...of 2010

2010 was an incredibly busy year for me on every front, and there hasn't been nearly enough time to do even a tenth of what I wanted to do. Family life and work, of course, took precedence over everything else, leaving precious few opportunities to explore personal projects and to simply kick back and play games, watch movies, read and reflect.

The following 'Best of 2010' list, therefore, is full of gaping holes but represents what I did have time for -- and enjoyed -- in the year that passed. Hopefully it'll inspire some of you to seek out Cool Shit that you otherwise might have missed. That, after all, is why we make lists like this, and I hope some of you will add your own favourites in the comments below.

See you all in 2011!

Click to read more ...

Late to the party, again

I honestly didn't see this story until now

Secret World Twitter accounts offer clues

which, when you think about it, isn't so strange given the lack of TSW related news since September. I haven't been looking. And neither, I suspect, have you.

Let's just say that my website returning is a sign of things to come.

As for the story above, slow news day or not, it's interesting to see how the secrets we strive to protect find ways to leak out. Even when it's not our doing. Remember: There is no conspiracy. It's all true.

A bit of housekeeping

Right. For some reason the system ate my first long draft of this post, so this time around I'm sticking to the basics.

Welcome! The site is live -- currently only via 'www.ragnartornquist.com', and not via 'ragnartornquist.com'; a bit odd, that, but I guess it'll sort itself out. There are already comments, though from today onwards you'll need to register to post. None of us like spam, and there's a lot of potential spammers. Your email address will be shared with no one, and you'll only ever receive missives from us if something really, really exciting happens.

I had a whole big explanation written about why I chose to go with Squarespace rather than a self-operated (or volunteer operated) site but that's all gone now. It all boils down to three things: Security, time and control. And I will probably still need to accept those graciously extended hands to help out with a bunch of things, like importing all the old Wordpress content, for example, and modifying the look and feel of the site.

This is very much a Work In Progress, but rather than waiting until every little detail was sorted out, I decided to push the site out before Christmas and tinker with it in the months to come. Expect changes. Lots and lots of changes.

Have fun, make yourself at home, and please don't break anything!

UPDATE: Registration is currently not enabled. It will be enabled as soon as Squarespace recognises my account settings. For the time being, you can comment without logging in.

Update on Thursday, December 23, 2010 at 15:52 by Ragnar Tornquist

It seems, unfortunately, that my current monthly plan does not allow for registered users, which means that I need to keep comments open to everyone -- for the time being. Obviously, if we start getting a lot of spam -- or trolling -- this will have to change.

Happy Cthristmas!

This means something.
 

Performance anxiety

After nearly a year of no long-form blogging, I find it somewhat daunting to be stepping back into the light and facing my audience in this format. Tweeting is cheating -- it's just too easy -- but with Twitter, Facebook and Tumblr (amongst others) taking centre stage and pushing the crusty old blogs aside, it's going to be a real challenge to make this journal work again.

But work it shall, and with the move to Squarespace we'll have put Indonesian hackers behind us -- we hope -- and face a bright new future.

Right. That's the first post sorted. It'll be easier from here on in. I hope.