I was late joining FediForum this morning, so it’s great to see the video of the Threads demo is already online. This is really going to be interesting when it’s enabled for more Threads users. | Continue reading
I skimmed through Don Lemon’s interview with Elon Musk. The segment on the new Tesla Roadster was entertaining. Other parts, sort of painful and awkward. You can tell Elon gets increasingly frustrated. Probably an impulsive and strategic mistake to scrap the deal, though. | Continue reading
I’ve been thinking about this blog post I wrote 13 years ago more and more. A few years after I wrote it, I remember backpedaling a little, questioning my premise about free apps. But now with the EU’s DMA and CTF, it seems relevant again, and the closing line has proven correct … | Continue reading
On the latest Core Intuition, we talk again about Apple and the EU, with the news of sideloading and steady progress to the rules. From the show notes: They talk about whether Manton would open an EU subsidiary if given the chance, and whether simply plunging in and doing somethi … | Continue reading
No joke, $700 for an M1 MacBook Air (via Daring Fireball) might be the best deal for any Mac in the history of the company. They’re going to sell a bunch of these at Walmart. | Continue reading
Finally got around to registering for FediForum. Looking forward to the discussions. I don’t have any specific goals this time, just hoping to soak up what folks are working on and where we can improve Micro.blog. | Continue reading
It’s a cheap shot to complain about developer tools — and Xcode overall is great! — but something is seriously wrong in Xcode debugging in recent years. Feels like I can reload an entire React Native app’s JavaScript faster than I can view simple variables when stepping through S … | Continue reading
To underscore how important sideloading or marketplaces are to me, I would be willing to set up a subsidiary in the EU, pay EU taxes, and have custom app code that runs just in the EU in order to get it. It’s not only about the 30%. It’s independence. | Continue reading
Dichotomy. In Waco this morning in between state park visits. ☕️ | Continue reading
Ben Werdmuller on a first-class fediverse platform: I’m not bullish on squeezing long-form content into a microblogging platform, whether on Mastodon or X. Long-form content isn’t best consumed as part of a fast-moving stream of short updates. It’s a good post. In some ways, Micr … | Continue reading
More updates from Dave Winer: he has a blogroll on his home page again, and a new site blogroll.social. One interesting twist is that his blogroll sidebar is sorted by most recently updated blog. We’re going with manually ordered in Micro.blog, but I can see the value in automati … | Continue reading
I can’t blame spam for my failure to reply timely to support emails, but it doesn’t help feeling overloaded with junk messages. Today I took a first step: a new workflow that automatically marks anything with “guest post” as spam. No real customers ever ask for that. | Continue reading
The TikTok bill has passed. I like Ben Thompson’s thoughts on this… We can support a sale (because there’s risk with China’s influence) while at the same time being concerned that forcing apps to be removed from stores is its own dangerous can of worms (and not something to make … | Continue reading
Dave Winer has a new page about blogrolls. Micro.blog’s new recommendations feature supports this link tag too. I love seeing how an older idea can be dusted off and given new life for the modern social web! Lots of potential for the future too, linking blogrolls together. | Continue reading
“…a book is different—it is not just a material possession but the pathway to an enlightened mind…” — The Diamond Age | Continue reading
Excited to see Apple continue to improve the EU rules. The latest big change is web distribution, so we’ll have something more like true sideloading. Seems like a reasonable approach: To install apps from a developer’s website, users will first need to approve the developer to in … | Continue reading
Getting great feedback about the new recommendations feature in Micro.blog. I’ve made a couple more improvements this morning. Blogrolls were a sort of early social graph, and they’re still useful today! There’s a joy in discovering new blogs that goes beyond the blandness of lar … | Continue reading
Today we’re introducing a new feature: blog recommendations. This was inspired by recent interest in bringing back blogrolls, including posts from Dave Winer, his service FeedLand, the recommendations feature in Ghost, and feedback from Micro.blog users asking for new ways to dis … | Continue reading
I’m usually pretty good about catching and fixing auto-correct mistakes, but the one I always miss is when typing Hugo’s shortcode and it turns into shortcake. | Continue reading
Old steps and trail built by the CCC, at Lockhart State Park. | Continue reading
Finished reading: Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel. Wonderful. I had been stalled in my reading and this book was just what I needed. | Continue reading
I should take a break from blogging about politics, but I really like this Joe Biden ad. Acknowledges the “he’s too old” but turns it around to what has been accomplished, and what still needs to be done. Great work from the campaign. There’s hope. 🇺🇸 | Continue reading
Happy anniversary to my blog, started on this day 22 years ago, during SXSW. Actually a little tempted to get back to SXSW one of these years. Tech has changed so much, platforms come and go, but blogs remain. | Continue reading
We just published the latest Core Intuition all about Apple, Spotify, Epic, and the EU, including a last-minute update with Apple’s reversal. | Continue reading
TikTok asking its users to call their representatives seems to have backfired. From the committee chair Cathy McMorris: We also witnessed firsthand, in real time, how the Chinese Communist Party can weaponize platforms like TikTok to manipulate the American people. There’s bipart … | Continue reading
Rollercoaster week for the App Store. Spotify ruling, Epic banned, EU getting involved, Epic now un-banned. Whew! We recorded a @coreint in the middle of it and we’re gonna try to add an update before it’s published. | Continue reading
Good idea here from Ben Werdmuller for a Fediverse VIP service: Fediverse VIP is a managed service that allows any brand to create individual fediverse profiles for its employees and shared ones for its publications, on its own domain, using its own brand styles, with abuse preve … | Continue reading
Excited to see reactions to last night’s Biden speech. A couple minor stumbles, but he nailed the core parts of it. I also sincerely hope that everyone frustrated by Biden’s support of Israel listened with an open mind. You can feel a shift, especially with the new push for aid t … | Continue reading
That’s the State of the Union we needed. Biden fired up and ready to get back to work. 🇺🇸 | Continue reading
Nick Heer: Apple’s DMA compliance report is set in Arial, in case you are still wondering how things are going. www.apple.com/legal/dma… Also, the “Non-Confidential” in the document title… I’m imagining the Apple internal, confidential version is basically the same but for mature … | Continue reading
Tips for not getting overwhelmed and distracted in this era of infinite content… Turn off all notifications, except for a small number of close friends and family. Mute all Slack channels. Hide all mobile app badges. Disable search and web suggestions on iOS. Use RSS and mark-all … | Continue reading
I usually try to avoid quoting just the end of an essay (spoilers!) but the closing lines in today’s Stratechery update are great: …once upon a time — back when “There’s an app for that” was about developers’ contribution to the iPhone — Apple valued developers; today, when “Ther … | Continue reading
Almost a little surprised Apple has banned Epic yet again, because it just further supports a potential EU argument that Apple is not in compliance with the DMA. From Epic’s blog post: If Apple maintains its power to kick a third party marketplace off iOS at its sole discretion, … | Continue reading
Dusting off Android builds for Epilogue this morning, after a new iOS build was submitted to Apple. New versions of Android Studio, React Native, Gradle conflicts, and much more command-line chaos. Might almost have it under control. | Continue reading
Even putting aside the long list of gripes about how Elon Musk ran Twitter into the ground, I’m worried about his influence on the 2024 election. Meeting with Trump to potentially fund his campaign. Twitter overwhelmed with misinformation. It feels precarious. | Continue reading
If you’re a fan of Brandon Sanderson, make sure to watch today’s crowdfunding video to the end. I’m excited. Also going to pick up Dragonsteel Prime, but skipping the leatherbound books. | Continue reading
MacStories has a summary of EU rules tweaks today with the arrival of iOS 17.4. For marketplaces, the €1 million line of credit is no longer required if you have 1 million annual installs in the EU. Doesn’t appear to be any meaningful concessions from Apple, and no changes to the … | Continue reading
Just a few hours left in the Kickstarter for Tapestry. Looks like the Iconfactory can hit the next stretch goal with a last push. The project has a lot of potential. We need more experiments like this for the social web. | Continue reading
Another good monthly summary from The Fediverse Report. There was a lot going on last month with Bluesky. | Continue reading
I like Spotify’s move into audiobooks, but playback is still too focused on songs and albums. If you listen too far in a book (or a family member listens and you want to go back and listen yourself) it is nearly impossible to rewind because progress is tracked per chapter. Can’t … | Continue reading
The demolition of the Frank Erwin Center. It has been a part of Austin my entire life — under construction when I was born and opened a couple years later. Some great memories there. | Continue reading
Steve Troughton-Smith: A $2B EU fine days before the DMA goes into effect is a clear warning shot. Agreed. Apple’s response also bugs me. It ignores Spotify’s contribution to making iOS a valuable platform, and it gripes about inconsequential things like Apple reviewing betas or … | Continue reading
Rearranged part of the living room to create a workspace, with new prints from Cameron Moll on the wall. | Continue reading
Craig Hockenberry blogs about some of the questions that are being asked about Tapestry. Whether the app should create new posts or not is interesting. Most feed readers don’t have posting either, and it’s a slippery slope from basic posts to replies to eventually needing your ow … | Continue reading