This isn't really first blog post ever, but on this date in 2003 I started Eyeteeth -- with a swell name and tagline, if I do say so myself, and little idea what I was doing. "Blog," with its oafish AWWW sound, still seemed like kind of a stupid word, and I often shied away from using it in conversation. (I fancied I'd started an online magazine instead.) My posts were all over the place -- rants about George W. Bush, links on organic agriculture or contemporary art or Star Wars LEGO kits, etc. -- and the technology wasn't great. Blogger had no image hosting, and I hadn't heard of Flickr (or maybe it wasn't invented yet), so I couldn't have swiped this image of the Millennium Falcon if I wanted to.
But it was a start, and through it I ended up achieving what I'd wanted: demystifying online publishing for myself and establishing a practice of daily writing and research. Eventually, my content started making sense. I began focusing, more out of interest than any well-defined strategy, on intersections. Between politics and art, activism and media. It was like what I'd sought to find in jobs -- editing at Adbusters, writing at the Walker, and freelancing on politics -- all peacefully coexisted in one place.
For one marketing-minded friend that focus was still too broad, but I figured: hell, no one gets paid on the internet, so I'm doing what I want.
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