This was originally published on Substack on April 4, 2025.
Building a Tech Community in Rural Ontario
Our Ontario (Canada) “municipality” spans three small towns and a handful of hamlets, for a total population of around 14,000. Up until the end of last year, I ran a web hosting business, which connected me both to many local businesses and also to other technical people in the area. In mid-2024, I decided to sell my hosting operations, in part to be able to focus on writing, in part to spend more time with in3d.ca (my business centred around 3D printing and related technologies), and in part to spend more time with my family.
I was fortunate enough to be able to transfer my clients to a local web developer, a far better option compared to merging them into one of the big hosting behemoths. Leaving the business also removed the reason to interact with the local community of technical folks, many of whom have become more than just business associates.
Back in February, four of us decided to get together at one of our local microbreweries, to share conversation and pizza. This was rewarding enough that we decided to make it a monthly thing, and to expand the group to other people who were technical and/or worked in the online space. Bad weather forced a cancellation of our March meeting. March also ended with severe weather, an ice storm had most of us without power for a few days, but most of us managed to get out yesterday for meeting number two.
Aside from more great conversation, the meeting resulted in a plan to include some of the other breweries in the area (we’re blessed with four within a 25 minute drive of each other), to set up a mailing list, and to invite others as we discover them.
In terms of personal impact, John Charlton, a web developer who is retiring into photography mentioned that he’s been posting his work here on substack. Aside from touting the features of this platform (which have convinced me to give this a try). He expressed some surprise that it was his writing that garnered the most positive feedback. I’ve read a few of his posts and I can say I’m not surprised. His writing appears effortless, in many cases it’s a small scale travelogue, as he takes you through a day of image-making, along with many excellent photographs. Highly recommended.
Dumb Passwords
For the past few months, I’ve been compiling the “Dumb Password Report”, an analysis of the passwords hackers have been using to try to gain access to my sites. I say the report is terrifying because I see attempts that closely match some of the passwords my hosting customers have tried to use over the years. Last night I prepared the Dumb Password Report for March. Check it out, especially if you think something like “Admin2024@” counts as a good password!
Advertising on Facebook
This morning I’m clearing a little backlog of unread emails. Of note today is David Gaughran’s newsletter (davidgaughran.com), who generously offers detailed advice on promoting books through Facebook. By generously, I mean there’s no up-sell, no bait and switch (“for the full story, [buy/subscribe/etc.].”). He does have books on the subject that can be purchased for a reasonable price, but half the time his newsletter doesn’t even mention them. I think his revenue model is landing big launch deals from major publishers, so putting all this information out there is demonstrating his expertise. He must be a thorn in the side for a group of “experts” who are selling “crack the code” workshops for significant fees. Especially since feedback from other authors is that those thousand dollar courses are often so outdated that they do more harm than good. Facebook is nothing if not a moving target.
I used to follow his emails closely, extracting everything I could from each, making notes. This has been moderated by three factors. Most importantly, I’m not sure Facebook is a great place to reach Science Fiction readers. It looks like a decent place for Fantasy, a great place for Romance, self-help, travel and the like. Then there’s their AI targeting push. They have made it extremely difficult for an advertiser to control who sees their ad, and naturally their “AI” biases toward larger audiences, which means more revenue for them, less efficiency for the advertiser. No thanks! And lastly, the change in Meta’s moderation policies. It’s one thing to keep an account there, to have an author page, but it’s quite another to actively support the thing by advertising there. When seeking a balance between my need to get visibility for my work and the desire to not fund a toxic platform, I’m leaning heavily toward spending my money elsewhere.
Yardwork
The arrival of spring and the aforementioned ice storm have left us with much work to do outside the house. There is a daunting list of projects. So much so that I won’t even begin to list them for fear of wanting to give up. On the list for just today is levelling some ground behind our garage, in anticipation of a new firewood storage bin, a trip to the dump to get rid of the debris that was formerly in that space, and tackling the dismantling of an old deck, the next step in clearing out part of the yard. It is a warm, sunny day and I need to get to it.
Thanks for reading this far!
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