If you're a regular viewer to my website, you've probably noticed that this is a new layout. In fact, you may have even noticed that this is its seventh (7th) unique layout.

My very first website was hosted by Neocities. This current layout is actually the most similar to that first design. It was very obvious that I was a beginner, but it gave it a nice retro vibe.

I then redesigned my website, keeping it in my typical theme, but moving to a more modern layout. Then I did it again. And Again. And again. And a few more times...

My goal was to be able to have a website that was more familiar to other websites, but still kept my style. I did that well, I think.

Eventually, I created a landing page with Webflow centered around commissioning or hiring me. This was a completely unique design--that of which lasted two (2) months. I honestly can't remember what made me rush to make this decision. I think I just hadn't worked on my old website for so long, and I eventually wanted to introduce server-side code into it, but Neocities is a static website. I felt Webflow was my only option, having used it before with another company.

But that wasn't the direction either.

I pushed it off for a little while...

But I eventually knew what the next step was. I needed to make my website my own--my hub.

I knew something had to change first, though. Something big. Something that had been bothering me for weeks, months--for years.

Deleting My Discord Server

Only a week or so before writing this, I deleted my Discord server known as HYPERSPACE. (That name will not go unused, I am a big fan of it still.)

I had been ruminating over the idea of deleting it for over a year, and the last month of its lifespan really kept pushing me. It was not something I liked.

Don't get me wrong, though, I love community management. But the dynamic between a creator and a fan is so unique to me. It wasn't something I was comfortable with building an entire community based around. It created a lot of meaningless drama, it gave me a lot of anxiety, and it was too much work for something that didn't feel like it was truly benefiting me.

After all, the biggest benefits from it were things I had already figured out how to replace--and the solution to that was this website. I knew where I wanted to go for so long, I just never did it.

I finally pulled the plug after awhile. I talked to several friends about it, and it made me realize that instead of just dreading it and letting it stay stagnant, I need to rip the Band-Aid off now. I knew I was going to delete it. I didn't know when, because I never said when. So I decided that when was now.

The New Website

This website is built from scratch using Kotlin, HTML, CSS, and JS. The very barebones.

I enjoyed making a static website with Neocities more than I did building a templated website with Webflow. But Neocities had limitations when it came to server-sided code.

After I built a basic dashboard for my Discord bot using Ktor, I learned enough about it that I made this website in less than a week. It has its kinks I have to work out, but otherwise it's working quite well right now (just don't look at it on mobile...).

I built an entire system for me to write this blog in Obsidian and just use Github to push it to the website.

This blog will be my new medium for announcements, and I'll be adding an RSS feed to it soon for those that want to subscribe to updates. I'll also use it to write really whatever I want--random nonsense thoughts, opinions, stories, etc. You'll see it all.

I think now that I have a website fully from scratch, it gives me the freedom to do so much more with it. So you can expect a lot more than what you see now.