End of the selfies project
In mid-September I launched my “selfies project”. Here is the dedicated section of my website: https://protesilaos.com/selfies. The idea of this project was to take a selfie each day and post it on my website. Why? Because I realised that I had no pictures of people in my camera roll, so I thought I might be doing something wrong. Starting with taking photos of me seemed like the obvious first step towards changing the status quo.
I had originally committed to run the series until the end of the year. Here is the article with the announcement of the project and the first selfie embedded therein: https://protesilaos.com/news/2025-09-15-selfie-project/.
I knew that the cumulative file size could be an issue, but I had not
actually checked how big the jpg files are. It turns out they are
large. To not make my website any heavier than it needs to be and to
minimise longer-term constraints with hosting arrangements, I am
hereby concluding the selfies project.
It was a fun experiment. I might still post the occasional photo, revealing or not, but not daily anymore (yes, I did censor a few).
What I learnt about myself:
- I kept the streak, despite the abrupt ending. I am good at doing what I set my mind to, but it was still a challenge to make this happen, given that I had to force myself to get used to the whole selfie thing.
- I still do not care about pictures of people. Not me, not others. And this is despite the fact I had several chances to take such shots. Whereas I enjoy capturing moments of my dogs, eagles flying above me, crows looking into my room, foxes in close proximity (I even have a video where I walk close behind a fox without it noticing me for a while), hedgehogs running around, picturesque mountainscapes throughout the year, flowers of all sorts, and generally all the beauty around me. Not the human element though: it remains distant.
- Originally the selfies were visible from my website’s home page as well as the catch-all RSS/Atom feed. I removed them after a few days on the premise that they would crowd out my other publications. I think this is factually true, but I will not rule out the possibility that it was also a convenient excuse to relegate the selfies to obscurity where really only I would see them.
- Fact or rationalisation, I think what matters is that I still prefer to be known for my deeds. I have so much to do on the creative front: essays, poems, and videos. I wish to be useful to—and even connect with—like-minded people. Pictures of me do nothing in this regard.