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Om Malik: I for one, refuse to use Alexa and Google Home in my apartment. I don’t trust them, much like I don’t trust Facebook. Apple seems to be doing a good job of keeping its nose clean, but who knows when they come under pressure from “activist” investors. So much promise, but without any…
Om Malik:
I for one, refuse to use Alexa and Google Home in my apartment. I don’t trust them, much like I don’t trust Facebook. Apple seems to be doing a good job of keeping its nose clean, but who knows when they come under pressure from “activist” investors.
So much promise, but without any regulation by the government, we are asking for trouble.
Kashmir Hill and Surya Mattu: I’m going to warn you against a smart home because living in it is annoying as hell. I have shockingly few smart gadgets. And what I do have, switches, are not great. They all lack “just works” factor, and that’s crucial for these devices.
Kashmir Hill and Surya Mattu:
I’m going to warn you against a smart home because living in it is annoying as hell.
I have shockingly few smart gadgets. And what I do have, switches, are not great. They all lack “just works” factor, and that’s crucial for these devices.
John Herrman on his five year old iPad: It was, in contrast to the iPhone from which it descended, understood by its users as simply good enough — not life-changing, but handy. It was to be used until its users started noticing it, at which point it was to be replaced. It was, like the…
John Herrman on his five year old iPad:
It was, in contrast to the iPhone from which it descended, understood by its users as simply good enough — not life-changing, but handy. It was to be used until its users started noticing it, at which point it was to be replaced. It was, like the iPhone, immune to attachment. But unlike the iPhones, which might be reclaimed by a cellular carrier as part of a scheduled trade-in or just shoved aside by a two-year upgrade, iPads tend to linger. They have time to reveal their tragic thingness.
This is a pretty good read. I understand why older devices don’t move up to newer version of iOS, but it does suck that they eventually get put in device purgatory.
Another brass pen which weighs a ton, but is it any good?
When I last talked about pens, I talked about my Machine Era pen, which is brass and heavy. Today it’s about the Namisu X-01 in brass, which is amazingly heavier than the last.
Why money causes problems for indie blogs, and is also critical to their survival.
I’ve been writing this site for long enough now that I’ve seen a few shifts in the blogging community itself. When I started writing here, people were starting to jump on the band wagon of blogging in force. I read a plethora of sites, all publishing nearly daily (like this one), written by people trying to make *it*. Trying to strike out full time with their writing in some way. And all of these sites had the same model: small advertisement from something like Carbon, The Deck, or Fusion and weekly RSS feed sponsorships. This is the ‘Daring Fireball Model’ of monetizing a blog. Hell, even some of them sold t-shirts every year, same as John Gruber.
I used this model too. I made roughly between $400-600 a month from the small ad (I think $600 was the highest I ever got to on that) and charged from $250-$550 per week for RSS Sponsors (near the end I just started cranking up the price to see what the fuck would happen). It took me at least one full day per week to manage all of this. It took away from my writing and my focus. And then in 2012 it started becoming a race to the bottom, because while my site was still seeing large growth, the advertisers were unwilling to pay more, and in fact wanted to pay me *less* for the same.
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Jessica Guynn reporting: “In total, we made changes that reduced time spent on Facebook by roughly 50 million hours every day,” Zuckerberg said, in announcing the social media company’s fourth-quarter results. “By focusing on meaningful connections, our community and business will be stronger over the long term.” Unless my math is wrong (and I don’t…
Jessica Guynn reporting:
“In total, we made changes that reduced time spent on Facebook by roughly 50 million hours every day,” Zuckerberg said, in announcing the social media company’s fourth-quarter results. “By focusing on meaningful connections, our community and business will be stronger over the long term.”
Unless my math is wrong (and I don’t rule that out), given that Facebook has 1.4 billion daily active users, that’s only a reduction of 2.1 minutes per person, on average. Right? No wonder he used the larger number.
Then again, the average Facebook user spends 20 minutes on the site per day. So there is hope for humanity, is I guess the lesson.
Brent Simmons: Micro.blog is not an alternative silo: instead, it’s what you build when you believe that the web itself is the great social network.
Brent Simmons:
Micro.blog is not an alternative silo: instead, it’s what you build when you believe that the web itself is the great social network.
I really want to get a pair of these for work travel.
I really want to get a pair of these for work travel.
Lindy West: Being on Twitter felt like being in a nonconsensual BDSM relationship with the apocalypse. So, I left.
Lindy West:
Being on Twitter felt like being in a nonconsensual BDSM relationship with the apocalypse. So, I left.
Miranda Katz: Those numbers tend to be steady regardless of the length of the show—and according to Panoply, the few listeners who do skip ads continue to remain engaged with the episode, rather than dropping off at the first sign of an interruption. I’m fairly shocked by this, but I don’t think it’s far off…
Miranda Katz:
Those numbers tend to be steady regardless of the length of the show—and according to Panoply, the few listeners who do skip ads continue to remain engaged with the episode, rather than dropping off at the first sign of an interruption.
I’m fairly shocked by this, but I don’t think it’s far off before we get podcast ad blockers. Take something like the “deepfakes” ML that places people’s faces on another persons body (usually to make porn right now, or add Nicholas Cage into movies) — that’s a much computationally harder task than learning when a podcaster is starting a stopping an ad read. It will be interesting to see which company jumps on making such an app “click play on your favorite podcast, never hear an ad”.
Zeynep Tufekci: Part of the problem with the ideal of individualized informed consent is that it assumes companies have the ability to inform us about the risks we are consenting to. They don’t. Strava surely did not intend to reveal the GPS coordinates of a possible Central Intelligence Agency annex in Mogadishu, Somalia — but…
Zeynep Tufekci:
Part of the problem with the ideal of individualized informed consent is that it assumes companies have the ability to inform us about the risks we are consenting to. They don’t. Strava surely did not intend to reveal the GPS coordinates of a possible Central Intelligence Agency annex in Mogadishu, Somalia — but it may have done just that. Even if all technology companies meant well and acted in good faith, they would not be in a position to let you know what exactly you were signing up for.
Our laws are dangerously lagging behind.
Pretty neat trick, it’s too bad you have to use really shitty keyboards to make it work well.
Pretty neat trick, it’s too bad you have to use really shitty keyboards to make it work well.
Jake Swearingen: But if you find yourself grazing through social media with the same vacant appetite you might use to slowly work your way through a stack of Pringles — not enjoying it, not hating it, just sorta doing it — then give my solution a shot. You can always reinstall. Hell of an analogy.
But if you find yourself grazing through social media with the same vacant appetite you might use to slowly work your way through a stack of Pringles — not enjoying it, not hating it, just sorta doing it — then give my solution a shot. You can always reinstall.
Hell of an analogy.
Great post. I also see a parallel here between blogs, vlogs, and podcasts.
Great post. I also see a parallel here between blogs, vlogs, and podcasts.
Some great thoughts from Joe Cieplinski around using an iPad for writing. I still hold that an iPad plus a keyboard you like with Ulysses running — there’s no better setup for writing.
Some great thoughts from Joe Cieplinski around using an iPad for writing. I still hold that an iPad plus a keyboard you like with Ulysses running — there’s no better setup for writing.
Figuring out what is what with a new organizer for my backpacks I love so much.
When Triple Aught Design previewed the [Context Organizer](https://tripleaughtdesign.com/shop/context-organizer/) on Instagram, I was sold on the fact that I needed to try it. The Context Organizer is part Admin Organizer (a term for those military inspired, MOLLE laden, pouches you see strapped to bags) and part DOPP Kit. What appealed to me was a few things:
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Looking at my EDC setups, what I carry in my four kits, and what I’m still working on.
I’ve recently had a good reason to pull out the EDC setups I keep (which turns out to be four) and go through them. I’ve long been a person who wanted to have each bag ready to go, so I didn’t need to think about adding the basics to them. However, the issue with that is that it can be quite expensive to duplicate all your gear, which means that some of the bags end up with items in them that I don’t like as much as the others.
Adam Popescu: “Never be the first person in the group to whip out his phone,” Mr. Alford said. “Don’t be Patient Zero.” Good rule to live by.
Adam Popescu:
“Never be the first person in the group to whip out his phone,” Mr. Alford said. “Don’t be Patient Zero.”
Good rule to live by.
Love this quote from Om Malik: As a passenger, sitting in back of an Uber X is like playing Russian Roulette with someone else pulling the trigger.
Love this quote from Om Malik:
As a passenger, sitting in back of an Uber X is like playing Russian Roulette with someone else pulling the trigger.
Nick Bilton: There’s another theory floating around as to why Facebook cares so much about the way it’s impacting the world, and it’s one that I happen to agree with. When Zuckerberg looks into his big-data crystal ball, he can see a troublesome trend occurring. A few years ago, for example, there wasn’t a single…
Nick Bilton:
There’s another theory floating around as to why Facebook cares so much about the way it’s impacting the world, and it’s one that I happen to agree with. When Zuckerberg looks into his big-data crystal ball, he can see a troublesome trend occurring. A few years ago, for example, there wasn’t a single person I knew who didn’t have Facebook on their smartphone. These days, it’s the opposite.
This is why talking about this, and taking stands is so important. Because as futile and slow as it seems it may be, in the end self-preservation often shows through for these companies and they realize they need to change.