video
The Theme System, the Theme Journal and why 80% of people don't achieve their New Year's resolutions
The Theme System is a cool idea from Myke Hurley and CGP Gray (co-hosts of the excellent Cortex podcast)
Blog
video
Why ScreenFlow's Animations Rock
I've talked about this before in numerous videos, so I wanted to make a single, focused video on
meta
Birch Bark has Moved to Substack
Check out the first issue over there (#46 total) and you can subscribe there if you have not already.
As a refresher for those who don't follow along, Birch Bark is a weekly newsletter (delivered every Friday morning), aimed at giving you my favorite things I found on the web that past week.
meta
My Quantified Life: 2020
Every other year I set up a quike survey for myself to take every night to track a few things in my life. These are things I'm either interested in improving, while others are just general curiosities. I'm publishing this on Christmas Eve, so I'm missing the last week
video
My 10 Favorite Free Apps and Services of 2020
As a companion to my 10 favorite paid apps and sevices of the year, here are 10 apps and services
video
My 10 Favorite Paid Apps and Services of 2020
Note: This video is *not* sponsored in any way. Everything I list if something I truly enjoy, not something I
Game
CD Projekt Red Wrecked their Reputation in One Fell Swoop
I don’t write about gaming a ton on this site, but the circumstances around CD Projekt Red and Cyberpunk
Birch Bark Issue 45 Preview
Below is the 45th issue of my Birch Bark newsletter, which I started back in February of this year. I was not expecting to have the year I had when I started, but I'm very proud to have published this every Friday since then. While I don't collect any analytics on
meta
And the Award goes To…
When I worked at Target, there was a list of 16 or so “personal leadership qualities” we worked from whenever we did reviews. You would have three that you were good at and three others that you needed to work on. They were all a bunch of generic things, and I honestly don't
video
Fitness Totals: A Simple App For Tracking Your…Fitness
Fitness Totals is out today and is a pretty cool app for seeing how you're doing in your
covid-19
The COVID Vaccines are Engineering Triumphs
One of the Greatest Feats in Human History - Synapse
The reason this vaccine didn’t take as long isn’t that Pfizer skimped on safety protocols. It’s because instead of doing each step of the process sequentially one after another, Pfizer and other companies took on enormous financial risk and did every step of
Apple
An 800ppi iPhone Display (or, why AirPods Max look lovely, but aren’t for me)
The original iPhone had a 3.5” display at 480x320px resolution, or 163 points per inch (ppi). The iPhone 12 as a 6.1” display at 2,532x1,170px resolution, or 460ppi. Pretty much everyone with good eyesight would agree that the iPhone 12 display looks much sharper than the original iPhone.
But…
What if
design
Having a Product or Support Mindset About Software
One of my favorite things to post are concepts for how Apple could improve their platforms in the future. Sometimes I'm dangerously close to what they end up doing, and other times I'm off the mark, but I like to do it because it is an extension to what I do
Links
The Best Explanation of RAW Photography I’ve Ever Seen
Understanding ProRAW. A journey into cameras, RAW, and a look… | by Ben Sandofsky | Dec, 2020 | Halide
To understand what makes it so special, the first half of this post explains how a digital camera develops a photo. Then we go on to explain the strengths and weaknesses of traditional RAWs. Finally, we dive into what’
video
A New Feature I'd Like to See, Enabled by ProRAW
ProRAW enables a lot of power in users, but it also allows Apple to get a little more creative in
Links
The “Force Closing Apps Makes Your iPhone Faster” of Macs
Is Google Chrome slowing down your Mac performance? - 9to5Mac
What piqued my interest was the technical side of this story, and some questions that I thought of while I was reading Loren’s report. Those questions were: Is it possible for a process to hide itself from Activity Monitor while it is running? When does
video
iPhone 12 Pro Review: 2 Months Later
I've been using the iPhone 12 Pro for just about 2 months now, and wanted to share my
Links
Google Chrome F.U.D.
Chrome Is Bad | Hacker News
It's a single anecdote that deleting Chrome on two computers sped them up. It provides zero evidence (even anecdotal) that it has anything to do with "Keystone" specifically. It provides zero evidence for the idea that "Keystone" is able to "nefariously hide itself