colinarms

Yup - we're using rich-markdown-editor for the content editor. Full support for code and syntax highlighting. GitHub: https://github.com/outline/rich-markdown-editor, editor demo: https://rich-markdown-editor-demo.onrender.com/?path=/story/...

Another Medium alternative is Papyrus: https://papyrus.so.

Privacy-first, simplicity and speed are the core tenets. Export posts at any time, send posts via newsletters, and no feature-bloat.

Disclaimer: I built Papyrus because I was fed up with Medium, Wordpress and Substack.

Great article, Gabriel!

Just circling back here - I launched custom domain support today. For a one-time fee of $50, you can unlock custom domains permanently for your blog. Thanks!

Just circling back here - I launched custom domain support today (for a one-time fee of $50, you can unlock custom domains permanently for your blog).

Just circling back here - I launched custom domain support today (for a one-time fee of $50, you can unlock custom domains permanently for your blog).

I'm getting a 504 Gateway Timeout when attempting to access your site.

I just implemented basic RSS functionality. There's now an "RSS" link at the bottom of all blog posts and pages.

Thanks again for the feedback!

Awesome - thank you!

1. I originally registered https://papyrus.dev, with the original idea being a newsletter aimed at developers. I pivoted to be more broader, and with that, changed the TLD to .so. I haven't gotten around to setting up mail on the new TLD yet, so still using the old one for everything.

2. I'm not sure yet. One of the selling points is no third-party trackers, so I'm not sure how readers will feel if some of their blogs started tracking them.

3. Thanks for the feedback, and I appreciate the mockup! Agreed that section can be clearer - I've added this to the backlog.

Custom domains are coming up real soon!

Agreed - they were a great inspiration for us.

Thanks!

Yes, I've been meaning to do this - I haven't prioritized it yet because we have not had enough quality blogs on the platform to showcase, but after all the HN traffic I think this will change :)

Thanks for the feedback. Customization is definitely on the roadmap, but nailing the reading/editing experience is higher priority for now.

Thank you! Appreciate the kind words!

Thanks for the catch - this should be fixed now.

Thanks a lot, Steven! Appreciate it!

Thanks!

Thank you!

This is something I'm actively working on. I've already begun to implement functionality to import subscribers from Substack (you can test it out in the /settings/blog page).

After I finish Substack, I'll begin adding support for importing posts/subscribers from other platforms.

Yes, there's a chance I can recover this. Can you shoot me an email (hello@papyrus.dev) with the email you signed up with, and the name of the post you were working on? Happy to look into this.

This definitely sounds like a bug.

Thank you - appreciate all the feedback!

I invested quite a bit into speed, and thankfully Next.js has a lot of great built-in support to make things fast - incremental static regeneration, link prefetching, image optimization, etc.

For the editor bugs - thanks for highlighting, I filed a bug and definitely hoping to tackle this eventually.

Agreed on the documentation as well - it's on my radar to improve.

For custom domain support and RSS - both features on the roadmap! Likely RSS first, as that's quite a bit easier to implement, and custom domain support shortly after that. (Custom domain support is probably the #1 feature request at the moment).

Awesome - glad to hear that! Appreciate the feedback!

What applications do you envision?

The editor is currently markdown combined with a rich text UI-based editor. I haven't explored supporting other types of editors (beyond extending the UI), but I'd be open to it.

Thank you!

We're still in the early stages so no large blogs to show just yet.

Here's the Papyrus blog, if you're more curious to see how a demo blog operates: https://papyrus.so/@PapyrusBlog

And thanks for the tip about the JS issues - I'm absolutely focused on making the entire site accessible without JS, so this is important to me. I'll take a look at shortly.

Thanks for the feedback - appreciate it!

Here are some blogposts that can describe it better than I:

https://thehypothesis.substack.com/p/heres-why-substacks-sca...

https://doyles.substack.com/p/in-queers-we-trust-all-others-...

https://www.vox.com/recode/22338802/substack-pro-newsletter-...

The TL;DR is that Substack has allegedly paid large sums of money to bring writers onto their platform. The writers they've paid have historically been on one end of the ideological spectrum, and Substack has not been transparent about who is being paid, nor how much.

Thanks! Happy to hear any feedback or requirements you have for your new project. Shoot me an email at hello@papyrus.dev if you want to chat further.

And thanks for that -- should be fixed now on a majority of pages.

Hi HN,

At the start of this year I set a personal goal to blog more. I wanted to 1) improve my writing skills, 2) build an audience, and 3) if the stars aligned, start earning a bit of supplemental income via paid posts or subscriptions.

I looked at the existing blogging/newsletter solutions out there, and none of them quite fit what I was looking for. They had paywalls (Medium), features I didn't need (Wordpress), too minimal a design (Buttondown), lacked transparency (Substack), or cost money even when I wasn't earning yet (Ghost).

So, I built my own.

No trackers or tracking cookies are used (beyond Plausible, for privacy-preserving analytics). Speed and minimalism is a big focus: all blogs are rendered as static HTML, using as little JS as possible.

You can write blogposts in markdown, publish them, let your readers subscribe, and (when you're ready) connect your Stripe account to start charging readers for access to paid posts. You also always maintain ownership of your posts, and you can export all data at any time.

Still in the early stages, so any feedback would be great.

Thanks!

I'm scheduling a call with my academic advisor sometime this week. I'm in good standing at school, and I take part in a bunch of extracurriculars, so even if I have to re-apply I don't think it would be difficult to get accepted again.

Agreed about the visa though - I have a call scheduled with an immigration lawyer tomorrow, so I'll determine how difficult it is (if it's even possible) to get an H1 or GC.

Thank you for your other points - seriously, much appreciated.

I asked that, and they didn't seem very eager for remote work. Additionally, I'd be getting no equity if I did this.