Life has been a little difficult for me since the pandemic. The pandemic has had several consequences (e.g., families who need childcare can definitely feel it). Getting COVID was not the worst part. I’d say it was probably the easiest part for me (after the painful 72 hours was gone, it was gone). I have also suffered from several other things in these three years. The number of blog posts I write in a year is a decent indicator of my life quality in that year. You can tell clearly from the blog archive page the time periods in which I was struggling, staying afloat, or drowning.
The bright side of the three years is that I made a few really good friends through my Chinese blog posts and also locally in Omaha. So good that I even started to feel that I had used up my “quota” of the number of friends in my life—I wouldn’t be able to afford more of my spare time with any new friends. I’m totally satisfied with my existing friends.
One consequence of the above dark and bright sides is that some people may feel I have disappeared from the Internet, since I still haven’t replied to their emails from two years ago. I’m sorry about that, and will get back to you at some point. Over the three years, I attended only one in-person conference (in September this year).
To encourage people to write to me publicly whenever possible, and assure people that I’m not missing, I have created a GitHub discussion board at github.com/yihui/yihui.org. You are welcome to ask me anything and discuss everything with me there, e.g., cooking, badminton, gardening, books, career, psychology, philosophy, and of course, programming.
Donate
As a freelancer (currently working as a contractor) and a dad of three kids, I truly appreciate your donation to support my writing and open-source software development! Your contribution helps me cope with financial uncertainty better, so I can spend more time on producing high-quality content and software. You can make a donation through methods below.
-
Venmo:
@yihui_xie, or Zelle:xie@yihui.name -
Paypal
-
If you have a Paypal account, you can follow the link https://paypal.me/YihuiXie or find me on Paypal via my email
xie@yihui.name. Please choose the payment type as “Family and Friends” (instead of “Goods and Services”) to avoid extra fees. -
If you don’t have Paypal, you may donate through this link via your debit or credit card. Paypal will charge a fee on my side.
-
-
Other ways:
WeChat Pay (微信支付：谢益辉) Alipay (支付宝：谢益辉) 
When sending money, please be sure to add a note “gift” or “donation” if possible, so it won’t be treated as my taxable income but a genuine gift. Needless to say, donation is completely voluntary and I appreciate any amount you can give.
Please feel free to email me if you prefer a different way to give. Thank you very much!
I’ll give back a significant portion of the donations to the open-source community and charities. For the record, I received about $30,000 in total (before tax) in 2024-25, and gave back about $15,000 (after tax).