A new Very Good Tweet™ from @agiletortoise@mastodon.social from has landed:
Jason Snell explains how you can generate images of generic people with Image Playground using skin tones and collections of pseudo-people as foundation:
This is where it gets a little weird: Rather that building a person, Memoji style, you choose from three different collections of thumbnails, which are the various Appearances that might come up when you generate an image. They appear to be weighted by gender, so the leftmost is (mostly?) women, the rightmost men, the middle more of a grab bag—but there’s a lot of variation between each collection of Appearances.
What a strange interface.
🆕📝 The Magic Keyboard with Touch ID Rules
Yeah, I should have gotten one a long time ago.
Jim Eagar on saying goodbye to someone(thing) beloved:
Just last month, I wrote a blog post about doing things for the last time. Yesterday, my wife and I talked about times when we did some activity with Gina that was the last time. […]
I want this sad episode to help me not take the things and people I care about for granted. This includes my relationships with our other cats, my wife, family, and friends. The realization that all of them will, at some point, die, as will I, gives me a heightened sense of value and appreciation for each of them.
My heart goes out to your family, Jim.
Yesss, bring on the camera bar! I’m ready to get rid of the wobble. Though this would interfere with Apple’s new best friends, Spatial Photos and Videos.
(Image via 9to5Mac)
“Eats their own dogfood” is kind of a revolting phrase. I propose “test pilots their own rockets” when describing developers using and testing their own software on the daily.
Headed back to that Indian grill tonight, followed by Wicked for date night!
🔗 Apple Original Films lands “All of You” starring and written by Brett Goldstein:
Apple Original Films today announced it will expand its film slate with “All of You,” a humorous and heart-wrenching romantic drama starring and written by Emmy Award winner Brett Goldstein (“Ted Lasso,” “Shrinking”), written and directed by Emmy Award winner William Bridges (“Black Mirror”), and hailing from MRC.
I think Apple’s given Brett Goldstein a blanket go-ahead for all his projects. So far, so good!
Brendon Bigley: ‘Panic Inc. Announces Blippo+'
Panic Inc. — creators of the PlayDate console and publishers of games like Thank Goodness You’re Here_ — announced some kind of FMV… thing… at Day of the Devs today called_Blippo+. There’s no real information here beyond the above trailer and the ability to wishlist it on Steam, but this is one of those things I saw and immediately thought: Yeah, I’m gonna love this thing.
Boy that video was unsettling though.
🔗 Voice Memos update brings Layered Recording to iPhone 16 Pro lineup
With iOS 18.2, users will be able to play their original instrumental ideas through the iPhone speaker while simultaneously recording vocals using the new studio-quality microphones on iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro Max.
Michael Bublé thinks very highly of it!
Sure seems like a UI tailored for musical artists’ needs and these additional features would go well in a dedicated app, though. Let’s call it Music Memos. Oh wait.
Maybe Apple couldn’t get enough artists to download an app that wasn’t preinstalled. Shame though.
Matt Birchler (🔒):
The election was 5 weeks ago, and I’d say at least half of the houses in my neighborhood that put out Trump signs and flags before the election still have them up today. Maybe some are waiting for the inauguration on January 20, but something tells me a lot of these are staying up for the next 4 years (at least).
But yeah, I don’t get it, and I just don’t get how I’d ever want to walk out my front door each day and see a sign sucking up to the current (or former) President.
I fear many of these will stay up until they’re too faded to recognize. Then they’ll be replaced.
Jason Snell blogged about Mic Drop, a handy utility that mutes and unmutes your microphone, system-wide, with a global hotkey:
Mic Drop literally does everything I expected from it. It lives in your menu bar and has support for global hotkeys or AppleScript, optional audio and multiple visual notifications of mute status, the ability to choose which mics are muted and which ones aren’t, and even an optional push-to-talk toggle mode.
I don’t do many video calls anymore, but I always hated hunting for the mute key. The visual status in the menu bar and pop-ups are nice touches.
I have real trouble remembering the correct usernames for folks now that we’re all spread across networks and servers. Autocomplete often shows outdated accounts, leaving me unsure which to pick. As a proud Text Replacements power user, though, I’ve found the perfect workaround.
Anyone else seeing this issue where you can no longer copy a web address from the Safari View Controller? I use this all the time, and I think it stopped working during the 18.2 beta. I hopped off the beta train, but there’s no new public update for me in settings. Still broken out there?
I don’t use Sketch, but I very much enjoyed @rafa@mastodon.design’s recap of what they shipped in the app this year. 🤣
I so grateful to have received two pairs of Mack Weldon slippers for Christmas a few years ago. So when my original pair went missing this week — and were, frankly, getting a bit ratty anyway — I could just pull out a fresh pair! They’re so cozy.
Jason Kottke made an ask of his readers to point out things only they have noticed:
Anyway, I was wondering if any of y’all have any bugaboos like this where you feel like you’re the only one who knows this is happening.
While I didn’t notice this weirdness personally, I happened upon it via a Reel, I think it fits the theme:
Why on earth would the wizarding world so extravagantly celebrate Christmas? Wouldn’t Jesus just be a normal dude in their eyes? “You turn water to wine? Yeah, we all do that here!” Even returning from the dead isn’t so special with horcruxes and everything. 🙃
TIL you can navigate complex interfaces from within a Messages notification. I expanded this one, long-pressed on an email address sent, and was able to tap and swipe through the UI for adding the address to a contact in the tiny viewport. What if I chose to add a new one? Mini keyboard!?
🆕📝 The App Store Awards unexpectedly brightened my day (and my Today View)
A calculator app wasn't on the list, but the Awards still led me to it and its wonderful widget.
Re: @kottke@mastodon.social’s microwave game challenge. 10,000! (Also, I have thoughts about microwaves and their buttons.)
🔗 Apple Watch Ultra 3 Will Support Texting via Satellite (Juli Clover / macrumors.com)
Apple is hoping that the satellite feature will encourage Apple Watch owners to update to a new Apple Watch Ultra, with the third-generation model set to come out in September 2025. Satellite connectivity would also allow Apple to better compete with companies like Garmin that manufacture dedicated satellite hardware for use in off-grid emergencies.
This alone would be a worthwhile update for me. Add in the fresh battery gains and other usual improvements and we’ve got ourselves a banger watch upgrade. 🤞
Shoutout to Simple Scan which was the runner-up as Best New App in the MacStories Selects awards. I love this thing and it gets 3(!) spots in my Control Center for super easily scanning documents to the right place in Files.
(Also to Shareshot, which framed this screenshot and earned Best Design.)
🎙️ On an episode of one of my new favorite podcasts, The Sharp End, from about five years ago, I heard a shout-out to someone I know in real life! Another local climber and hiker, Matt Baer, apparently won a climbing helmet giveaway back then. Makes the world feel a little smaller, in a good way.
The Daley family thru-hiked 1300 miles of the PCT — with three kids under five 🤯:
On the PCT, none of the wrong distractions existed. The little ones found multiple purposes for everything around them. Rocks transformed into plates and jumping platforms, trees became resting places and climbing toys, and sticks turned into all the things. Their imaginations went wild, but so did the need for practicality and focus. They became partners in looking for good shade or where they all might sleep for the night–empowering tasks that helped the family function. And the parents transformed, too.
👏
Apple’s holiday ad, a personal web project, an Apple News tip, a magic song, an exciting trailer, an AppleScript, and a wild single-use timer. Are you getting it? These are not seven different things— oh wait, yes they are. 😆