🆕📝 Uninvited Guest (Or, The Black Bear Snack Bar)
A(n admittedly cute) reminder that, yes, I do live right on the edge of wilderness. 🐻
Wow, have I really done 150 of these things? I probably should have done something special, but it's your regular interweb roundup this week! Thanks for reading!
🆕📝 Google’s New Home Gadget Refresh Gets a Thumbs Up From Me
I don't own any Google Home products and they're a real pain to set up at my parents' house, but I'll admit they've done a few things really well this time with the Streamer Box, Nest Thermostat, and Gemini Intelligence. #Blaugust2024
🍿 Just watched: Thor: Love & Thunder
At my core, I'm a gadget lover. Here are the latest ones I'm geeked about having in our home. #Blaugust2024
🆕📝 Crashing Clockwise #566: ‘That’s My Shredder Sound’
A gadget you should get, air travel tech, Apple's new Distraction Control impressions, anticipation for controlling more apps with Siri, space or sea, and permission prompt problems. #Blaugust2024
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You will never hear a British politician — at least not a mainstream one — mentioning God in a political speech or campaign. Ever.
These are really notable differences. Maybe it’s just “the grass is always greener” situation, but this sure does sound like a saner way to do elections.
I gotta say, I’m excited for Apple’s Writing Tools when Apple Intelligence rolls out later this year. I’ll probably rely on the Proofread option more than anything. I use Grammarly now, but it’s so distracting and I don’t enjoy it.
But at the moment, my only AI-capable device is my Mac…
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Between May and August, more AI Pins were returned than purchased, according to internal sales data obtained by The Verge. By June, only around 8,000 units hadn’t been returned, a source with direct knowledge of sales and return data told me. As of today, the number of units still in customer hands had fallen closer to 7,000, a source with direct knowledge said.
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Apple’s recent feature changes suggest a value system that’s wildly out of balance, preferring to warn (and control) users no matter how damaging it is to the overall user experience. Maybe the people in charge should be forced to sit down and watch that Apple ad that mocks Windows Vista. Vista’s security prompts existed for good reasons—but they were a user disaster. The Apple of that era knew it.
Oh how I love a spicy take! (Emphasis is mine.)
Long days in the mountains are always good days in the mountains! Thanks Lewis family for all the laughs! 📷
🆕📝 You (And I) Can Do Hard Things
An important reminder for today and every day. #Blaugust2024
🆕📝 I was wrong about the AirPods Max Smart Case
It's really not so bad. Might be good?
It seems that if I happen to stay up until midnight, I’m very likely to stay up until at least 1 a.m. 😣
🆕📝 Crashing Clockwise #565: ‘Friendship Dots’
Blogging fodder on Find My friendship or foe-ship, un-upgraded tech, Siri's second coming, tech travel lessons, time spent abroad, and AI friendship or foe-ship. #Blaugust2024
Jason Sattler, writing for FrameLab, gets so close to jumping on the POSSE train in suggesting that campaigns deprioritize X in order to sap its power and influence:
Go “Twitter Last." Campaigns from Harris for President on down should clarify that they will post to Twitter only after updating other platforms. Steering the media away from Twitter helps democracy. Announcing you will make news elsewhere will send reporters and users to these other platforms, as will every announcement the media makes that says, “As the campaign noted on BlueSky…” etc. Political strategist Murshed Zaheed calls this going “Twitter Last.” A huge announcement – like naming a vice presidential nominee – would be a great time to try this strategy.
I know news outlets don’t feel like they can leave X, but this seems like a good strategy to ween themselves off. But instead of pointing to other social networks as where the news breaks, I suggest campaigns post to their own websites first and then share the link.
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That not to say your iPad can’t do much more, and you’re thinking how stupid I am for not having Stage Manager float windows all over my screen, so I can edit videos and listen to background music. I think it’s remarkable that a tablet, albeit a ridiculously expensive one, can be all of these things to different people — but mine is just a full window machine, thank you very much.
My iPad is my favorite writing machine. I use multitasking, but not that often. Likewise to Greg, Stage Manager is too much for how I want to get stuff done here.
🆕📝 Belatedly Grading My Predictions for Apple’s May ‘Let Loose’ iPad Event
It didn't feel right that I never got around to reviewing how I did with my guesses. #Blaugust2024
🆕📝 Overcast’s 10th Anniversary Update
I'm sympathetic to Marco's reasoning behind and results of the foundational rewrite, I still love using Overcast, and, yes, I have some likes, dislikes, and wishes. #Blaugust2024
I finally buckled down and put in the work for the task looming over me for the past month. I’ll probably have to do more to it, but I think I got 85% of the way there tonight. 🤞
My reward? The next big, scary task on the to-do list. But it’s at least, I think, not as big, nor as scary. #LeapYear