Patreon's recent debacle¹ kicked me out of my shy and retiring mode and prompted me to offer listeners alternative ways to support my podcast. In a sense I am lucky, because the podcast lives on a WordPress-powered website, which means that there are many different options to do that. And in an sense I am unlucky, because ditto.

It has been an interesting month, not least because on 11 November I pledged to be more alive to recording and reviewing my activities. This is the result, a few days late. Interesting too because I was away for 10 days, attending the memorial service for my PhD supervisor, swanning around (very) old haunts and spending time with my family. A good break.

On and off I take to heart the old adage about not being able to manage what you don't measure, and I think I'm about to swing into the on ramp again. This all started with an interesting post by Lukas Rosenstock at his Self-Improvement Blog. In a way it is just another of those monthly reviews that many people do, and which I read with a mixture of awe, guilt and imposterdom. How do people achieve that much? Why don't I do as much? Who am I kidding? This one was a bit different because Lukas mentioned three pieces of software that seemed intriguing and new to me: RescueTime, Focus Booster and Exist.

A paper just published in Nature Geoscience has terrific news for anyone worried about the sustainability of agriculture.¹ It should be possible to grow 10% more calories and 19% more protein while simultaneously using 14% less rainwater and 12% less irrigation water. And that, the authors say "would feed an additional 825 million people".

Interest in the IndieWeb appears to have upticked ever so slightly over the past couple of weeks, which may be why I've noticed so many more posts about how and why people are posting to their own sites and their various social presences. I meant to weigh in much sooner on some of them.