migrating all of my old websites to this platform. Why? The platform I had been using has become a completely unusable mess over the last decade. It is, in my opinion, a top example of the enshittification of platforms. I mentioned it already on this blog as part of a conversation. But, I'm not turning it into content. Why? Covering the enshittification of that platform is a little too on-the-nose for me. Instead, I can stick to my guns and write about the things that I want to write about without the distraction (although, enshittification is well within the range of topics I'm interested in exploring).

The writing in communities like this is at its best when the authors have a sense of why they are writing. They find a core set of values and range of topics and ideas that they want to explore through those values. That makes for more diverse writing: everyone brings something different to the table even when covering the same topic. That makes for more natural and interesting interactions. Much more than everyone riding the next big meta wave.

Categories: #Opinion Tags: #meta, #metas, #enshittification, #blogging, #communities, #community, #waves, #writing License: Copyright Unattributed. Licensed under Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 4.0.