Links
- A free year of a .lol domain - make your own website, hosted anywhere you like. Mine is Linkage.lol
- Membership in Social.lol - a Mastodon community based on respect for all including the LGBT community, POC and the neurodivergent. That's where I have my account and I've met some of the coolest people I've ever encountered on the Internet, and I've been online for a long time. There is also a Discord server.
- An email address - username@omg.lol, which is cool as hell anyway you look at it. Get it forwarded to an existing email account. It's so easy
- A bio page like mine - Amerpie
- A /now page like this - Amerpie/now
- A status log that can cross post to Mastodon and be embedded in a web page
- A photo gallery for sharing photos and embedding them in your web site
- Would you believe there is more? Go have a look!
I have updated my /now page - What I’m reading and watching, plus links to this week’s blog posts, the week’s best purchase, and the links I added to my personal bookmarks.
This Week's Bookmarks - Best Horror Movies, Aerial Photos of Junkyards, Digital Decluttering, Chili Recipe, Food Trends for 2025, Fly with One Bag, Messages for Life
The 100 Best Horror Movies of All Time: Critics' Pick
Aerial photos of scrapyards and arranged the junked cars, planes, trains, and other objects_
Digital decluttering – alexwlchan
White Chicken Chili (BEST EVER!) - Cooking Classy
Whole Foods predicts the major food and beverage trends of 2025 | Food Dive
How to Fly With Only a Personal Item—Plus Our 3 Favorite Small Bags (2024) | WIRED
Messages for Life are short, inspirational emails that have been brightening my days. They arrive only on weekday mornings and always contain a positive message, like reminders to slow down, relax, celebrate yourself, and play. These messages convey a lot of wisdom in a very natural and relatable way. They feel like love letters from the Universe.
Online Communities of the Past and Present
Although I used a local BBS and AOL chat rooms back in the day, the first online community I ever found a home in was at Epinions, a dotcom company that paid you to write reviews of commercial goods, including books and albums. You could use HTML to dress up what you wrote, so there was a small but satisfying thrill in learning how to be good at that. As usual, they had an off-topic category too, where you could write about whatever you wanted, and I contributed there all the time. People could follow you and send you private messages. I eventually outgrew it, but I tried to find a guy from there recently, after 27 years, and I succeeded because he's still using the same unique username.
When I had a Geocities website, part of it was dedicated to Vietnam veterans and their kids. I corresponded with quite a few men and women who were eager to have someone to talk with about their experiences. I live near a giant army base, so all the vets I know have comrades-in-arms everywhere they go, but the 18-year-old who got drafted from Iowa in 1967 and did his year in hell didn't always have that, and I was glad to hear them out, publish their stories, and generally just be as supportive as I could.
I was in some great bicycling forums around the turn of the century, one of which still sends me birthday greetings every year. I went as far as Georgia to meet folks from there for an organized ride.
For a few years, believe it or not, I took part in the local newspaper's community forum, which was mostly a cesspool of name-calling and ad hominem attacks on liberals. I'd write outrageously provocative stuff about W. Bush and his wars just to stir up the flag wavers. They doxed me regularly, and the woman I was married to absolutely hated me going on there. After a while, it wasn't fun anymore, so I stopped.
When I hiked the Appalachian Trail, I kept an online journal every single day and posted to a website called Trail Journals. As a result, I had people up and down the East Coast who wrote to us and visited us on the trail. It wasn't unusual to meet trail groupies who knew all kinds of our fellow hikers from reading their journals. More than a decade later, I am still in touch with people I first met through that journal.
Then we enter the long dark winter of the soul—Facebook was all there was. I never really used Twitter for anything other than news, so I didn't find much social about it. My Facebook experience is much the same as many folks. In 2008, it was a place to keep up with friends and family and to reconnect with people from the past. Today, it's the same toxic hellscape for me as it is for everyone else. I mostly stay there to see pictures of my grandkids. In 2017, I had a viral post that caused me to get literally thousands of friend requests, many of which I accepted for the hell of it. I met plenty of cool people, including a friend I eventually met in Derry, Northern Ireland.
My experience on the IndieWeb since I joined micro.blog in January has been my favorite experience out of all of them. In 10 months, I've posted more on Mastodon than I did on Twitter in 15 years. I have three accounts on different servers. I closed my Twitter account too, not wanting to send any traffic to what is essentially the Nazi Bar of the Internet. I am a happy customer of OMG.LOL, 500.social, and Onephoto.club. Aside from Micro.blog, I also use Scribbles and BearBlog.
I have accounts on Instagram, Threads, BlueSky, Pinterest, Nostr, Pixelfed, Farcaster, and Tumblr, but I use them mostly to syndicate what I write on my blogs.
I do love Reddit, where I've had an account for nearly 19 years, despite its checkered past. Syndicating AppAddict there has driven lots of traffic to my website. Earlier this year, I volunteered to become a moderator of r/macOS, a subreddit with over 300K members. That's been interesting. I get a chance to help out newbies and to stamp out some toxicity, so what it lacks in actual fun, it makes up in satisfaction.
Enjoyed it? Please upvote 👇
Make Your Internet Better Today
Make Your Internet Better Today - A free service can block ads and malware before it ever gets to your computer. Start using it today. I did. - linkage.lol/make-your…
This Week's Bookmarks - Grocery Prices Worldwide, Wildlife Photo Winners, The Truth about Media Lies, Stranger's Project, Content Creators vs. Journalists, 2004 the 1st Year of the Future, Great Talk from XOXO Conference
OMG.LOL is the Best Thing on the Internet
OMG.LOL is the Best Thing on the Internet - The community at OMG.LOL along with the services offered are the best thing on the Internet. - linkage.lol/omglol-is…
OMG.LOL is the Best Thing on the Internet
When I first started investigating blogging, I was heavily influenced by a British fellow by the name of Robb Knight. One of the many things he recommended for folks looking to involve themselves in this thing called the IndyWeb was a $20 a year membership in the web community found at OMG.LOL Describing what you get for that is kind of hard, but I'll give it a shot:
I have four blogs on three different platforms and I use elements of OMG.LOL in conjunction with all of them. If all this sounds cool to you but you simply can't afford it, message Adam, the guy who runs the place, and you might qualify for a scholarship sponsored By a caring member of the community. If you can afford it, great, sign up using my referral link, and I promise to use the benefits to help someone come onboard.
Enjoyed it? Please upvote 👇
📝 Doing the Best We Can - For once, pop psychology gets it right. We are doing the best we can do with what we have to work with. - louplummer.lol/doing-the…
Bump Up Your Meme Game
Bump Up Your Meme Game - A good meme says a lot. Here are some famous ones to study and a website to make your own. - linkage.lol/bump-up-y…
📝 Blogs Are Not Commodities - The blogs I like are building blocks of something beautiful and heartfelt, not optimized, market driven revenue generators - louplummer.lol/blogs-are…
Cardinals at the Window - A Benefit Album for Western North Carolina
Cardinals at the Window - A Benefit Album for Western North Carolina - An album featuring 136 artists costing only $10 is available with the proceeds benefitting hurricane victims in Western, NC. - linkage.lol/cardinals…
📝 Quit Being Paranoid - Being cautious is a survival skill. Being paranoid is just an annoying personality trait. - louplummer.lol/quit-bein…
Can I Trust This App
Can I Trust This App - Learning how to determine whether software is trustworthy is a 21st century survival skill. - linkage.lol/can-i-tru…
📝 What Is Your Love Language? - In what way do you like to be shown you are loved? - louplummer.lol/what-is-y…
Death Row Last Meals
Death Row Last Meals - The last meals of convicted criminals have long fascinated us. What would you ask for? - linkage.lol/death-row…
John Wayne Gacy’s Last Meal
Just How Much Cocaine Was in Coca Cola?
Just How Much Cocaine Was in Coca Cola? - You’ve heard the tales about Coke. have you ever looked into them? - linkage.lol/just-how-…
This Week's Bookmarks - Human/Animal Hybrids, Internet Forums, Generational Labels, Book Finder, Hurricane Propaganda, Panoramic Photo Awards,
Forums Are Still Alive, Active, And A Treasure Trove Of Information - Aftermath
What generation am I? A full breakdown of the years (and names)
Find book recommendations based on your favorite authors
From the Storm to the Stormtroopers - by Timothy Snyder
Panographic Photo Awards for 2024
Donald Trump Is the Tyrant George Washington Feared - The Atlantic
North Carolina's Beaches
North Carolina’s Beaches - The 300 miles of southern coastline along North Carolina’s shores and beautiful and affordable. - linkage.lol/north-car…
Great List of Apple News, Tips and tricks from u/TheCallOfTheRooster on Reddit
A thread on r/MacOS, a group I help moderate on Reddit, included a pretty good list or resources today. Plug these into your RSS reader and you’ll be sure to keep up with all the latest Apple, iPhone and Mac news.
https://9to5mac.com - Apple news and rumors galore.
https://macrumors.com - the Goliath of Apple news and rumors, the one, the only, MacRumors.
https://appleinsider.com - long-running rumors and news site, got subpoenaed by Apple in 2006 for publishing leaks (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_v._Does](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_v._Does)).
https://tidbits.com - “the longest-running Internet technology publication”, Apple coverage since 1990.
https://cultofmac.com - been around for ages, published by popular Apple book author, good mishmash of Apple stuff.
https://osxdaily.com - great Apple tips and tutorials site, been around since 2006.
https://macobserver.com - born in 1998, nice bit of everything Apple.
https://idownloadblog.com - since 2008, probably the best source of jailbreaking info around.
https://iphonehacks.com - around since 2007, iPhone and jailbreak focus.
https://mjtsai.com/blog/](https://mjtsai.com/blog/) - comprehensive link-out site and interesting insight, from an Apple developer perspective.
https://mrmacintosh.com/blog/](https://mrmacintosh.com/blog/) - Mac admin focused, useful for enterprise and troubleshooting.
https://www.macstories.net - heavy iPad and automation focus, if you like Shortcuts this is your place.
https://sixcolors.com - MacWorld alumn and good insight.
https://www.loopinsight.com - MacWorld alumn, mostly a link-out site.
https://daringfireball.net - insight from John Gruber, a well-connected Apple fan.
https://macworld.com - born in 1984! The original Mac magazine.
https://appleworld.today - spun off from TUAW, remember TUAW?
https://www.iphoneincanada.ca - for the Canadian Apple fans out there.
https://appadvice.com/](https://appadvice.com/) - App focused and app reviews.
https://www.patentlyapple.com - digging into Apple patents, offers clues into the direction Apple is thinking.
https://objective-see.com/blog.html](https://objective-see.com/blog.html) - deep insight into Mac malware.
https://lowendmac.com - Got an old Mac or two laying around? This is the site for you.
https://forums.macrumors.com - probably the best Apple focused forums on the web (other than reddit, of course).
https://www.bloomberg.com/authors/AS7Hj1mBMGM/mark-gurman](https://www.bloomberg.com/authors/AS7Hj1mBMGM/mark-gurman) - stories from the ace Apple rumor reporter out there, Mark Gurman.
https://developer.apple.com/news/](https://developer.apple.com/news/) - Apple developer news, straight from the horses mouth.
https://www.apple.com/newsroom/](https://www.apple.com/newsroom/) - Apple PR newsroom.
https://512pixels.net - Good Apple hobbyist site.
https://eclecticlight.co - Mac troubleshooting oriented.
https://macdailynews.com/](https://macdailynews.com/) - Long-running Apple news aggregator.
https://www.aboveavalon.com - focuses on Apple financials.
https://arstechnica.com/civis/viewforum.php?f=19&sid=b86f431b9a5406eeb1452afc73d7096a](https://arstechnica.com/civis/viewforum.php?f=19&sid=b86f431b9a5406eeb1452afc73d7096a) - ArsTechnica Mac forums
📝 When You Don’t Have a Stop Button - What it is like living with a personality that never gets enough of anything pleasurable. - louplummer.lol/when-you-…