Hi, I’m Herb Bowie, a writer and software developer, and what you’ve stumbled upon is my eponymous website. Here you’ll find stuff I’ve written, as well as links to my other sites showcasing larger projects.
My Education in Racial Superiority
For what it’s worth, a personal story about my education on the subject of racial superiority. “I am, to all appearances, white, and my ancestry, as far as it can be determined, is mostly European. But please don’t hold that against me.”
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07 Feb 2026
Inextricably Linked in Freedom
The originators of jazz were only two generations removed from slavery. They were victims of rigorous forms of segregation that routinely and institutionally denied their humanity. So freedom was much more than a word to them. These pioneering musicians were exuberant about exhibiting this newfound personal freedom through their art. But they were also excited about hearing other people do the same thing. They understood that all were inextricably linked in freedom, just as they had been inextricably linked in bondage. And it wasn’t theory; it was life as they lived it.
Wynton Marsalis, 2008
From the author:
Welcome!
Thanks for visiting my site. Hope you have the time to explore some of the content!
From the same author:
Built with Notenik
Available for free from the Mac App Store, Notenik can be used for taking, organizing, formatting and publishing notes, with each note consisting of multiple fields, as well as chunks of Markdown text of any length. The HBowie.net website has been built using Notenik.
Contents Outline:
This site’s content falls into a number of different categories. Feel free to drill down into any area that interests you. Stay connected through one or more of several avenues.
Hot Off The Press…
See a list of my latest original writings, as well as the latest quotes added to my commonplace book. Visit the Discourse Forum for the latest Notenik news.
Follow/Connect
If you’d like to keep up with my work, and/or connect with me, the following avenues are available.
Mastodon
Notenik Discussion
- Sign up for my email news at news.hbowie.net
- Send me an email at herb@hbowie.net
Source Code
Software
Notenik is my note-taking, web-making, content-managing app, written in Swift, using AppKit, exclusively for the Mac. Find out more at Notenik.app.
Big Ideas in Software Development is my web book about software development. You can find it at SoftDevBigIdeas.com.
Portable Wisdom
- Check out my web book Important Things to Know About Humans
Songs and Music
I’ve written many pieces discussing songs that I’ve found compelling in one way or another. I talk about their themes and meanings, as well as how they work.
- Songs Index – A list of content on this site.
- Lexicon of Song – A separate site offering this content.
- Reason to Rock – A separate site offering an entire online book discussing the aesthetics of rock music.
General Essays
Here’s an alphabetical list of essays I’ve written on a variety of topics. I’ve culled out any dated, topical pieces, so what’s left should still be useful reading.
You can also see a list of all my original essays grouped by primary topic, which makes them a bit easier to sort through.
Reference Summaries
I’ve written a number of pieces that serve as convenient summaries of ideas and models more extensively described by others. I’ve broken out a convenient list of these.
My Commonplace Book
One of my uses for Notenik is to maintain a digital commonplace book, containing brief quotations from others that I have found meaningful. This content can be accessed in a number of different ways.
- Authors Index – A sortable list of all cited authors
- Latest Additions – The most recent quotes added.
- Portable Wisdom – Daily Quotes randomly chosen
- Random Quote – Pull up a random entry
Recurring Topics
I use tags to identify various types of content touching on particular topics. You can use the tags cloud to find content on particular topics.
Finding Stuff
See the alphabetical index for an index to significant terms, authors and creators referenced from my original writings hosted on this site. Or just search for something.
Credits
See the Credits page for credits and licensing.
Donations:
I am happy to make all of my content on this site free for anyone to read and share, without any fees, personal data collection, advertising, or restrictive copyrights.
But if you would like to express your appreciation for my work by making a small financial donation, then all gifts will be gratefully accepted!
Clicking on the button below will take you to a page on the Ko-fi site, where you can “buy me a coffee,” if you’d like.
Thanks!