Reader Mode
For aesthetic reasons, the site is quite claustrophobic. As part of that, the text is quite small and has low contrast, which can be hard for a lot of people to read.
Because this can be difficult to read, and because I want my site to be easy to use, I created a Reader Mode which is a high contrast, easy to read, distractionless mode. It is better for both serious reading, and for those who need more accessibility on the website. You can enable it by hitting the icon in the upper right hand corner of the page. Those who use screen readers should have their own button available which you cannot see. The website will remember your choice, and all pages on the site will be in this mode.
If you have any trouble with any of the reader features, or have any accessibility requests, please contact me via gmail: sen.otaku, with the subject line "NEOCITIES READER MODE" or "NEOCITIES ACCESSIBILITY". In the email, please let me know if it is a specific page, or the website overall.
My Inspiration
This website was inspired by dense link portals like Yahoo Japan which often feel cramped by Western standards. I tried to take this vibe and crank it up to 10, while adding in a minimalist-kawaii vibe.
While not generally available in reader mode unless they are important to the meaning of the text, I have decorated the website with understated icons. This is another part of minimalist-kawaii.
And finally, as a former twitter addict, I created a "recent thoughts" section where I will share tweet-like thoughts.
On Whether You Should Write
They say you shouldn't write unless you know what you want to say. On the contrary, as many have said, writing is thinking. But I'll say this: You shouldn't write unless you know who you are writing for. Your audience might be yourself, and that's okay. But "The Public" isn't an audience. "The Public" is made of many different audiences, whether that be John Q. Public or Aleister Alchemist or Isaac Intellectual. Who do you want to talk to?
And, on that topic, writing can do more than reach that audience, it can connect you with individual people in it who want to talk about exactly what you are talking about, whose interests you share. Henrik Karlson talks about it in his blog post "A blog post is a very long and complex search query to find fascinating people and make them route interesting stuff to your inbox". And that's who I hope to find, my "fascinating people". Hopefully, I'll write more about what that means in the future.