The Miscellanies

The Miscellanies

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The Miscellanies
The Miscellanies
Welcome to The Miscellanies

Welcome to The Miscellanies

Or: the email newsletter as a blog.

Raf Noboa y Rivera
Oct 17, 2019
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The Miscellanies
The Miscellanies
Welcome to The Miscellanies
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Once upon a time, people created their own websites to share a piece of themselves with the world. Some of these sites were static, updated randomly, sometimes rarely. Others were updated more regularly, and from there came something a weblog, or “blog”, for short. The word, a portmanteau of “web” and “log”, as in a diary.

Fast forward twenty years (!) or so, and now you’ve got email newsletters. Like this one, for instance. Yes, I’m compressing a lot of information here (which I’ll cover at some point), but I think you get my drift.

Email newsletters are the new blogs.

Welcome to The Miscellanies. I’m Rafael Noboa y Rivera. I’m a writer, political activist, and for lack of a better term, a technologist - someone who works in and with technology.

Wait a second: that tells you what I do, but it doesn’t tell you who I am. So: who am I?

Let’s try this again: I’m someone who’s lucky to have lived what my friends think of as an “interesting” life. I’ve gone to war, worked on a bunch of political campaigns, written about sports, beer, and war (among other things), worked for both Apple and Facebook, survived death more than once, and - this part is important - tried to be a better man the longer I’ve been around.

Some friends thought I ought to share the things I say and write to them with the wider world. And that’s how this newsletter came about.

If you subscribe, you’ll get my thoughts on a wide range of things: not just tech, politics (it’s a Presidential election year, after all!), and sports, but life, men’s style*, and above all, how us men can go from being knuckleheads to decent guys**.

Sign up now so you don’t miss the first issue. Thanks!

In the meantime, tell your friends!


*True story: I come from a family of fashion designers. My grandmother used to design wedding dresses (and other formalwear) for Puerto Rico’s Miss Universe winners. I might’ve picked up a thing or two from her, my mom, and other folks. Might as well share what I’ve learned!
**As someone I respect greatly once put it: The patriarchy fucks with everyone. That includes men. It makes it nearly impossible for us to live the kinds of full, emotional, honest lives that would make us better friends, family members, partners, and work colleagues. It’s a lot of work, it never ends, and it’s its own reward.

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