A Quick Anniversary Note
Today somehow marks 20 years of writing/editing/designing/producing kottke.org as my full-time job (and almost 27 years in total).1 Here’s part of what I wrote five years ago to mark the 15th anniversary:
It seemed like madness at the time — I’d quit my web design job a few months earlier in preparation, pro blogs existed (Gawker was on its 3rd editor) but very few were personal, general, and non-topical like mine, and I was attempting to fund it via a then-largely-unproven method: crowdfunding. As I wrote on Twitter the other day, attempting this is “still the most bonkers I-don’t-know-if-this-is-going-to-work thing I’ve ever done”.
Thanks to everyone for reading and for all the support over the years.
- I texted a friend yesterday: My website is older than Doechii. (It’s somehow been around for more than a quarter of the entire lifetime of the New Yorker magazine. And almost 11% of the age of the United States of America, which it might outlast who knows?)↩
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Happy anniversary! So grateful for all the amazing work you do here.
Jason, congratulations on twenty years and thank you! I do not wish to know what my life would be like without kottke.org for the last two decades. Thank you, parasocial brother.
Wooooo!
Happy anniversary!
My uncle told me about this site some time c. 2002 when I was late in high school. I’m very grateful for the content over the years. This was really my introduction to blogs (along with mikeindustries at the time). Thanks and keep it up!!
🍾🎉
It’s an institution! Love that you’re still around keeping the web good.
Congratulations and thank you for being one of the best sites on the net for ... forever.
my favorite place on the net, congratulations, Jason
🎉🎉 yesssssss 🎉🎉
I think I must have been following you almost since the beginning in that case... Thank you for twenty years of interesting links that have enriched my life!
Wouldn't be doing what I do without what you do. Which, on reflection, is perhaps not a net positive outcome. Still, that is a staggering milestone, congratulations!x
💞
Congratulations!
Thank you so much for continuing to provide the best website/blog/linkblog in the world!
Congratulations: 20 years is an impressive accomplishment! Look forward to you continuing what you do.
Congratulations and thank you!
Congratulations Jason! Truly stellar (heh) work you are doing here. Thank you!
Congratulations!
Feels like a muted celebration, maybe because of current events. You shouldn't let that hold you back; it's a remarkable milestone. Thanks for the insightful, funny, serious, thought-provoking content you brought us over the last 20 years.
One of the great, original websites. Congrats! May it continue to have a long and healthy life.
I’ve been following you since before I left New York City to work for Amnesty Intl in Latin America —that was 2004. Your website kept me feeling like I was still who I was before I decided to change everything. “I only own two pairs of shoes, but I still read kottke!”
Ironically and wrongly, I’ve only recommended your website to others twice: during the early days of the pandemic and now. In the past 72 hours, I’ve told at least a dozen people to come here when they say that doomscrolling is killing them. “Don’t turn it off, just find a way to tune in more intentionally—or let Jason do it for you.”
I also give you credit for The Kid Should See This which I was obsessed with before I had a kid, thanks to you.
Happy Birthday, KDO.
And wow, Jason. You get the patch for bravery today and everyday because you really did it!
Love,
All your Parasocial Peeps
A fine thing! Congratulations on 20 years and thanks for bringing us along on the joy. 💙
Thank you for the joy.
🚀🎉🥳
Congrats! 20 is the new something.
Congratulations! Thank you for helping make the internet something other human beings can still relate to.
Congratulations and thank you. You remain one of the few enshittified places on the web, which is saying a lot.
Amazing. I blogged about you going full time when it happened, and it’s funny to read now. Felt like such a wild concept. (I talk about donating to Kottke.) I had also forgotten just how annoyed people were.
You doing KDO full-time is as old this year as The Breakfast Club was when you started doing KDO full-time.
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