Minner/What is Minner?

What is Minner?

Minner is a private diary. One photo or a short thought per day¹, with an optional caption. That’s it. There are no likes, no comments, no followers, no feed, no algorithm. Your entries are private by default and organized by date on a simple calendar.

Minner is built for people who want to document their days without performing for an audience. The name comes from the Norwegian word for memories.

Who makes Minner?

Minner is built by one person. “We” refer to “ourselves” as “we” elsewhere on the site because it feels weird to say “I” when you’re running a service. But on this page, I say “I”.

I’m Jan Schjetne, and I’m building this because I’m sick of being lured into engagement bait everywhere I go on the internet. I just want a place where you can post your own photos and thoughts without sitting around waiting for likes and comments. A place where follower counts don’t matter.

By day I’m a tech lead in a design system in the public sector, working to make everyday life simpler and better for the people instead of just generating profit for shareholders. Earlier in my life I’ve made a living as a photographer, designer, developer, and telemarketer.

I have no ambitions of getting rich off this platform, but I’m hoping to eventually cover my costs, if any of you out there are interested in tossing a few coins my way.

Why do you have to apply to make your diary public?

At its core, Minner is a place to hold on to your own memories, and to look back on what you’ve thought and experienced. In a world where everything is designed to scream for attention, Minner seeks out a quiet place. A place that’s just yours.

It’s also natural to want to share your memories with others. That’s why it’s possible to open your diary to the public. But since this site is run, maintained, and moderated by one person, I want to be careful about what gets shared with the world. I don’t want this service to be misused by people who just want a place to dump whatever they want onto the internet.

I do promise to review every application for a public diary as soon as they come in, and if I get the impression that you’re a genuine person and not a spambot or similar, I see no reason to deny public access to those who want it.

How is Minner moderated?

What you show and say in your own diary is largely your business, and I have no interest in snooping through your private life, but this site does need some ground rules. If I have reason to believe you’re doing illegal or seriously unethical things, I have to act.

If you have a public diary, the rules are a bit stricter. In Minner’s public diaries, there is no tolerance for racism, homophobia, transphobia, bullying, gambling, fraud, explicit pornography, intolerance, or other garbage. If you want a more specific description of what’s not allowed here, I’ll refer to the words of Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart:

“I shall not today attempt further to define the kinds of material I understand to be embraced within that shorthand description, and perhaps I could never succeed in intelligibly doing so. But I know it when I see it.”

It’s important to me not to create yet another place on the internet where conflict and obscenity get to reign, so if a diary shares things I don’t think belong on Minner, I may set the diary back to private, delete individual entries, or in the most extreme case, permanently ban the user.