I'm backing up the truck
Here goes my first proper long form Nostr post - yay!
## What is Modulations? How did it begin?
I joined Substack when it launched and started writing a blog about a lot of general stuff and it had no direction, then during Covid I started getting back into music production, exploring music theory, learning synthesis which led me to becoming deeply fascinated in it all - I originally got into music as a youngster, learnt guitar and some keyboard playing in my teens and into my twenties back in the 90s. I wrote a simple piece of music software on both my Commodore 64 and Amiga 500, later moving on to the PC learning Cubase at the point in time when it was rather fresh to the world - it all made sense and I wrote a few tracks, releasing them on what was known as MP3.com at the time.
Fast forward some 20 years or so!
Around 2018, I started getting interested in Ableton and can remember rekindling my Yamaha CS2x to use with it and then two years later during Covid, this became a big thing for me, it helped keep me sane during the lockdowns.
Not long after Covid I started a Substack called Modulations, which makes use of it's blogging tools, audio and video embedding, podcasting and so on.
It's gained a lot of subscribers, did have some paid subscribers for awhile but since I've lost them, another good reason to gradually move the project over to Nostr.
## What’s the plan going forward
I’ve always enjoyed journaling and writing about my music, the tools I use and the tools that I would like to try out in the future; of which there are many of course. These days so many new products are launched every month, all of which I tend to either ignore or add to my “maybe buy someday” list.
They come in two main forms, software or hardware and then they can all be divided into Synth, Sampler, Sequencer or FX.
There has been a desire in many to switch to what we call DAWless which I can’t help but think at times is a network effect of YouTubes influencers. Don’t get me wrong many of them are good at what they do and are aware that there are some highly desirable products out on the market.
*For the non computer based musicians out there, who don't know what DAW means, it stands for Digital Audio Workstation.*
Do we need them all though? Do we need to go DAWless, stick with the DAW or go for something in between?
I’m asking this for myself if I’m honest. I bought gear these past few years, sold some because I didn’t gel with it or it was gathering dust.
2025 may well be more of a Hybrid studio year, where I explore using Ableton, in conjunction with some hardware devices. I have my eyes on a couple, that will fit in well with what I already own.
In the meantime, check out https://modulatioos.substack.com
It will continue there for awhile but the dream is to Nostrify it completely if I can!!
Checkout Npub.pro
Your long form content will show up in clients that support it, while the posts are aggregated into a destination spot. https://thebloghustle.npub.pro/
Once you stop for a few months you'll never go back. For a while it felt like weed was a shitty Bitcoin L2, like I was smoking my sats away. I believe in you anon.
I use it all the time, but primarily just write in the thing without bothering to dive into all of the extensions. Although I do have a nostr obsidian in the thing, not sure if it works tho.
GM Nostr,
I was here before you could zap
Before you could follow
Before you had a profile
It was just a bunch of anon npubs yelling at each other on the global feed.
All the clients were slow to the point of being almost unusable
The rate of progress is insane.
Yep, the blogging clients are habla.news Yakihonne, Highlighter, Shipyard, Primal now I guess, blogstack.io. Posting long form to one will have them show up on all. Video clients are probably zap.stream amethyst, maybe nostrudel, not sure which other clients use the video nip.
The building blocks are being built in real time.
Imagine what highlights and v4v will be like when more people gravitate towards the medium and substack replacements.
Imagine the silk road v2 vibe that shopstr will bring once more people start buying and selling on nostr.
#Nostr
Maybe post to highlighter for now, I think it'll label it with the video kind and itll show up in places like flare.pub zap.stream and eventually the youtube killer.
Some days you just can’t win the battle with your LLM 😢
We’ll fight another day.
Gn, o wise ones. 😴 🛏️
They start hallucinating and just saying whatever to appease your query.
You point out the mistake and they say "Oh, I see now" and then give you another wrong answer.
With Bitcoin Well, you can get your direct deposit to land in your albyhub.
You can use Strike for bill pay.
The pieces are coming together.
No one is ready for what 2025 nostr will bring.
If your not bullish on Nostr, you probably aren't using it.
Zapping releases on zap.store is wild 
Night Nostr
U click options, bookmark and then use :
Olas DVM
:happyclap_sm:
:cheemssuperactivated_sm:
Nostr sure is wild.
Amethyst has custom gif things
Shout out to nostr:nprofile1qqs8a474cw4lqmapcq8hr7res4nknar2ey34fsffk0k42cjsdyn7yqqpzemhxue69uhks6tnwshxummnw3ezumrpdejz7qgwwaehxw309ahx7uewd3hkctcpzemhxue69uhk2er9dchxummnw3ezumrpdejz7382ta8 for the pack
And emojito.meme
In hindsight, going to bitcoin Miami in 2022 was one of the best experiences of my life.
At one point I was lost in the convention center and stumbled across Guy Swan in the middle of a podcast, and casually exchanged hi's with Samson Mow.
Had a convo on the beach with Supertestnet
Purple pilled a few bitcoiners with the wife
Ran up on Will and said "HEY MAN! I'M ON NOSTR. WE'RE REALLY OUT HERE HUH?"
Hangin in there, freak
Zap!
Keep up the great work!
It stopped working for me a few months ago and I switched to SN, and there was some Npub giving a free subscription to their scheduled posting service too. I'll checkout shipyard again, but I might stick with highlighter for a bit for long form.
And found a few bugs, maybe fck around and submit a PR......the hustle is real.
https://highlighter.com/ is cool.
Mornin Nostr.
Lets get to work.