Jackson Kerr's Site

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It is my goal that everything on my site (except the links section but duh) should be made by me. I don't really want to respond directly to other media. I want to create new things. Recently I came to the horrible realisation that every time this page is loaded, it's using a font made by someone else. Even worse, that font can be different depending on what browser/device you use which sometimes caused things to be slightly out of alignment.

The simple solution was to make my own font. As you probably guessed, this is it. Here's all the characters:

ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz
0123456789
!@#$%^&*()-=_+[]{};:'"<>,./?`~

I went for a minimal, blocky look. It's fine. The file size is small, but it's no work of art.

Do you care about this? Is this interesting to anyone except for me? Should I care if it isn't?

In making this font, I thought this might be a good thing to write about until I considered; Are most of the entries on this site just going to be about making the site? And if so, is that interesting?

No, I don't think it is...

A blog about making a blog is only interesting to someone learning how to make a blog, and even then maybe just as a means to an end. Sculptors don't spend all day making statues of chisels, and the best books aren't about publishing or overcoming writer's block. These examples seem silly, but for some reason, on the internet (and especially the blog space) people seem to constantly write about writing on the internet.

I aim to avoid this from now on.

Oh, and by the way. I'm not happy enough with this font to go on using it for the whole site. I may get around to making another one.

Peace out

Update: Added the new font to this page on 2025-05-05 :)

I've been using a "dumbphone" for I think about a year now. It can only use SMS and make/receive calls. It has no internet connection. I hold this as one of the best decisions I ever made.

Although I had already taken steps to limit my social media; I had deleted Instagram and Facebook off of my smartphone a year prior. Here in New Zealand most people I know use Facebook Messenger as their main avenue for communication. I was worried about losing contact with friends and family. Ah, the dreaded FOMO. Eventually I decided to try it "just for a couple of days". I grabbed an $80 candy bar phone on my way home from work and all my apprehensions melted away.

Well, what about that FOMO?

It turns out that for the most part people who care about you are willing to send you a text message instead of a Facebook DM. And I started treating the group chat more like an email chain. I could check it on my computer at work an hour before leaving work to see if there were any invites to events and that pretty much solved my problem.

What about banking? I set up my debit card so that CHQ/Paywave accesses my weekly budget and SAV accesses my short term savings. This means that if I will never be somewhere and not have access to money. Maps? I look up the directions before I leave, if it's complicated I'll write them down in a notebook I carry. Email? Why do you need to see emails at the pub??? Do it when you get home!

Ok, here's the part where I admit that I've been lying to you. It turned out that I actually couldn't live my normal life without a smartphone. My work, my bank, steam, and a lot of other things require an authenticator app for login. My gym requires an app FFS. Also, what if I want to listen to music? Well... For this I still use a smartphone and a Digital Audio Plater (effectively a tiny android tablet). The smartphone stays in my drawer at work and the DAP stays at home.

So far I've only talked about the issues with using a dumbphone. If you're a full time smartphone user this whole thing probably sounds silly to you. It did to me the first time I heard about someone using a candybar phone in the 2020s. Modern smartphones are arguably the most effective tool that humanity has ever created. Why would anyone want to give that up? Put simply, there are hidden costs to owning a smartphone .

Although I was already vigilant about managing notifications and unsubscribing from bullshit emails, there are always things that slip through the cracks. Do I really need that group chat notification in the middle of fixing an issue at work? Or when enjoying time with friends? The benefit of the dumbphone is that I know that when it beeps, someone is actively trying to get in contact with me specifically. Not just someone sending me a meme or sharing a post.

I've found that since switching, my time out of the house has had a completely different vibe to it. There are few objects in out lives that spend the same amount of time with us as out phones so a change effects a lot more of you life than you may thing. I no longer have a 24/7 entertainment machine on me at all times. Whenever I am out of the house, I am present. The lack of a phone changes sitting in a waiting room, being on the bus, or otherwise waiting somewhere. When I'm bored I'm compelled to talk to the people around me, take in my surroundings, or just go into my own mind. When I wake up in the morning I get straight out of bed. No more wasted time scrolling. I've also noticed that I sleep much better. Something else I did not expect is how much more I notice the people around me being on their phones.

Using a dumbphone is one of those things where the drawbacks are clear, but the benefits are indirect. You really need to give it a go to know what you will gain and whether the drawbacks will actually apply to you. I implore you to give it a go, even just to try it out for a couple of days. The only piece of advice I will give to you is that there is no such thing as the perfect dumbphone. So don't get hung up on finding it. Just walk into the store and buy the cheapest one available. If you must have a specific recommendation; the TCL Onetouch 4042. is very simple to use and I have had no issues with it.

Most phones have a screen time feature, check it and see if that would convince you. Do you think you are going to look back in 5 years and wish you spent more time staring at a screen or less. The quote "The only people that will remember you worked late are your kids" has always stuck with me and I think applies here.

Go on, see if those T9 typing skills are still in the mind palace somewhere.

Assorted videos from a cheap camera I bought on TradeMe in early 2024 overlaid with me singing a cover of Like a brother by hey, nothing.

Watch the video on Youtube or DailyMotion.

In the last year or so I have made an effort to change the type of content I have been consuming. My goal was to switch to content that was slower and focused on the real world. This was inspired by being suggested one of Evan Monsma's videos I Dropped Out and Moved Into a 100 Year Old Cellar.

The video and audio quality are not great but the vibe is relaxing and he tells a story.

I think his videos do the best job of expressing the vibe I want to capture in this website.

I want to present my hobbies here in a low-effort and casual way. In the past I have held high standards for what constitutes as being "worth sharing" and this has lead to not releasing anything I make. Perfectionism is the enemy of just getting something out there. Evan uses the end-tag "Made for the sake of making" which speaks to me.

I was inspired to create this site by The Melonking Manifesto but there's not much to see here yet... In the meantime, have a cool link to explore.