Yearly Blog Update 2021

It's that time of year again. I need to reevaluate my online presence and make a few changes. This won't be my biggest year for changes, but there are at least some worth mentioning. I am also looking at a few changes in the background that are not worth mentioning.

Random Rants and Ramblings
I started my series of Short Stories as a means of pushing myself outside of my comfort zone regarding creativity. When I look at my work, I see little if any value in making these public. I still see some value in writing, but I'm moving this project from public to private. I will likely make some changes to my approach as well, but this will only become relevant if I ever have a reason to make these public again.

I should also mention that I have seen some bizarre interpretations of things that I have written online. I will probably start adding some clarifications that should be unnecessary. For example, if I say anything against the Democrats, I might explicitly state that this is not the same thing as supporting Republicans.

The War Between Schooling and Education
This is perhaps where my biggest change will occur. I have found someone online that is interested in contributing. I have granted this new user permission on both my Blogger accounts, but it will primarily focus on the education blog.

Ever since I started my blog about the war between schooling and education, I have strictly focused on the pro-education side of the war. This new user will provide counterpoints and take the pro-schooling side. For those who maintain anti-educational/pro-schooling values, don't get too excited. As hinted with a single word in the last paragraph, this contributor I found openly admits to being a fictitious entity. As such, some of its arguments might not be compelling. This user will be introducing itself in a couple of days.

Twitter
On a related note, I have been playing around with an idea on Twitter that I hope will make my presence a little less tedious. I have made it a personal rule that I can't explicitly state what I'm doing, but I can lead people to the answer. I have already intentionally embedded a number of clues. If you pay attention, some of these clues should make it incredibly obvious.

Although I have been trying to improve my Twitter presence, I have to admit that I have mixed feelings about the platform. In particular, I'm not sold on the community. I have found a few good accounts to follow, but most responses to my comments seem to rely on faulty assumptions. Over the next year, I will look at the pros and cons of maintaining this presence. I was originally going to limit my focus, but I don't want to keep myself from Tweeting certain pictures (and maybe videos). I will scale some things back a bit. This will include recording who I currently follow (if I want to add them back) and starting fresh in that regard. I will more likely look for Tweets to share and reply to rather than read those fed to me.

Tumblr
My Tumblr account right now includes nothing but posts of old pictures I have taken. I momentarily considered moving these to Twitter, but I decided to hold off for now. I want to see how things work for 2021 first. For now, I will continue these photo posts and nothing else.

Flickr
There are no changes that I'm currently considering for my Flickr account.

eBird
Because I am scaling back usage of my Twitter account, I am no longer Tweeting any eBird checklists. I have also been holding off on listing any birds that could increase traffic to my birding locations until the pandemic has eased up a bit.

Nature Log
My nature log came to a screeching halt this year. When the state pushed lockdowns, I did not want them to close off the areas in which I went walking. I have continued to track some of my more noteworthy sightings, but none of them have been posted to my nature log. Once things improve, I will add summaries for this timeframe. Like eBird, I will not be Tweeting updates.