What is HobbyStack?
HobbyStack is a hobby discovery platform. It helps people find activities that genuinely fit their life, their budget, time, living situation, and personality, instead of just whatever is trending. And once you find something, it helps you actually start.
Why I built it
Most hobby content online is either a generic listicle written to rank on Google, or a deep forum thread that already assumes you know what you are doing. Neither helps the person who is just trying to figure out whether a hobby is right for them, or how to take a real first step without spending a fortune or an entire weekend on research.
I built HobbyStack to fill the gap between “I want a hobby” and your first actual session. The hobby pages give you an honest picture of what something really involves, cost, physical demand, time, space, whether it is solo or social, and the getting-started steps break it into small, doable moves instead of a vague pep talk.
Who is behind it
HobbyStack is a small, independent project, built and run by one person, Michael van Oudtshoorn, not a faceless media company. I am a developer and a serial hobby-starter myself, and the frustration that shaped this whole thing (starting things, quitting things, not knowing where to begin) is one I have lived plenty of times.
Being one person means I can keep it honest and opinionated instead of watering everything down. It also means I read the feedback myself. If something is wrong, there is a real human on the other end who wants to fix it.
How the data and guides get made
I will be straight about this, because trust matters more than sounding impressive. The hobby database and the first drafts of the guides are built with a mix of research and AI tooling, which is the only way one person can cover 200-plus hobbies at any real depth. But the goal is accuracy, not volume, so every hobby is grounded in real sources:
- Real communities. The active subreddits, forums, and Discord servers for each hobby, to learn what beginners actually get wrong, what gear people actually use, and what the experienced consensus looks like.
- Books, courses, and organizations. Where authoritative instruction or a governing body exists (ABANA for blacksmithing, the American Homebrewers Association, and so on), guidance is checked against them.
- Corrected fast. When something is wrong, out of date, or a reader flags it, it gets fixed. Feedback is a first-class part of how the content stays honest, not an afterthought.
What I hold it to
- No thin content. If a page is not genuinely useful to a beginner, it does not go up.
- Honest tradeoffs. Hobby pages say who a hobby is not for, and what the annoying parts are, not just the highlights.
- Affiliate links are disclosed. Some gear links earn a commission at no cost to you. That never decides what gets recommended, the recommendation is what the community actually uses.
- Gear I would not use myself, or that practitioners do not endorse, does not get recommended.
Corrections and contact
Spotted an error, disagree with a recommendation, or think something important is missing? I want to hear it. Use the feedback button on any page, or email me directly at 101michael108@gmail.com. Accuracy is the whole point, and reader feedback is a big part of how it gets there.