19 October 2024 marks my one-month anniversary of joining omg.lol.
I discovered the existence of omg.lol for the first time when I became more active in exploring personal websites during the first half of 2024, after I learned about the resurgence of personal websites in 2022. I was quickly intrigued by omg.lol for its fun name (OMG LOL!), cute logo (named Prami), and the offer of various web services including a web address, a profile page, status update log, a Mastodon account, PURLs, pastebin, community chat, and more, for an affordable price of US $20 per year.
Furthermore, since I already started using the static site generator Eleventy to build my own websites at the time, another fact about omg.lol that caught my attention was the fact that a few Eleventy users are also omg.lol members, including Robb Knight, who is also part of omg.lol's staff.
At first, however, I did not feel that I had a use of an omg.lol membership yet, since I already had my own websites and at least one Mastodon account. Therefore, I did not immediately join omg.lol, though I still checked out the platform from time to time, because I did find what omg.lol does interesting, by offering people to claim their own space on the internet. Learning that omg.lol also offered membership sponsorships for members of marginalised groups made me respect omg.lol even more.
Then, in September 2024, I learned that omg.lol was hosting a fundraising campaign for the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, which includes discounts for omg.lol membership fee and daily auction for lifetime omg.lol address. This time, I began to seriously consider joining omg.lol for real, as this was an opportunity to not only obtain an omg.lol membership, but also support a good cause for children. At last, I joined omg.lol after successfully bidding a lifetime address in the auction and registering my helenchong.omg.lol address!
After setting up my omg.lol profile page, I began to connect with the omg.lol community by joining the community chat, Discourse forum and the social.lol Mastodon instance, and I have been enjoying my time in omg.lol's wonderful community since. Adam Newbold, the founder of omg.lol himself, is also a really nice guy who is pleasant to talk to.
To make more good use out of my omg.lol address, and the fact that you can configure the DNS of your omg.lol address, I have also created a blog.helenchong.omg.lol subdomain to use it as the address of my new personal blog, Galaxy Garden. It is worth noting that I was inspired to have a personal blog again by other bloggers in the omg.lol community.
I am incredibly grateful that services like omg.lol exist to bring back the fun of carving your own corner on the web, and I am proud to be a member of omg.lol and its delightful community. I am following omg.lol's development and looking forward to what it has in store for the future.
UPDATE, 4 November 2023:
After waiting for the items to ship from the U.S. to Malaysia, my lifetime omg.lol membership goodies have arrived at my home at last!
These goodies include a double-sided Prami coaster printed with regular and distressed Prami, an enamel Prami pin, two 3D printed Prami tokens made of polylactic acid (PLA) filament, and 10 pieces of stickers featuring hearts Prami, sick Prami, distressed Prami, annoyed Prami, and regular Prami.
The package of these goodies also included a message from the founder Adam Newbold:
Thank you so much for being an amazing lifetime member of omg.lol!
Enjoy these goodies, and let me know if there's ever anything I can do for you.
— Adam
Thank you, Adam, for these adorable Prami goodies, and again for all your work on omg.lol and more!