Links
A late contender for my favorite blog post of 2024
John Gruber: How It Went
But he’s an optimist at heart. You’d like him. I, of course, don’t know who you are, dear reader, but I know you’d like my dad, Bob Gruber, because everyone likes Bob Gruber.
It’s exceptionally rare for me to tear up reading a blog post,
Members
Why Mac gaming has such a hard time getting off the ground (members post)
A hard look at the numbers and why it seems like such a challenge to change the narrative about gaming on Macs.
The un-sexy aspects of “professional” tools
The word “pro” gets appended to a lot of products, and that tends to simply mean some combination of more features and better build quality. But I think there are (at least) 3 aspects to products, both hardware and software, that make them good professional tools.
1. Reliability
2. Predictability
3. Flexibility
Professional tools must
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Invalidating
John Gruber: The Brutal Clarity of This Result
I realized this year — or perhaps over the last four years — that for me, belief in the merits of democracy is quasi-religious. It’s more than a philosophy. It’s a fundamental belief. I have faith in democracy, and part of that is accepting the results
Links
A nice link on a bad day
Jeremy Markovich: Tony Hawk Wanted to Track Down a Mysterious Skateboarder From 1979. We Found Her.
Folks, we love two things around here: Tony Hawk and decades-old mysteries.
On a shitty day, it’s nice to have something pleasant to link to.
Politics
I’ve never felt worse about my country (but the fight continues)
I despise Donald Trump. I think he’s a lying, racist, fear mongering, transphobic, sexual abusing, convicted felon, incompetent, and dangerous person who is driven by hate and resentment.
Yes, I think Trump is a bad person, but he’s not what I’m most riled up about. What bothers me more is that half
Links
Substack continues their pull away from the open web
Sarah Perez for TechCrunch: Substack Is Giving Out Free Subscriptions to Boost App Installs
Publishing platform Substack is now pushing users to install its mobile app by offering gifted subscriptions. While Substack itself is available across platforms, including the web, those who want to take advantage of the free subscription offer can only do so
Here's hoping…
Tomorrow is the US Presidential election, and no one knows what's going to happen. Maybe Kamala Harris will
Some random YouTube videos I dug recently
I used to share some YouTube videos every week in my newsletter, but that turned into feeling like work, so I stopped. Buuuut, it is fun to share some joy with others, so here's a few videos I've watched in the last week or so that made me go, "damn,
Members
Call of Duty and "the average user" (members post)
What does Call of Duty's massive success (and horrendous user interface) mean about the importance of design?
Links
Apple acquires Pixelmator. Oh my!
Pixelmator Team: A new home for Pixelmator
Today we have some important news to share: the Pixelmator Team plans to join Apple.
This is huge for this company, and it’s well-deserved. Pixelmator has long-been a prime example of what a great Apple developer looks like, and I’ve used their products consistently
Links
Ghost is still the right tool for me
John O'Nolan: Democratising Publishing
Having seen how things worked on the inside for several years, the conclusion I personally came to was that WordPress and Automattic were not truly about democratising publishing, after all.
At the same time, I felt the product was becoming slow and bloated. WordPress was desperate to no longer
Links
John Green, Tuberculosis, and using your platform for good
Maddie Bender for The New York Times: Can John Green Make You Care About Tuberculosis?
Mr. Green has emerged as an unlikely spokesman in the global effort to fight the disease. His latest project, a book called “Everything Is Tuberculosis,” interweaves the social and scientific histories of tuberculosis with the present-day story of a
Links
YouTuber Patrick Willems? No, no. Filmmaker Patrick Willems 👌
Jennifer Maas writing for Variety: 'Dinner Plan' Short Film at Nebula Casts Griffin Newman, Zach Cherry
Nebula has set the cast for its upcoming short film from “Night of the Coconut” director and popular video essayist Patrick Willems, “The Dinner Plan.” A dark comedy about a guy with a rare food allergy who’
Links
A lot changed in 2004
Anil Dash: It feels like 2004 again.
A generation ago, those of us in tech might talk to our friends or family and hear them say, "I think the ads in my Hotmail account are terrible, and I can’t send any attachments. And Yahoo search is getting worse, plus Mapquest is so slow.
Links
The Quest 3S ain’t no Vision Pro
Michael Burkhardt writing for 9to5Mac: Meta Quest 3S review: Apple would never make this
The reason why I say Apple would never make it is for one reason, and one reason only: it’s too low quality.
Michael goes on to note the lower quality build of the Quest 3S, which admittedly is lower quality
Members
The medical community loves a headset (members post)
Apparently there are surgeons who are getting tons of value from the Vision Pro. That’s great, but is it evidence that the Vision Pro is a great success, or is it just that surgeons use literally every headset that comes out regardless of if those headsets are successes or failures?
Members
The “I can’t see it so no one can see it” fallacy (members post)
The iPad mini jelly scroll situation taps perfectly into my favorite category of controversy: things that have objective facts mixed with subjective experience. Beware the idea that we all see, hear, and smell the world the same.
