Now

This is a "Now Page", and you should make one too. Last updated on 2020-11-11.

Currently

Well, a lot has happened since we last spoke. There's been ... an election in the UK, the UK left the EU, an ongoing global pandemic, months of UK lockdown, a US election, and it's still only November. I'm looking forward to seeing the back of a year in which I've lost people close to me, seen others turn into raving q-natics, and had to balance the needs of work with the needs of three growing children stuck at home with their parents!

Right now, things are pretty good. Readable has weathered the covid storm relatively well, in part due to our customer base and in part, I think, due to people working from home taking on more soft-skill work like writing content. We've gone fully remote as a company, taking on our first overseas employee, and I've got myself a small private office in the countryside. I've not managed to give the time to ApolloPad that it deserves, but it's not going anywhere.

I've also started to carve out a bit more time for life in general. It's great to have a mission, to pursue lofty ambitions both as a company and personally, but I need to give a little more time to things that I've neglected in the pursuit of those things - personal relationships and hobbies, for a start.

Next

Readable is about to go through a big change - we're changing how we charge for the product, splitting it into three. That will allow us to stop doing silly things like charging $5 to analyse the readability of a 200,000 page website (yes, really), and set our prices more in line with our value proposition. That's, hopefully, going to open a lot of doors for us.

The big goal for 2021 though, is for me to take a holiday. No phone, no laptop - I won't exist to the company for two glorious weeks. I've not done that for 8 years or so, and it's well overdue. And I think it's important - how can I preach about keeping a sensible work/life balance and the benefits of taking time away from work when I don't practice those things? In order to do that I need to hire at least one more person - a capable developer. So we need to grow the business to that point and recruit someone brilliant. I can't wait.

Before

• If you want to see what I was up to before, check out the previous version of this page.