Independent blog navigation site "Firewood" officially launched

After nearly a month of development, I have finally launched Firewood (firewood.news), a standalone blog navigation site that I completed independently, from design to backend!

This is my first true Node.js and Svelte application, and also my first complete application that includes both frontend and backend.

Firewood is a standalone blog navigation site. Unlike other navigation sites, Firewood uses AI to classify, summarize, and tag articles, making it easier to categorize them so that readers can quickly find content they are interested in.

The Power of Words

I’ve always believed that writing is a skill possessed by few. Most people don’t even have the patience to sit down and read a long article. (I guess many readers of this article didn’t even make it here and went straight to the comments section.)

Words are not like pictures; they are not intuitive and easy to understand. They are not like videos where you can just follow along with the progress bar without deep thinking; you follow the video's line of thought, not your own.

Words have a threshold. Without visual impact, readers need to imagine the world conveyed by the words. Since words are not time-bound, readers can repeatedly read a particular paragraph, carefully analyze, and imagine.

When watching videos, it’s easy to be influenced by the atmosphere; you can only passively accept the output of the video creator, moving on to the next clip without time to think about the content. It’s difficult to get hooked on words; without clear logic and excellent prose, it’s almost impossible to make you feel the same as being in a live broadcast.

Thus, articulating a matter or viewpoint clearly in a long article is something most people can't do.

In this era, is writing, especially long-form writing, still meaningful?

Innumerable taboos and sensitive points, an imagination where everything can be an affront to China, make many give up expressing themselves.

Setting aside facts and insurmountable forces, the current environment in Qin also does not encourage serious discussion through articles.

Look at your most frequently used apps on your phone; how many encourage long-form output? Even if there are, how many are suitable for serious discussions in the comments? Does the community support a serious discussion atmosphere?

Almost all community and content-based products are diluting the personalities of content creators; they only serve as content output factories, forced to continuously output the same theme without becoming a complete “person” online.

Moreover, Chinese products deliberately make the comment function unsuitable for references and replies, making it impossible to track a dialog that has gone through many rounds.

Worse still, these products dilute or even prohibit hyperlinks. Hyperlinks are the basis of the web. They not only link pages but also serve as credentials: through links, one can know the source of information and assess its reliability, and further readings can expand detailed discussions. Yet in today's niche popular products, you either can’t post links at all or can only post shopping links.

Because while the truncheon may be used in lieu of conversation, words will always retain their power. Words offer the means to meaning, and for those who will listen, the enunciation of truth. And the truth is, there is something terribly wrong with this country, isn't there?

Even in this environment, many are still willing to spend more effort setting up blogs and writing articles that few people read. I hope to have a platform to give more exposure to these contents, which is my original intention of developing Firewood.

What Firewood Means

The literal meaning of Firewood is stacked wood.

Near the Han Dynasty beacons in Dunhuang, there are heaps of mounds. These are woodpiles from two thousand years ago that have formed into fossil-like structures through long-term weathering.

Words last longer than pictures and videos. The energy contained in words is greater. I hope these words can be like the wood of the Han Dynasty, enduring despite being ignored, to be discovered by future generations.

While everyone else is researching how to make viewers more addicted and increasing product placements, I hope we can leave something different.

Plan

Firewood will not aim to keep traffic on the site, but will try to direct traffic to various blogs. Future development work will focus on optimizing information classification and presentation, as well as backup for blogs that go offline.

For more details on Firewood's technical architecture, please read "The Technical Architecture of Firewood."

If you share my ideology, or if you think Firewood does a good job, please forward this article to social networks, groups, or your friend circle to help me promote it. I am not an influential KOL, and your casual forwarding act means a lot to me.