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Sam Rivera

Notes, writing & local-first

Sam Rivera

Suspicious of dashboards that replace writing. Boring Markdown is a feature.

Brooklyn, NY

Note apps, capture habits, and PKM setups for people who think in links, not widgets. Local-first tools, plain-text workflows, and the self-hosted stuff writers actually keep using.

About

Sam writes for people who take notes to think, not to decorate a second brain museum. App comparisons when the question is "will I still open this in six months," boring Obsidian defaults, Logseq when the journal is enough, and calling out systems that turn into procrastination furniture.

Came out of tech writing and DevRel. Still keeps a plain Markdown vault on git because it's dull and it works. Won't push a plugin until you've written twenty notes without one. The beat stretches into local-first apps, document pipelines (Paperless-ish), and lightweight self-host for writers: sync, backups you understand, tools that don't need a status page hobby.

Shares head-to-heads with Riley when pricing and scenarios matter more than philosophy. Leaves Docker networking and Tailscale mesh drama to Jordan. Lives in Brooklyn. Walks a lot. Sourdough when the vault is calm.

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