Slack’s Sneaky A.I. Training Policy

Corey Quinn: I’m sorry Slack, you’re doing fucking WHAT with user DMs, messages, files, etc? I’m positive I’m not reading this correctly. [Screenshot of the opt out portion of Slack’s “privacy principles”: Contact us to opt out. If you want to exclude your Customer Data from Slac … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 14 hours ago

iOS 17.5 Bug Apparently Restoring Long-Deleted Photos

Over the past week, several threads have been posted on Reddit claiming photos deleted years ago are reappearing in their libraries, and in those of sold and wiped devices. Chance Miller, 9to5Mac: There are a number of reports of similar situations in the thread on Reddit. Some u … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 15 hours ago

Sponsor: Magic Lasso Adblock — YouTube Ad Blocker for Safari

Do you want to block all YouTube ads in Safari on your iPhone, iPad, and Mac? Then download Magic Lasso Adblock – the ad blocker designed for you. It’s easy to setup, doubles the speed at which Safari loads and blocks all YouTube ads. Magic Lasso is an efficient, high performance … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 19 hours ago

Apple Pencil Shadow Casting

In a video on Threads, Quinn Nelson shows how the Apple Pencil casts a tool-specific faux shadow on the surface of the page. I love this sort of thing — a detail like this that, once you notice it, brings a little joy to whatever you are doing, whether that is creating art or jus … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 1 day ago

If Kevin Roose Was ChatGPT With a Spray-On Beard, Could Anyone Tell?

Albert Burneko, Defector: “If the ChatGPT demos were accurate,” [Kevin] Roose writes, about latency, in the article in which he credits OpenAI with having developed playful intelligence and emotional intuition in a chatbot—in which he suggests ChatGPT represents the realization o … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 2 days ago

The New Yorker Cartoon Caption Contest

Look, I should not tell you to choose my caption as the winner for this New Yorker cartoon. All I can tell you is that I have small, silly dreams and winning this thing is one of them. ⌥ Permalink⌥ Permalink | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 2 days ago

Generative A.I. Is Shameless

Paul Ford, Wired: What I love, more than anything, is the quality that makes AI such a disaster: If it sees a space, it will fill it — with nonsense, with imagined fact, with links to fake websites. It possesses an absolute willingness to spout foolishness, balanced only by its c … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 2 days ago

What Are We Actually Doing With A.I. Today?

Molly White: I, like many others who have experimented with or adopted these products, have found that these tools actually can be pretty useful for some tasks. Though AI companies are prone to making overblown promises that the tools will shortly be able to replace your content … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 2 days ago

Google Is Expanding A.I. Feature Availability in Search

Liz Reid, head of Google Search: People have already used AI Overviews billions of times through our experiment in Search Labs. They like that they can get both a quick overview of a topic and links to learn more. We’ve found that with AI Overviews, people use Search more, and ar … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 3 days ago

The iPad Pro Reviews Are in, and You Already Know How This Goes

Samuel Axon, Ars Technica: The new iPad Pro is a technical marvel, with one of the best screens I’ve ever seen, performance that few other machines can touch, and a new, thinner design that no one expected. It’s a prime example of Apple flexing its engineering and design muscles … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 4 days ago

ChatGPT Can ‘Flirt’

Zoe Kleinman, BBC: It [GPT-4o] is faster than earlier models and has been programmed to sound chatty and sometimes even flirtatious in its responses to prompts. The new version can read and discuss images, translate languages, and identify emotions from visual expressions. There … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 4 days ago

The Missing Years in Emoji History

Matt Sephton: At this point, I couldn’t quite believe what I was seeing because I was under the impression that the first emoji were created by an anonymous designer at SoftBank in 1997, and the most famous emoji were created by Shigetaka Kurita at NTT DoCoMo in 1999. But the Sha … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 4 days ago

OpenAI Introduces GPT-4o

Ina Fried, Axios: OpenAI Monday announced a new flagship model, dubbed GPT-4o, that brings more powerful capabilities to all its customers, including smarter, faster real-time voice interactions. The presentation was broadcast live and it is worth watching, particularly the last … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 4 days ago

Apple Is Still Launching Apple Music Features on Weird Microsites

Apple is spending the next two weeks trickling out what its “team of experts alongside a select group of artists” think are the one hundred best albums of all time. Sure, add another to the pile, I do not care. However, unlike Pitchfork and Rolling Stone, Apple has a whole music … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 4 days ago

Sponsor: Magic Lasso Adblock — the Safari Ad Blocker Built for You

Do you want an to try an ad blocker that’s easy to setup, easy to keep up to date and with pro features available when you need them? Then download Magic Lasso Adblock — the ad blocker designed for you. Magic Lasso Adblock is an efficient and high performance ad blocker for your … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 5 days ago

Abandoned Blogs

From Lucy Pham, a collection of abandoned blogs — exactly what it says on the tin. This reminds me of a really wonderful piece of net art from probably fifteen years ago — maybe more — which was a series of quotes from people apologizing for not posting in a while, or something s … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 7 days ago

The Paranoid Crusade Comes for Public Radio and Signal

Justin Ling: [Philip] Zimmermann is a bit of a hero of mine. (I tried to hide my gushing while we spoke.) I’m particularly fond of him because of the broad, complicated, messy coalition he helped usher in to continue advocating for this open internet: Anarchists, libertarians, pa … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 7 days ago

Sponsor: ListenLater.net — Listen to Articles as Podcasts

Experience your favourite articles as podcasts. Simply email Listen Later a link, a PDF, or a newsletter, and our A.I. — featuring remarkably human-like narration — will transform it into a podcast episode. Delivered straight to your preferred podcast app. Start listening for fre … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 7 days ago

Reddit’s Partner Policies, Applicable to ‘A.I.’ Licensees, Prohibits Using Deleted Posts

Reddit: Our policy outlines the information partners can access via a public-content licensing agreement as well as the commitments we make to users about usage of this content. It takes into account feedback from a group of moderators we consulted when developing it: We require … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 8 days ago

How Apple Shot ‘Let Loose’

Stu Maschwitz: After Apple released a behind-the-scenes video about the production of “Scary Fast,” the Internet did its internet thing and questioned the “Shot on iPhone” claim, as if “Shot on iPhone” inherently means “shot with zero other gear besides an iPhone.” These takes we … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 8 days ago

Slop Is a Good Name for Unwanted A.I.-Generated Material

“Gabe” on Twitter [sic]: it’s cool how every google search now starts with a wall of LLM slop that is completely useless and takes up half the screen Via Simon Willison: Not all promotional content is spam, and not all AI-generated content is slop. But if it’s mindlessly generate … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 8 days ago

The Hacks of Modern WordPress Theme Development

David Bushell: I loathe what WordPress development has become. If you haven’t kept up with Gutenberg and full-site editing (FSE) you may be surprised at how radically different modern WordPress themes are — and not in a good way. Modern WordPress theme development is a series of … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 9 days ago

Steve Albini Has Died

What a loss, and what a life. A trip through Steve Albini’s catalogue as a recording engineer — never “producer” — is a varied and lengthy excursion. Yes, he recorded Nirvana’s “In Utero” and it is very good, and he also worked with Cloud Nothings, and Sunn O))), and Low, and bla … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 9 days ago

TikTok Sues U.S. Over Divest-or-Ban Law

Rebecca Kern, Politico: TikTok and its parent company ByteDance sued Tuesday to challenge a law President Joe Biden signed to force the sale or ban of the video sharing app. The petition filed with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit claims the law viol … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 10 days ago

Apple Introduces M4 SoC in New iPad Pro Models

Kudos to Mark Gurman — Apple really did introduce the M4 SoC in the new iPad Pro models. The M4 comes just six months after Apple launched the M3, which is currently used in half the Mac lineup. The other half — the Mac Mini, the Mac Studio, and the Mac Pro — all use […]⌥ Permali … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 10 days ago

Judge Mulls Sanctions Over Google’s Routine Destruction of Chat History

Ashley Belanger, Ars Technica: Near the end of the second day of closing arguments in the Google monopoly trial, US district judge Amit Mehta weighed whether sanctions were warranted over what the US Department of Justice described as Google’s “routine, regular, and normal destru … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 11 days ago

Apple’s Shifting Supply Chain

Cheng Ting-Fang and Lauly Li, Nikkei: Apple is deepening its ties with China even as it further expands production in Southeast Asia and India, highlighting the balancing act the iPhone maker is striking between politics and business. Apple increased its China-headquartered suppl … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 11 days ago

Sponsor: ListenLater.net — Listen to Articles as Podcasts

Experience your favourite articles as podcasts. Simply email Listen Later a link, a PDF, or a newsletter, and our A.I. — featuring remarkably human-like narration — will transform it into a podcast episode. Delivered straight to your preferred podcast app. Start listening for fre … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 12 days ago

Microsoft Says It Is Prioritizing Security Again

Satya Nadella, in a memo to Microsoft employees since posted on the company’s blog: Today, I want to talk about something critical to our company’s future: prioritizing security above all else. Microsoft runs on trust, and our success depends on earning and maintaining it. We hav … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 13 days ago

Sponsor: ListenLater.net — Turn Articles Into Podcasts

Thanks to Listen Later for sponsoring this week’s posts at Pixel Envy. Some sponsors provide their own Friday posts, but I was asked to write a little something of my own for Listen Later and I am happy to do so. I only accept sponsorships for products I actually like and would u … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 14 days ago

WhatsApp Pushes Back on Encryption-Hostile Policies in India

Raghav Mendiratta, of Stanford University’s Center for Internet and Society, in March 2021: Under Rule 4(2), it is mandatory for a significant social media intermediary providing messaging services to identify the first originator of a message if a competent court or executive au … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 15 days ago

Apple Modifies Terms of Core Technology Fee With More Exceptions

Apple: […] Today, we’re introducing two additional conditions in which the CTF is not required: First, no CTF is required if a developer has no revenue whatsoever. […] Second, small developers (less than €10 million in global annual business revenue*) that adopt the alternative b … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 15 days ago

Spotify Is Recommending ‘A.I.’-Generated Music

Zach Ocean: Encountered AI music in the wild today Motown-style tracks straight from Suno/Udio with … interesting … titles and lyrics Recommended by Spotify via Discover Weekly These “interesting” songs include instant classics like “My Arms Are Just Fuckin’ Stuck Like This” and … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 16 days ago

‘Dark Wire’

Joseph Cox has a new book called “Dark Wire” coming out in June about Anom, a company that purportedly distributed highly secured phones but was actually an FBI operation. Cox published a short teaser on Mastodon and was interviewed briefly by Ben Smith of Semafor. I am looking f … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 17 days ago

Tech Journalism Has the Same Faults as Other Beats

Timothy B. Lee, writing in Asterisk: Over the last decade, Silicon Valley elites have grown increasingly frustrated with media coverage of their industry. And they aren’t wrong that coverage has grown increasingly negative. But I think they’re wrong to assume this reflects a host … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 17 days ago

The Curious Case of Apple’s Third-Party SDK List for Privacy Manifests

Apple: Starting May 1, 2024, new or updated apps that have a newly added third-party SDK that‘s on the list of commonly used third-party SDKs will need all of the following to be submitted in App Store Connect: Required reasons for each listed API Privacy manifests Valid signatur … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 17 days ago

From Space to Story in Data Journalism

Robert Simmon, Nightingale: The launch of Ikonos was one of a handful of developments that allowed newsrooms to expand from reporting on rocket launches and satellite hardware, to using remote sensing data as an essential tool to help tell stories. A wide variety of satellite dat … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 18 days ago

Sponsor: ListenLater.net — Turn Articles Into Podcasts: Send a Link, Receive Human-Like Narration to Your Podcast App

Welcome to a world where your reading list becomes your listening playlist. We are thrilled to introduce you to ListenLater.net — an innovative service that turns articles into podcasts, making your favourite reads accessible in your favourite podcast app. Have you ever stumbled … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 18 days ago

What Is Noise?

Rarely do I link to something just because I want you to go read it, but this piece by Alex Ross in the New Yorker is just such an occasion. It is a wonderful piece about how we sometimes embrace noise and sometimes reject it, and what “noise” even means. (Via Matt.) ⌥ Permalink⌥ … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 19 days ago

FCC Votes to Restore Net Neutrality Rules in U.S.

Tom Wheeler, former FCC chairman, writing for the Brookings Institution in October, following a vote to begin the process of reclassifying broadband as a “Title II” telecommunications service, regarding efforts to paint net neutrality regulations as no big deal: It is the conduct … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 19 days ago

Lots of People Were Locked Out of Their Apple IDs

Michael Tsai: I had another instance of my Apple ID mysteriously being locked. First, my iPhone wanted me to enter the password again, which I thought was the “normal” thing it has done every few months, almost since I got it. But after doing so it said that my account was locked … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 20 days ago

I Hope This Email Finds You

Waldo Jaquith: I made a new Mastodon bot, called “I Hope This Email Finds You.” Twice a day it proposes a novel way to conclude that sentence that opens so many emails. (It uses phrases from Google Books that include the phrase “finds you.”) I’ve been having fun reading these, so … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 21 days ago

Websites That Forbid Other Websites From Linking to Them

Malcolm Coles: 10+ years ago I created an annual list of websites that FORBADE you from linking to them, DEMANDED you write to ask for permission or LIMITED links to only their home page. Royal Mail even promised to post me a paper licence. Now a decade has passed, let’s see who’ … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 21 days ago

Sponsor: Magic Lasso Adblock: Incredibly Private and Secure Safari Web Browsing

Online privacy isn’t just something you should be hoping for — it’s something you should expect. You should ensure your browsing history stays private and is not harvested by ad networks. By blocking ad trackers, Magic Lasso Adblock stops you being followed by ads around the web. … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 21 days ago

The Onion Is the Latest Publication to Be Sold by G/O Media

Mark Stenberg, reporting for Adweek in January: Digital media company G/O Media is shopping around its portfolio of editorial assets in hopes of securing buyers for individual titles, part of a broader effort to divest the properties ahead of another challenging year for the medi … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 22 days ago

‘Microsoft Must Stop Selling Security as a Premium Offering’

Mary Jo Foley: In a perfect world, Microsoft would take security seriously again. It would be transparent about breaches. Its execs would stop gloating about increasing security service revenue at a time when Microsoft can’t secure its own employees, let alone customers, against … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 22 days ago

True Believing Tesla Retail Investors

Hardika Singh, Wall Street Journal: Bartash isn’t alone. Scores of individual investors have piled into Tesla shares in recent years, lured by the company’s technology, visionary chief executive and mammoth stock market gains. Through the end of last year, the stock was one of th … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 23 days ago

The Utility of Google Search Was Sacrificed for Ad Growth

Ed Zitron read a bunch of the emails released in United States v. Google and believes the quality of Google’s search engine has been in decline since early 2019 thanks to new leadership: These emails are a stark example of the monstrous growth-at-all-costs mindset that dominates … | Continue reading


@pxlnv.com | 23 days ago