Cool to see a link to Ran's writing on here. I've followed his blog for something like 12+ years. I'm pretty sure his writings were some of my first exposure to

Cool to see a link to Ran's writing on here. I've followed his blog for something like 12+ years. I'm pretty sure his writings were some of my first exposure to the ideas of dropping out, primitivist philosophy, and FIRE (were people calling it FIRE back then)? I kept coming back to his site because he always seemed to offer viewpoints on things I'd never considered or seen others say. He could distill long articles down into a few articulate ideas that really made me think in new ways and turned my brain on. He had quite an influence on my own personal journey in life. I was already becoming quite dissatisfied with a life in tech, cranking out code for companies I didn't care about, when I found his blog in my mid 20s. I got pretty hooked on a lot of the more hardcore philosophy around dropping out, primitivism, homesteading, etc. I also became fixated on the idea of saving/investing and retiring early, and that formed my main life goal for nearly a decade. I did manage to FIRE and mellowed out a lot on the more radical ideas of dropping out, and developed a more balanced view towards tech instead of disdain for it. The world is complicated, and the idea of just dropping all tech and going back to the past sounds so silly and infantile to me now, but I guess it comforted me in a time of existential dread. Anyway, not sure why I'm launching into a story of my life here, just felt nostalgic seeing this link up on HN today.