Hey! A Café...

I meant to have this to you yesterday morning, but was so busy trying to read through the formatting draft sent by the world's most patient formatter (seriously, thank you for putting up with me, Éric. Good lord), as I kept finding things that really ought to have been taken care of by the time it was sent off to be formatted. I'm quite annoyed at myself.

Part of it was that I misplaced the actual completed manuscript, and ended up sending him an older version... and then I couldn't find the actual completed one. I think it has just upped and walked entirely off my computer.

As of the writing of this blog post, I have sent what I'm hoping will be the absolutely final file. If it's not, I'll be very upset with myself. I mean, I'm already not very thrilled, but I will be quite stroppy.

I think I've left it too late now to have any copies available for Can-Con, which is a shame. While I intend to have it available for the Starlings a couple of months ahead of the actual release date, I did want a few copies by Can-Con as sort of a special for folks coming out to the convention. I have still to create a full cover for the book, so it's not looking like it's going to happen now. Oh well. I'll still try, but I cannot expect miracles.

But that's not the point of today's blog post. At all.

Have you heard of hey.cafe?

Well, neither had I until a friend mentioned it. It's a social media platform (groan, I know. Another one. Hear me out, though). It's kind of like Twitter and Facebook smushed together; with a feed like Twitter, but the ability to create "Cafés" which are a bit like Facebook Groups. So I could, theoretically, create a private café for family things, which wouldn't appear on my feed, and I can safely share much more personal details, pictures etc than I could in Facebook, especially since I, for personal and safety reasons, don't ever use my personal Facebook. I'm only ever on as my page. My public feed would remain public, but I'd have an easier time connecting with family over socials than I currently do. It's the kind of flexibility I want, and used to have, from Facebook. I don't have to click out to be my page. I'm just my public persona in my feed, and my private self in that theoretical café.

It's ad-free, user funded (you don't have to buy the "Pro" package. It's free to use for everyone), so data isn't collected and sold. And, best of all, it's Canadian owned and operated, so there is a greater focus on Canadian news, events, and personalities.

Because it's nice and small, I'm having a greater ability to interact with the folks I follow on there. There's no algorithm, so my posts aren't being artificially buried, and my feed isn't missing anyone I'm following for any reason. Best of all, I don't have to pay to be seen by everyone who follows me (looking at you, Facebook), because these developers seem to understand that you would follow people because you're interested in what they've got going on and would like to keep up with it. The follow button is not functionally useless unless the person you follow is willing to pony up. It's nice.

I hang out there about as much as I do on Facebook and Discord, so if you're also sick of Facebook, and would like to find somewhere new that has most of the functionality, I do recommend hey.cafe.

And if you decide you like it, you can find me there at: hey.cafe/@s_m_carrire.

Slán go foill!