bradenslen
bradenslen

@jenett Thank you very much for the listing!

Wow! The Linkport is so cool. This has to be all custom coded? Impressive. Neat. Right now I'm just ecstatic to know it exists. Please excuse me while I explore. :-)

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bradenslen
bradenslen

@jenett Ah, I get it, it's a huge linkblog and so well done. Very usable. Good search. Please tell me some things about it and your curation hobby.

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hope
hope

@jenett Lol and you just won the domain contest of eternity!

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hope
hope

@jenett I love the name linkport! I call my @linklockerapp bookmarks my own private linkhole.

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hope
hope

.@jenett Do you have a feed for the epic amount of curation you do? I did see the pointers feed. I mean does your Linkport have it's own feed? I've tried to set up linkblogs in the past. For some reason I fail at updating them. This makes me want to get back to doing mine though. I had one from 2012 until around 2016 or so. I still keep webspinner.me up and going, but it needs to be revived. I'm thinking my directory efforts can do that.

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hope
hope

@bradenslen This is exactly what I want my directory to be like. Sure a directory with categories and such. Although one that keeps updating, like a linkblog! I love me some good linkblogs!

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hope
hope

@bradenslen I was never all that great at mine, but it was lots of fun!!!

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bradenslen
bradenslen

@hope There is no reason you can't do a linkblog instead of a directory. With a good search function and a good category structure like @jenett has it becomes very much like a directory or a human edited search engine. That would work fine.

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hope
hope

@jenett You're very welcome!

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hope
hope

@bradenslen Well sure, but isn't yours both?

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hope
hope

@bradenslen I mean you update it on a regular basis, and it has a feed. Therefore, it's a directory with blog-like features.

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hope
hope

@jenett You too! Have fun that is.

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hope
hope

@jenett Lol you bet they are!

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bradenslen
bradenslen

@hope It's really just a matter of the underlying scripts. I have both a blog and a directory hooked together but either could stand alone. The Linkport is a blog script alone. But to the end user the results are close to being the same.

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bradenslen
bradenslen

@hope I've never encountered a linkblog as well setup and thought out as @jenett has done with Linkport. At first I thought it was a custom directory thing. @kicks and I had talked about using tagging or categories for a non-hierarchical directory early on. Jenett has pretty well achived that with a linkblog. It's a really good use of off the shelf blog script.

But there is another part to this that goes beyond scripts and designs. There is a lot of hard work that went into collecting, sorting and curating links over many years building a large index. That took a lot of work.

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JohnPhilpin
JohnPhilpin

@jenett very cool ... love what you and @brandslen are up to - the sheer dedication to keeping these kinds of services going over so many years is awe inspiring …

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JohnPhilpin
JohnPhilpin

@JohnPhilpin calling @bradenslen ... sorry - typo - really looking forward to micro blog incorporating user name auto complete!

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bradenslen
bradenslen

@JohnPhilpin No worries. I'm glad you like what's going on.

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hope
hope

@bradenslen Oh yeah the curation part does take lots of work! Although I've been doing it for years privately.

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hope
hope

@bradenslen Yeah it looks almost like a daily updating directory to me. This is a good thing, because I used to see directories get stale from lack of updates.

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hope
hope

.@bradenslen I have over 6000 links in the linkhole. A lot of them are things like recipes though. There are also lots and lots of blogs lol. Oh yeah, and random places that end up in more random places from latenight surfing.

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bradenslen
bradenslen

@hope I did some searches for linkblogs last night. Most do not have their own search and most do not have categories. They are just streams of links which soon get pushed down off the front page and into archives. So what would make a linkblog really usable are the dedicated search of the links and categorizing each link with the category titles on display.

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bradenslen
bradenslen

@hope That is fantastic! It sounds to me like the linkhole could be the foundation for a linkblog search thing useable by the public. Dedicate a search for it at the minimum. Recipes always seem popular. Right now blogs are not popular but awareness is growing and having a big index of blogs is an important resource IMHO. You definitely have something good there.

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jgmac1106
jgmac1106

@bradenslen we have a p-category tag that will help with this, debating whether I need to make a directory of h-cards or treat my follower page like a linkblog.

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hope
hope

@bradenslen Recipes are pretty popular! Lol I could probably make a recipe search engine. I also have lots and lots of blog feed addresses. I could also make an rss feed engine. That's why I thought one big directory that's updated on a regular basis, that has an RSS feed and a design like a linkblog but the category structure of a directory would probably be the best thing.

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hope
hope

@bradenslen Mine used to have tags. That's because I used the built-in tags feature from WP. It started on Tumblr and Tumblr made heavy use of tags. When I flipped it over to it's own WP install, I stuck with that. Eventually it ended up on @blot. While that was fun, using Dropbox as a way of blogging seemed like it could be a problem if I posted too much.

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hope
hope

@bradenslen I'm sure there are some epic search plugins for WP. When I was looking at the linky plugins for WP I was like hmm... couldn't these be used to manage a linkblog that updates regularly? I'm sure that one could be used for the administration of links. I'm not a huge fan of the way Press this works, but I'd be looking for something quick like that for updating.

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bradenslen
bradenslen

@jgmac1106 Heh, I need to gronk this whole tag thing and how to parse it.

I'm just thinking out loud so don't mind me if this doesn't apply to you: why not just start a linkblog? What if you dedicated a Known or WP instance as a linkblog with full Indieweb plugins so that every time you curate a link a webmention is sent out? This is something I wanted to do but didn't know that the tools were available. Even if you only used it for your bookmarks and following you would end up with something really useful and something you could do on the fly.

The reason I mention a dedicated instance is, after seeing @jenett 's setup, one really must have the dedicated search of the linkblog index and the categories so people can find stuff. The old school linkblogs just won't do.

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bradenslen
bradenslen

@hope I think you are on to something really neat here.

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jgmac1106
jgmac1106

@bradenslen well in terms of mf2 p=category is a tag, but you may want to index rel="tag" for older posts, and then the first p-name after the h-*

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jgmac1106
jgmac1106

@bradenslen IndieWeb community so small could probably build a feed of everyone and parse and cache. So checkin post you can build a real time "Where in the world is" that uses last Longitude and latitude

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bradenslen
bradenslen

@hope There are a lot. Here are two that caught my eye. WP Fulltext Search this enhances the WP native search without replacing it. I've been happy with it on a convetional blog. I'm not sure if it would work as well on a linkblog. I went with it because it didn't replace the default search in WP only added too it. I was too chicken to completely replace.

Better Search is the other one. It replaces the default WP search function. It sounds pretty good but I haven't tried it.

There are a lot more.

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jgmac1106
jgmac1106

@bradenslen you can then parse read, watch, and listen for media searches and recommendations. Food and drink posts.

I guess just name the search engine, "Privileged"

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jgmac1106
jgmac1106

@jgmac1106 My brother in law built a massive search engine using this open source tool github.com/altamirac... it can handle petabytes of data. We are talking a few gigs max.

Will talk to him at Turkey Day

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bradenslen
bradenslen

@jgmac1106 Hrrm, I'm really just a weekend mechanic. Everything beyond HTML is "High Level Coding" to me, I might understand the theory but not I'm not able to code it. This is more @kicks forte. He know stuff. He reads books. :-)

That said, Greg, you are on to something. That and I still think you could make an awesome linkblog.

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bradenslen
bradenslen

@jenett I keep calling it a "search thing" because the traditional term of "linkblog" does not really describe what you have built with the linkport. "Linkport" is a good term.

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jgmac1106
jgmac1106

@bradenslen same here. I only know a bit of html... It's why I can use microformats

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bradenslen
bradenslen

@jgmac1106 That sounds really cool.

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bradenslen
bradenslen

@jenett It really is a directory, with the added bonus of fresh new links like a traditional linkblog. Win - win.

Good article on daily pointers. I was wondering, why have both? The lack of new sites and lots of URL's going dead were big factors in my pulling the plug on my remaining niche directories back in 2006.

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kicks
kicks

@jenett Cool thread. Getting myself in here. Hi, folks! Joe, amazing site—Linkport. How on earth have you kept the links all intact? I couldn’t seem to find a broken one.

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kicks
kicks

@jenett Wow, you hand-check the whole thing?? Ok, wow, so if you don’t mind I have a few more questions—actually, quite a few more, but I’ll constrain myself! A lot of links I find through just old-school surfing, but there are some tools that are like virtual mines for me. (Google is often useless, because a search for ‘interesting blog’ usually just yields clickbait and I don’t want to just regurgitate that stuff.) What tools or sites have you found most useful for discovering links? Also, is surfing a kind of skill? I mean: finding obscure avenues, well, they are obscure—hard to find by definition! At the same time, having a ‘linkpost’ at least provides an intersection between worlds where people can find each other. Do people find you? Is that just as important as you finding them? And, yeah, since you’ve been doing this for several decades—has linking changed over time? Like: what is modern linking? Also, if you’d rather post your answers as a blog post, I can link to that. Great to meet you—I’m immediately a huge fan!

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Ron
Ron

@kicks @jenett Ditto on all those link Q's. Surely it has required great patience & perseverance over many years.

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hope
hope

@Blot Because I was on a free account. I still am.

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hope
hope

@bradenslen Thanks for those!

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hope
hope

@bradenslen Hmm well I'd like to test both things just for fun.

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hope
hope

@bradenslen As in WP without the link manager plugins, and with one installed. Not sure which one I'll decide on yet lol.

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hope
hope

@bradenslen Worst comes to worst, I'll have a decent index.

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hope
hope

@bradenslen I'm not sure if Known has the extensive search plugins that WP does.

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hope
hope

@jenett Lol it's still being filled as we speak hah.

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hope
hope

@bradenslen Lol I know just about enough to break WP.

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bradenslen
bradenslen

@hope Personally I would pick WP over Known for this. WP has so many plugins that could be useful. For instance I found a dead link checker plugin for WP that would be useful.

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bradenslen
bradenslen

@hope It sounds like you will have a decent index. Even if half are dead links and have to be culled, you will still have a great starting point. This is very cool.

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bradenslen
bradenslen

@hope Same here. I don't think you will have problems with WP.

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hope
hope

@Blot Well, I was afraid of posting too many files and taking up too much space.

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hope
hope

@bradenslen Me neither!

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hope
hope

@bradenslen I'll cull dead links before I do anything, that being said it's going to be a big project!

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hope
hope

@bradenslen Yeah that's going to be useful going forward.

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JohnPhilpin
JohnPhilpin

@hope oooh another blot user ... will add you to my directory later

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hope
hope

@jenett Which feed reader do you use?

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hope
hope

@jenett I myself used to love the blogrolls! Back around 2004-2005 there was a blog on Blogger called Two Things, places and sites of interest. It's how I discovered the unfortunately no longer working 43Things.

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hope
hope

@jenettIt was, in fact a linkblog.

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bradenslen
bradenslen

@hope Culling links: I don't envy you. :-) It's boring and sad when you remember a site that you liked and find it dead.

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hope
hope

@bradenslen Yeah it definitely is! Will start the culling of links Tomorrow.

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hope
hope

@jenett Is Fever still being developed? Also, will it let you view just one individual feed, instead of all the articles at a time? Lol I really don't like my RSS reader to look like Twitter!

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hope
hope

@JohnPhilpin OK cool, will you post me a link?

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JohnPhilpin
JohnPhilpin

@hope there you go

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hope
hope

@JohnPhilpin OK, what's that for?

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hope
hope

@jenett Yeah, it's no longer being developed.

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hope
hope

@JohnPhilpin That's in essence, a blogroll!

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hope
hope

@JohnPhilpinI'm a former blot user. I use WP now.

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JohnPhilpin
JohnPhilpin

@hope had not thought of it like that ...

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JohnPhilpin
JohnPhilpin

@hope oh - sorry to hear that ... will update the 'blog roll'

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JohnPhilpin
JohnPhilpin

@hope if you mean the list ?? i am tracking blot users that are also mb users in the hope that we can help each other with nuances - e.g. right now - O am trying to work out why my blot posts suddenly no longer get posted to MB?

Other blogs I have are cross posting to MB just fine.

Both my blot posts are cross posting to other places not called Micro Blog.

Started around three days ago … and wondering if this has reared its head again .... except other people seem to be posting to MB just fine.

what’s a boy to do!

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JohnPhilpin
JohnPhilpin

@hope and thankyou for the idea - it is now my BLOTROLL 😊

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bradenslen
bradenslen

@JohnPhilpin bonus scooby snacks for term "blotroll".

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hope
hope

@JohnPhilpin Well hmm not sure about that one lol.

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JohnPhilpin
JohnPhilpin

@bradenslen those snacks should be sent to @hope

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jemostrom
jemostrom

@JohnPhilpin sigh, I was quite confused “why does he have a list of BLOT-TROLLS” 🤦🏻‍♂️

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JohnPhilpin
JohnPhilpin

@jemostrom STOP!! 😂

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hope
hope

@JohnPhilpin Lol send chocolate!

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kicks
kicks

@jenett (Joe’s full article is here.) Yes, here we are again—I think what you’re saying is that even a single-line annotation of a link, even just a few words of human curation do wonders when you’re out discovering the world. (Perhaps even more than book recommendations—where we know that at least we can rely on certain publishers and editors to vet their publications—I’m a big fan of the Dalkey Archive[1], for instance—but we have no idea the quality of writings out on the Internet at large and are desperately reliant on these annotations in the field.) Pinboard is doing everything right in that regard—of course, it cribs from Delicious before it—giving hyperlinkers an appropriate amount of meta-dressing to put around their link: tags, description, search tools. However, it misses out on the kind of visual styling and layouts that you, Joe, get to enjoy. (I really like how you batch up links for the day, similar to how h0p3 does it.)

I think another of my lingering questions is: what are we really doing here? When I look at h0p3’s links, he’s trying to catalog his discoveries for the day completely—at least, I don’t think he edits this list. You also mention in your essay that you ‘curate links for my own ongoing use’. Whereas I tend to ‘advertise’ links more, to bring attention to the parts of the web that I want to survive. So it’s more natural for me to work towards a final directory of links, a hub of all the nodes that I want to see connected. I want these individuals to be aware of each other. I see your Linkport as being a type of directory; I wonder to what extent you are doing this as well—and I wonder what kinds of collaborations we could get going between our directories. You do say that ‘people finding me and finding some of my links enjoyable’ is a secondary goal. I guess another angle I keep alluding to is the benefit you give to the authors behind the links you’re publishing—this type of work is a tremendous gift to them. Along these lines: I see link duplication as being an interesting thing—clearly we don’t all just want the same links, but I think it will be interesting to see how much overlap there is. I also really like, for example, when David Crawshaw’s article last week got linked by h0p3, Brad, Eli, other microbloggers—it made me feel like we were trying to send some kind of concentrated transmission to the author—linking as a greeting, links as an invitation.

With time, many personal sites and blogs disappeared from the web as people flocked to the big silos where their content became a heavily monitized commodity. To me, the web had lost much of its soul as people gathered in just a few, huge noise chambers. […] Current trends and a rebirth of personal blogging certainly make the type of curation I do much easier, thank you. Had it not been for that stimulating conversation, I probably would not have been writing this.

It’s interesting to me that the corpypastas (or CorpASAs) had this kind of effect. Because they actually eased publishing and participation for so many people. Facebook is a type of gated community—so I see why it had this kind of effect. But it’s interesting that Twitter and Instagram also dampened the growth of the web. I hazard that perhaps this was simply because their game was best played by their rules—an external link to Twitter wouldn’t show up in your ‘likes’ whereas a like from another tweet was fully realized by the author and the… err… liker. And I don’t want to chalk this up to mere ego—the author and the liker could see each other from across the Internet. And that is valuable. This is also what micro.blog is assisting us with—we have our blogs, but it is a useful capsule pipeline, so that we can get to each other clearly. (This is why I’m not just linking to your blog post and waiting for you to notice somehow—this communication structure that we’re using here is very useful to us, even if I can almost guarantee that this post is going to be flattened into a massive paragraph by micro.blog. No problemo—I’m just glad to have a direct line to you, Joe!)

Regarding another thing Kicks asked about: Aside from evolving html, accessibility, and design standards and practices, I’m really not sure if linking, in general, has changed over the years. I’ve been doing it the same since day one. But that’s just me.

For me, I do find that Webmentions are really enhancing linking—by offering a type of bidirectional hyperlink. I think if they could see widespread use, we’d see a Renaissance of blogging on the Web. Webmentions are just so versatile—you can use them to commment, you an form ad-hoc directories with them, you can identify yourself to a wider community. I really feel like they are a useful modernization. But I like that you are true to the linking you’ve always done. It still works. It’s an ideal that we fell away from I guess.

The Third Policeman, of course! But also: Heartsnatcher by Boris Vian (just my kind of meandering, vexing thing), Writers by Antoine Volodine. And soon I will get into Impressions of Africa by Raymond Roussel. ↩︎

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