7 ms·
Show HN: A Handwritten Blogging Platform
The idea is a place for beautiful notes like https://insidevoices.handwritten.blog https://insidevoices.handwritten.blog.
- cmbza 2mo agoHi Emile I like the concept too. People are losing the ability to read handwritten letters and notes. I'm just curious, how does this all work? Can I simply take a photo of a page?
- emilesilvis 2mo agoHi cmbza - yes, you take a photo, which you can then upload through the site or email to a publish address.
- suls 2mo agoVery cool, maybe add a more prominent header link to https://handwritten.blog/how-it-works https://handwritten.blog/how-it-works. I had to read the comments here to find it
- emilesilvis 2mo agoGood idea!
- arlattimore 2mo agoReminds me of tinyprojects.dev Paper Website project from 2021 https://paperwebsite.com/ https://paperwebsite.com/
- emilesilvis 2mo agoInteresting, thanks for sharing.
- chrismorgan 2mo agoI was very disappointed, when that happened, that the paper aspect of it was purely at authoring time; that it was converted into text. This one gets it right, preserving the handwriting aspect.
- MitPitt 2mo agohuh that website looks like it was generated with Claude just yesterday or something
- bpev 2mo agoI mean, LLMs are just imitating prior work, no? Poor designer probably feels like the people who liked using em dashes.
- brudgers 2mo agoSimilar but for typists, https://onetypedpage.com/ https://onetypedpage.com/
- emilesilvis 2mo agoInteresting, thank you for sharing!
- 2349pm 2mo agoMight be missing something but I expected a way to browse the blogs - maybe even a 'random blog' link!
- emilesilvis 2mo agoI have a "discovery feed" on the backlog, but people would need to opt in for their blogs to appear there in any case.
- donut 2mo agoReminds me of E. W. Dijkstra's digitized hand-written manuscripts: https://www.cs.utexas.edu/~EWD/index13xx.html https://www.cs.utexas.edu/~EWD/index13xx.html
- emilesilvis 2mo agoIndeed!
- krehwell 2mo agoi really like this. my issue is usually i read while selecting so my eyes follow which unfortunately the website won't support
- emilesilvis 2mo agoYeah I can imagine that's tricky to do in this case. Maybe I can think of something.
- vishnukvmd 2mo agoThis is beautiful!
- emilesilvis 2mo agoThank you!
- altmanaltman 2mo agoWho is this for though? As a writer, a lot of times I am writing over 5,000 words in a single article. I can type at around 170 wpm but my wrist starts hurting the moment I write more than three pages in my journal. I also use a split ergonomic keyboard which helps my hands a lot. I also revise my writing heavily which is very hard to do with handwritten stuff. For readers, it will maybe be a novelty but I don't really see why anyone will prefer reading content that is handwritten since it has a lot of accessibility problems which are solved with proper typesetting. I could see the value if it was a collection of interesting notes or unique handwriting styles etc. But i don't think its usuable as a blogging platform imo
- nextlevelwizard 2mo agoBlog posts don’t need to be 5000 words nor do you need to write them on one sitting (or under 30 minutes). For wrist fatigue having better paper and pen help a lot, but part of it is just using the muscles and not having a death grip. This being said I don’t like that this is hand writing with a device. It just isn’t the same as actual physical media.
- altmanaltman 2mo agoYeah they don't need to be. But what about revising and editing? You will just straight up write the perfect thing in first go? What about accesibility for the reader? And yeah I can learn how to write better with my hand but i can also learn how to be a swordfighter. But I don't see how that should be a prerequisite for a blogging platform. I am not saying nobody will ever like this. But as someone who has used blogging platforms for a long time to be considered a power user, the stated comment was my prespective.
- nextlevelwizard 2mo agoNot everything needs to be catered to you. If you dont like it then go away. There are literally thousands of blogging platforms for you to choose from. Just worrying about having it be perfect already tells where the actual problem is. Everything doesn't need to be polished or edited or perfect. Things can be fun and loose and whimsical. Sure some people can't read my hand writing or they are blind and they can't get to my content, that is life. Again my enjoyment is paramount, not some potential reader. You should be writing for yourself.
- rgovostes 2mo agoIronically, "No feeds. No algorithms. No likes." reads like copy that is, well, not handwritten.
- emilesilvis 2mo agoI can assure you it was written by my own hand (but appreciate it might sound like marketing - perhaps I can change it a bit so it sounds more natural :)
- kinlan 2mo agoI think the implication was that an LLM generated the text (which isn't an issue for me even if it was.) That all being said, I love this project and I love how you're exploring linking in other mediums. I tried to do other linking demos via https://aifoc.us/hypermedia/ https://aifoc.us/hypermedia/ - it's something we don't do anywhere near enough
- emilesilvis 2mo agoFair enough, I might have gotton some help from an LLM with the copy! Thank you!
- satvikpendem 2mo agoIronic.
- emilesilvis 2mo agoMarketing is not my strong suit, so I use all the help I can get.
- est 2mo agoWell I hoped it was some kind of SVG with alt text for copy. Turns out it's just a webp.
- emilesilvis 2mo agoIntersting idea!
- purple-leafy 2mo agoHow about a blog that contains its entire source code inline in the blog itself? [0] [0] - https://mjwg6zy.blog/ https://mjwg6zy.blog/ Such that copy pasting its contents reconstructs the blog byte for byte
- emilesilvis 2mo agoThis is cool - I love quines!
- purple-leafy 2mo agoHeh thank you, more to come. Cool blog btw
- slicendice 2mo agoFantastic idea! I think the hardest part for people to adopt this will be overcoming atrophied handwriting skills and no autocorrect. One thing that doesn't seem clear to me from reading without signing up is how do you actually upload content? Do you have to have paper and pen and then take a picture of it, or do you provide some kind of excalidraw-like canvas for writing? I notice there isn't any paper background or line rules, which I think would also be nice for those who fancy a bit of structure when reading/writing.
- emilesilvis 2mo agoThanks! This is good feedback. Yes, you can upload a photo through the backend, or just email it to a publish email address. Good idea about the line rules and paper background - this could land as "theming" in the future.
- jonas21 2mo agoI love that the comments on some of the posts (like this one) are written by hand too! https://handwritten.danieljanus.pl/2022-10-01-hyperlinks-in-handwriting.html https://handwritten.danieljanus.pl/2022-10-01-hyperlinks-in-...
- emilesilvis 2mo agoThis is actually not on handwritten.blog, but on the site of the person where I got the original idea from! Maybe I can incorporate something like this on handwritten.blog too (e.g. a way for people to send in comments via email).
- 8by3 2mo agohttps://tuhat.net https://tuhat.net has comments via email, but only when responding to a newsletter post. Then the replies are put in the authors letter inbox connected to the post. Though all comments are private to the original author.
- emilesilvis 2mo agoThanks for sharing.
- Tomte 2mo agoStop replying to every single comment here!
- emilesilvis 2mo agoNo!
- pseudosaid 2mo agotouch grass
- ezst 2mo ago
- chinchang 2mo agolove the idea! I had a similar thing on my todo list :) Glad u made it.
- emilesilvis 2mo ago\o/
- wei_b0 2mo agothis seems to be great for like a single page exhibition or something, but reading long form content from something like this, personally I feel this to be not so intuitive
- emilesilvis 2mo agoI think I agree. I think it's more for the writer than for the reader.
- wei_b0 2mo agototally banger if so
- arkits 2mo agocool idea, but doesn't this prevent translation for foreign audiences? or even screen reader integration
- emilesilvis 2mo agoThere are transcripts. I'm assuming those can be translated and read by screen readers, but good reminder, let me check!
- vivid242 2mo agoVery human, well done! Thank you!
- emilesilvis 2mo agoThank you!
- tekchip 2mo agoIs this moderated in some way? It is the internet. Hard to see how this doesn't fill with doodles of penises and other similar things or worse.
- emilesilvis 2mo agoIt's not moderated. You own your content (including doodles of penises and other similar things).
- vasco 2mo agoNice, left you my handwritten review of the odyssey: https://vasco.handwritten.blog/the-greek-movie https://vasco.handwritten.blog/the-greek-movie
- ogundipeore 2mo agoThis is really lovely! I saw a couple weeks back where someone made a custom app on their remarkable with an LLM responding to handwritten text Makes me think that I should get my remarkable modded as well to post things I write to my website directly, incorporating some ideas from this. Thank you for sharing!
- emilesilvis 2mo agoThank you!
- sandeepkd 2mo agoI love the idea from a personal note collection perspective, however as a blog I feel that it can be taxing to be able to read so many different handwriting styles
- szszrk 2mo agoDifferent handwriting styles is just ... personal. Literally a letter. Even HAM radio operators or Morse code users have unique style. Could be ideal for small blog communities, but it falls apart when targeting large audience. I need 250% size increase to be able to read this, and floating text makes it a super hard read for me. OP, please use lined template for writing :)
- emilesilvis 2mo agoGood idea `:)
- speerer 2mo agoHi, I've been working on handwritten blogging too! It would be great to compare notes. I might also drop you a line on another platform.
- emilesilvis 2mo agoLet's do it!
- mehraban 2mo agoseems cool. but is bloging still alive?
- HelloUsername 2mo agoHmm, how come this is only a Show HN post now, but it seems it's already been live since at least 2022: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33055426 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33055426 ?
- chrismorgan 2mo agoThe domain has changed hands. What it was then is now at https://handwritten.danieljanus.pl/ https://handwritten.danieljanus.pl/.
- sarreph 2mo agoI've been thinking about getting a Remarkable... Really tough to choose between the Pro, the Pro Move, and the Pure. I would quite like colour (for doodling), and the price point of the Move is slightly better, but I'm worried about the (small) size of it. Ideally I'd want something with colour support at an A5 paper size level. Wondering if anyone can speak to their experiences with any of them?
- emilesilvis 2mo agoI use my ReMarkable Paper Pro every day :) I use it personally to do maths and journal, and professionally to take notes. What's your budget?
- sarreph 2mo agoGreat to hear, thank you for sharing! Am considering getting one, but holding out until September because they haven't refreshed that particular device in a couple of years... I wasn't intending on a budget as large as the Paper Pro's, but I could stretch to that if it made me demonstrably more productive / happier. I was keener on the price point of the Paper Pure, but like the idea of a backlight and colour!
- shawNell 2mo agoConsider the Supernote Manta (10.7") and Nomad (7.8") as well. I've been using the Manta for a few months now, and it is quite a pleasure to write on.
- sdoering 2mo agoInteresting idea. I got myself an eInk tablet last week and was thinking about how I could incorporate handwritten notes/blog posts into my regular blog. As a separate section and maybe a separate RSS feed. Because I actually liked the idea of enabling people to read my handwritten notes. I just would not want to put that onto an external service, being more of a selfhost person...
- emilesilvis 2mo agoThanks! Undertandable :)
- analog_daddy 2mo agoI feel people who like this type of blogs and want to try something like a static website would love Styluslabs’ Write https://www.styluslabs.com/ https://www.styluslabs.com/ Handwriting is better as SVG if you are writing digitally, and while everyone has their own vector ink based proprietary formats, I like the simplicity and openness of SVG’s!
- emilesilvis 2mo agoVery intresting, thank you for sharing!
- chrismorgan 2mo agoSVG is completely unsuitable for recording pen stroke data, and fairly unsuitable as a publishing format for handwriting. It’s capable of representing a technical pen/fineliner with opaque, constant-width stroke tolerably well, but nothing else. For all other pen styles, you need variable stroke width (for which you have to switch to using a filled instead of stroked path, bloating it hugely and making it essentially uneditable), and also want some degree of variable opacity and/or texturing of the stroke (both impossible in SVG).
- analog_daddy 2mo agoYeah i think you have a valid point. I did have this issue come up where i was trying to vectorize an indexed png and no amount of playing with different engines and settings gave me a good enough reduction in size. It was essentially treating my handwritten strokes as variable width.
- flobosg 2mo agoBrings to mind Jeff Bridges’ homepage: https://www.jeffbridges.com/ https://www.jeffbridges.com/
- emilesilvis 2mo agoBeautiful.
- twalichiewicz 2mo agoThanks for sharing this, instant add to my "unique artists" bookmarks folder.
- rschoultz 2mo agoVery cool. I created a similar project back in late 2002 (2003?) using Anoto digital pen and paper for publishing to a blog format. That version was using a bluetooth connection to some Nokia or Ericsson handset that had gprs for communication with Anoto servers to route handwriting traffic. I went only so far as having an internal demo, though. A lot have transpired with the Anoto platform since then, also.
- emilesilvis 2mo agoSounds amazing! Thanks!
- jensabacik 2mo agoNice idea! And I see that there's also automated transcript for SEO & accessibility. Is there some standardised way to upload the content, or any image goes?
- emilesilvis 2mo agoAt the moment, any image goes.
- apt-get 2mo agoSee also: https://postbox.garden/ https://postbox.garden/
- h2aichat 2mo agoIt is a great idea, congratulations! Not sure if we will remember how to write ;-)
- tempfile 2mo agoWithout any way to access the corresponding text, this is unfortunately an idea I hope never gets any significant adoption. I wonder if there is a way to make the underlying text accessible. OCR could presumably attempt to get at which letters correspond to which glyphs. Can a drawing be annotated in SVG as representing some character, as in an illustrated manuscript? If so, maybe this can be saved.
- deleted 2mo ago[deleted]
- vladsiu 2mo ago[dead]
- ir3ne 2mo agoThis is lovely. I have a growing "long reads" bookmarks folder, and this feels like exactly the kind of site I'd keep adding to it. Looking forward to reading more.
- EmadKhair 2mo agoLove this! At an era where AI is automating everything, it's good to see a product that reminds us of the way it was before computers and AI got involved. (I need to work on my handwriting! haven't used a pen in ages! X))
- shant_extry 2mo agoThis has got to be one of the most interesting, unique, and beautiful ideas I have seen on the internet in a long, long time.
- dev0t 2mo agoNice! Looks like a book with hand-written reviews in many European hotels
- summerdays 2mo agoThis looks good.