PKM Weekly April 2 2023 – Issue 063

Welcome to the PKM weekly newsletter. My goal is to round up good resources in the PKM space so you don’t have to. If you get value from this newsletter consider supporting it by becoming a member. You could also purchase a course if that fits your needs better. Membership includ … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

Don’t Buy a Piece of Substack – Own Your Work

Let’s talk about Substack starting its enshittification walk towards death by asking writers to prop up a company that doesn’t make money. To read this post you need to be a member. Members get my courses as well as the weekly research notes.. | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

Repurposing a ThinkPad 701C with Framework

I love this repurposing of an old computer with new brains from Framework. Before I purchased my 13″ Framework I tried to get an older ThinkPad, but after numerous shipping issues, I never got any of them. I love my Framework laptop. I love that even though I missed out on their … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

The Richest School Can’t Afford to Pay Workers Properly

This story from Vice about Harvard shows the sad state of affairs across the working world in North America. Harvard is doing the “great service” for it’s student workers of showing them resources to help them pay for things, like food. They want to be congratulated for this, whi … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

Canadian Government Sinks More Money into Propping Up Fossil Fuels and Planes

Sigh…so it appears that the current federal budget has money earmarked for “making improvements to air travel”. They have $1.8 billion dollars devoted to this nebulous “improvement” campaign, specifically to improve security screening. Most of us know that the pain we go through … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

Control Sonos from Fedora

For a while now I’ve controlled my Sonos system via AirPlay from any one of my Apple devices. But with a Fedora Framework laptop in my house, I needed to find a new way to send audio to the speakers without needing AirPlay. Unfortunately, Sonos doesn’t make an official Linux app, … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

PKM Weekly March 26 2023 – Issue 062

Welcome to the PKM weekly newsletter. My goal is to round up good resources in the PKM space so you don’t have to. This issue was sponsored by Reflect.app. Reflect is a note-taking app that mirrors the way your brain works through networked notes. It has a GPT-4 AI assistant that … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

What Does it Take for Us To Rethink Our Most Closely Held Ideas

Today we look at why it’s hard to rethink our closely held ideas, and how to engage in the work needed to start thinking more critically about them. If you want to read this whole post become a member. Members get all my courses included.. | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

How to Access Synology in Fedoras Terminal

I had to move a bunch of files over from macOS to my Framework laptop, including a bunch of node stuff that just wasn't copying via the standard file browser in Fedora 37. This means I turned to rsync which will just work to copy any amount of files, and can resume itself. Wh … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

Publish from Obsidian to WordPress

Back in early 2022 I covered an Obsidian plugin that let you publish to WordPress and at the time I wasn’t all that impressed. It felt hard to use, didn’t remember your password, and really didn’t save any time. Since then I had it on my list to write a better plugin that took ad … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

PKM Weekly March 19 2023 – Issue 061

Welcome to the PKM weekly newsletter. My goal is to round up good resources in the PKM space so you don’t have to. If you get value out of this newsletter consider supporting it by becoming a member. You can either get my weekly thoughts or all my courses and my weekly thoughts. … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

Excellent Look at why TikTok Bans are Economic not Privacy Related

From Paris Marx Since the dawn of the internet era, the United States has been pushing the line that every company needed to allow unfettered access to the web, or else they were violating the rights of their citizens. Any country that dared limit access to the web was chastised … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

Owning Books is Resistance

In today’s member post we talk about owning books as an act of resistance to censorship. Specifically physical books. If you want to read the whole post become a member. Members also get my courses.. | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

Security Recommendations from the NSA

This is a great set of security recommendations from the NSA. Some of them are going to be hard for non-technical users, like having 3 different wireless networks. One for you, one for guests, one for IoT devices. Overall, if you can do a number of these recommendations, you’ll b … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

The Impending US Ban on TikTok has little to do with Privacy

Casey Newton from Platformer on what appears to be the impending banning of TikTok in the US. But I’m deeply uncomfortable about the implications of governments making one-off decisions to eliminate social apps on national security grounds, while at the same time taking a pass on … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

Obsidian Novel Word Count

Depending on how you have your projects organized, you may want the word count of a folder. This is where Novel Word Count for Obsidian can help you. Novel Word Count does one thing, count the words of the items in the folders in your Obsidian vault. By default it will only show … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

Don’t Trust Facebook’s Decentralized Social Network

I recently read on Platformer that Facebook is trying to build a “next-generation” text-based social media platform to replace Twitter. I mean sure, Twitter is dying and its death is not happening nearly as slowly as I thought it would be1, but why on earth should we trust Facebo … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

It’s okay to not be creative

The third installment in some thoughts on creativity. It’s okay to not be creative. Tomorrow I’ve got 2 kids at home and a puppy to take care of. Usually, I’d record a YouTube video but I find it unlikely that I can get the dog to settle and the two kids occupied at the same […] | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

It’s Okay to be Bad at Things – to be creative

Yesterday I wrote about the media demanding our attention and we can’t find the time we need to be creative. One thing I forgot to mention is that it’s okay to be bad at things. I’m terrible at email, I don’t respond in Discord, and as I said yesterday my phone is almost entirely … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

PKM Weekly March 12 2023 – Issue 060

Welcome to the PKM weekly newsletter. My goal is to round up good resources in the PKM space so you don’t have to. If you get value out of this newsletter consider supporting it by becoming a member. You can either get my weekly thoughts or all my courses and my weekly thoughts. … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

When the Media “Demands” Our Attention

I recently got mentioned in a Mastodon discussion about creativity. Here is the exact wording from Q. It’s hard to be productive as a creative person in the modern age because we are inundated with media that demands our attention and responses. I’d be interested to hear from oth … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

Some Fun Framework Laptop Information

I just ordered my first non-Apple laptop in 10-years, a Framework laptop. I’ll be running Fedora on it and for the first time in a while I’m excited about the new tech coming into my house. Here are some fun reads/videos that show why I’m excited about the new laptop. I Could mak … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

Easy iFrames in Obsidian

I recently started gaming again and built a second Obsidian vault to keep track of the resources I want for various games. At this point it’s mostly a repository for Hollow Knight. This means I have lots of videos to embed and my previous method with a Templater file to start fro … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

PKM Weekly March 5 2023 – Issue 059

Welcome to the PKM weekly newsletter. My goal is to round up good resources in the PKM space so you don’t have to. If you get value out of this newsletter consider supporting it by becoming a member. You can either get my weekly thoughts, or all my courses and my weekly thoughts. … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

Student Loan Forgiveness is Bad for Rich People

Today we talk about why rich people want to stop student loan forgiveness. They say it’s not fair since they won’t get any debt forgiven, but really they want to make sure people that aren’t rich enough don’t compete with them for jobs. To read this whole post become a member. Me … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

In Person Schooling is Literally Killing Kids

While there was much rhetoric around COVID-19 school closures harming the well-being of children, with some sources saying these COVID-19 closures increased suicide, a new study calls that finding into question. This study used a number of methods to track the history of teen sui … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

One Simple Trick to Make Connections with Your Notes

I’ve helped a number of people with their note system, and almost every one of them has had the same problem. This single problem can be fixed with one trick, not an easy trick, but it’s the single biggest thing standing between you and producing something from your notes. Make T … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

PKM Weekly Feb 26 2023 – Issue 058

Welcome to the PKM weekly newsletter. My goal is to round up good resources in the PKM space so you don’t have to. If you get value out of this newsletter consider supporting it by becoming a member. You can either get my weekly thoughts, or all my courses and my weekly thoughts. … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

You’re Not Family – Business Doesn’t Care About You

Let’s talk about the “family” rhetoric companies use to exploit workers. If you want to read these posts become a member. Members get my courses included.. | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

SteamOS vs iPadOS

I recently realized that my kids are older now and I have time for gaming again, so I purchased a Steam Deck for my birthday. If you’re not familiar with it, a Steam Deck is a handheld gaming computer that runs Linux under the hood. It’s dockable to external monitors, and even le … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

PKM Weekly Feb 19 2023 – Issue 057

Welcome to the PKM weekly newsletter. My goal is to round up good resources in the PKM space so you don’t have to. If you get value out of this newsletter consider supporting it by becoming a member. You can either get my weekly thoughts or all my courses and my weekly thoughts. … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

The Rich Person’s Guide to Creating an Innovative Child

Today we talk about a book that seems like it should be about raising innovative children. It’s really a guidebook for rich parents to help their kids get ahead and never addresses any structural issues with education or society. To read the whole post become a member. Members ge … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

3 Things OmniFocus Gets Right

I recently spent a few months with OmniFocus as my main task manager as I investigated building a course around using OmniFocus. To keep it short, no plans for an OmniFocus course. There are enough things that drive me bonkers that I’m going to stop using OmniFocus. Now there are … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

Soggy Straws vs Private Jets

So it was Super Bowl weekend and while 140 private jets appear to have been tasked with delivering rich people back home after the event I was rushing through Mcdonald’s and was delivered a paper straw to drink with. As you can guess from the title, it got soggy long before I was … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

PKM Weekly Feb 12 2023 – Issue 056

Welcome to the PKM weekly newsletter. My goal is to round up good resources in the PKM space so you don’t have to. If you get value out of this newsletter consider supporting it by becoming a member. You can either get my weekly thoughts, or all my courses and my weekly thoughts. … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

If Books Could Kill – Ruined my Reading

This is a members-only post so you need to become a member to read all about how my critical reading improved after listening to If Books Could Kill.. | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

The Obsidian Plugins I Actually Use

I’ve shown off a lot of Obsidian plugins here, and a bunch of them haven’t made it into my regular rotation despite my initial excitement about them. Today we’re going to look at those plugins that I do use regularly because they fit my workflow. Book Search Each book I read gene … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

The Tragedy of AI and Google Bard

After reading Casey Newton’s post on Google playing catch up with AI via Bard I’ve been prompted to complete some thoughts I’ve had brewing about search. When I want to research a new product I no longer go to Google. The clickbait and ill-informed reviews of products are a waste … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

We’re just workers and can be let go at any time

From Bryan Merchant at The Los Angeles Times “I think it’s waking people up to some realities of what the industry is really like,” Alejandra Beatty said. “We are workers. Even though we have benefits and we are highly trained — we’re still workers. We can still arbitrarily lose … | Continue reading


@curtismchale.ca | 1 year ago

The Mullet Method of Deep Work

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@curtismchale.ca | 3 years ago