Nick’s End of the Year video for 2023 reminded me that for some odd reason, I am the old man of gear reviews. Well, Dan and I are. Except Dan hasn’t updated his site since 2022. So after four or five generations of online reviewers have come and gone (anyone remember Knife Thursday?) I am still here. In a lot of ways I feel like the loser that Matthew McConaughey played in Dazed and Confused (the fact that folks didn’t realize he was supposed to be a loser is kind of hilarious and a strong commentary by Richard Linklater about losers and their perception of their glory days). Nick pointed to Neeves Knives and Metal Complex as the next vanguard in knife reviews. I just hope that Nick sticks around because he offers a unique perspective. He is also gives truth to JB Pritzker’s claim that if you are looking for the smartest person in the room, find the kindest person.

But all of this begs a question: why are content creators and reviewers subject to so much turnover? Another question: why haven’t I quit? I think the answers are interconnected—make it fun and understand what you want to do.

Lots of folks have tried to make a go at this by relying on ad revenue from sponsors and/or Google. I did for a while. It didn’t work well. I felt bad when it curtailed my editorial freedom. I felt bad if I didn’t generate revenue for them. And I felt bad if I had to send a bill. Also, I view this site as an extension of the hobby and do you know what I don’t want to deal with in my hobby? Any of that stuff.

That view—that this is a hobby done for fun and that’s it—has helped me keep it fun and helped me keep writing. I write what I want to write about. I review what I want to review. And being untethered from other demands makes this fun and engaging, even 14 years on.

I am a bit concerned about revenue. I can’t afford to review dozens of products a year with NO revenue, so I do have affiliate links for Amazon. I also do some freelance writing for Gear Junkie. So when I write in a review that I purchased something with my own money it came from either of those two sources. And I learned what Consumer Reports found out a long time ago—when I buy stuff myself I am much more candid. I am happy to take review samples, of course, but given how many reviews I have done, how long I have been around, and how clear I am when I accept them, I strive to be equally candid, but it took a long time to get there. There may come a day when I need to figure out some other way to monetize this, but I don’t want to do that if I don’t have to. So until then, this system seems to work.

Tailoring this to what I can manage is a key to longevity. I loved recording the podcast. I loved listening to the podcast. But I didn’t like editing it. It was a HUGE time commitment, both recording and editing, so I let it go. It was painful, but it was necessary. A three hour podcast took about 7 hours to produce—3 to record, 3 to edit, and 1 to load and cue up. That was too much. I also like making YouTube videos. But not as much as writing. And so I do them as much as I can, but I don’t worry about it too much. I also really like working for AKTI. Answering questions from knife folks is fun. Keeping tabs on knife laws is fun. Reading knife cases from around the country is fun.

In the end, that’s the key to longevity—find something you want to do and then doing it for a long time is easier. I don’t want to be a professional content creator. I don’t want this to be my job. I have a pretty stressful job and having a stressful side hustle seems self-defeating. I don’t really care about the metrics or the views. I haven’t looked at either of those things in years. I do this because I find it enjoyable. The minute I don’t, its over. And I am not going to be sad about it. This blog has given me more than I ever imagined it would.

I DO care about putting out good and unique content. I want what I write to be clear and understandable even if you disagree. And I want to have a point of view, a perspective that is mine. You know what? I really hate big fat slabby folders. They are dumb. They are self-defeating. And they are pretty terrible as knives. But if you like them, great. I don’t really get bothered by people disagreeing with me. On this point, they are wrong, but so what? Why do internet disagreements have to fracture peoples’ ability to interact with each other? Why do IRL disagreements do that same? I have lots of friends I disagree with on a lot of things and I enjoy it. Echo chambers don’t work for me.

So as the guard changes again, and I am even more the outlier, the older, grayer haired man, and I am good with that. Come here for what is hopefully interesting, entertaining, informative content. That’s all I ask and all I want. Hopefully I will be here in another 14 years.

Thanks for reading. See you next week, as always. Haven’t missed a week in 728 weeks.