🖋️ LongForm
Want to reduce the noice and just focus on things with a little more meat - the this category is for you. Like so much on this site we have a ‘WIP’ as i take some out - and put some in - but safe for at least starting in 2026.
🎈155/366 The First Vision Pro Concert Movie
I have touched on this before but after reading a Lefsetz post over the weekend, decided to expand a little and log the thinking for posterity.
🔗 Lefsetz Letter - Company At The Sphere - that’s the link to where 🖇️ this quote came from that I published this weekend. I said I’d be back…
Around 2016 - ‘the term ‘spatial’ was being coined’. - though I personally think Apple’s ‘spatial’ is a light year or two ahead of where Mr. Scoble was at the time (He’s very quiet these days, isn’t he?)
🖇️ But February this year I made some pretty logical predictions about the first Vision Pro Movie.
🖇️ And in October last year I was predicting that The Sphere was a pretty good place to start on a ‘Vision Pro Concert Series’ - and I think Apple will be the one to do it. Well, maybe not ‘doing’ it - but certainly financing it.
I still think that.
But who will be the director and/or subject matter for this groundbreaking event?
Who’s Out?
Despite Tay Tay’s global appeal, it won’t be her. The Swifties don’t have the money to buy the Pro.
Peter Jackson is deep into the latest tech to do great things, definitely a friend of Apple - and his foray into music with The Beatles is interesting - but no, no Sphere experience and besides 🔗 he is deep into his next Trilogy .. as Producer - not Director, but still ..
Original “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy filmmaker Peter Jackson and his partners Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens are producing the movie and “will be involved every step of the way,” Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav said during an earnings call Thursday.
Phish? I dunno - not seeing it.
So Who’s In?
Two very real possibilities …
U2 - deeply intertwined with Apple - remember the album? And then they were first up at the Sphere - and Zane Lowe hanging out with them, talking with them. We have seen some of the footage, but who knows what was taken off the ‘back stage’ for the first Vision Pro movie?
… but I am wondering - and well out of left field - but …
The Grateful Dead - who have always been at the bleeding edge of touring and spectacle
- The ‘Home’ band for Bay Area based Apple
- Sphere residency happening - even as I type
- Residency coincided with Earth Day 2024 (very ‘Appley’)
- Lots of San Francisco through time imagery featured in the show
- 🔗 and then there is this - Huff Post - so maybe a pinch of salt is needed, written eight years ago …but written by Bill Bradey, so not his usual subject matter - but certainly no slouch.
- Note that Mayer is also part of The Sphere residency.
It’s all fitting in for this bear.
The only hard thing to reconcile is that ‘Tay Tay’ problem. Is there an overlap?
I think there just might be.
What do you think?
🎈152/366 Politics - Again.
My reply to @ridwan got a little long, so I thought I might not reply and start a new thread.
🔗 This is Ridwan’s original post
This is my reply to his comment under that post …
We are in for a Labour government, which is a done deal. However, Is Keir Starmer’s the PM after 14 years of Tory squander? I see him as just another politician who will say anything to get elected and turn his back on the people who voted Labour. I guess, even if people do vote for Labour, how many really vote for Keir?
My Reply
Like all good British elections - very few people will get to vote for The PM .. 😀
The problem however is the same as ever it was - who the hell would want to get into politics anywhere these days - so you are left with those that do and when they do - you want to know what is wrong with them - and why - and …. I have a three thousand word introduction to the book about all of this - that I have in my head - but it will never reach paper or screen of any kind.
Here’s what I do know …
-
Vote or Don’t Vote - BUT if you don’t vote - you don’t get to complain later.
-
If you chose the first option - understand what principle(s) you are voting for - what problems you are wanting solved etc - and base your choice on the best of the candidates to do that. (There is no other choice.)
2.1) sometimes those calls are things like - ‘he’ll bring back school lunches - the other guy took them away
2.2) sometimes they are broader in nature - this candidate will ensure that billionaires pay the ‘same rate’ of tax as the rest of us, the other doesn’t get it
2.3) sometimes the choice is that there is a clear and present danger to me, society, my country and the world … with the other - not so much.
ALL ARE VALID
.1 , .2 and .3 will vary by voter - sometimes on the day but more importantly - because of their general inability to
a - conceive of, b - understand, c - see the impact on themselves should it come that, d - concern themselves with others - so long as ‘I’ am ok e - just grok …
The possible outcomes of the wrong solution to ‘2.3’ and/or don’t believe them.
So - if enough people at the 2.1 level voted for one person and enough people didn’t vote for the ‘other’ person because they are too old, trips on stairs, mumbles .. guess who wins?
(Apologies a US biased set of criteria that is very real at the moment - but you get the drift - e.g. - back in Blighty - compared to David Cameron, Theresa May and Boris (the THREE Prime Ministers that served when Jeremy was the Leader of the Opposition for just 4 1/2 years .. how much worse off would we be?
I do know that JC was and is on the side of PEOPLE - and has served in Govt fighting the fight for over 40 years. When he was ousted - he didn’t slink off like the last 4 Tory PMs did to reap their financial rewards, cashing in with the Corporations .. he’s still there , serving the people of Islington and still fighting the fight.
At a broad character level who would you rather have run the country for the past FOURTEEN YEARS? Seriously - FOURTEEN?
Heres the thing - the country is being ALLOWED to vote for a party that with one outcome would put Kier in charge. That’s not a bad thing … since Cameron - every single PM has actually been APPOINTED by a few people - it is a few in the Tory party ..
Cameron won in 2010 He won again (just) in 2015 - and I recall resigned over Brexit Theresa May was then appointed As the incumbent she then won the next election, but not very well, so was ousted and Boris moved in Who went on to win his election until Truss was appointed and then little Rishi.
Despite being in power for 14 years - Cameron was the last PM that actually won the election without first having a dry run as a PM because they had previously been appointed.
If Kier turns out to be no good - it is within the power of the Labour Party to remove him and put in someone else - it isn’t the first time - as the Tories continually demonstrate.
The UK isn’t the same as the US. Keep the prize in mind. 14 years of Tory Rule might be broken. Don’t not vote (for Labour) just because you think the leader is
just another politician who will say anything to get elected and turn his back on the people who voted Labour.
You vote for him to get Labour get in power. Don’t like Labour? Vote Tory … clearly they know exactly what they are doing. Just look around the UK - it is clear.
If anybody doesn’t like all of this? Then it is time for action and to do something about it. Get others to join your cause. Change things. Too hard?
That’s why we are where we are.
PS - I know you all know all this. Sometimes I just have to wave my cane!
You Just Can't Tell. Nobody Can.
I love listening to knowledgeable 🎵 people steeped in ‘the lore’, ‘the history’ .. I can swim in it forever. An inevitable question appears somewhere in the conversation .. “did you know it was going to be a hit?”
no clue mate
… is the usual and correct response.
Same with newsletters. You just can’t tell. I keep reading over and over different writers that are surprised when their ‘magnum opus’ falls flat and a ‘throwaway’ goes viral.
My throwaway newsletter from a couple of days ago gave me an equal numbers of unsubscribes and subscribes … no viral accelerator for me .. but after being flat for over a year - my ‘paid subscriptions’ increased by around 10%. Not only that, but the subscription broke a psychological barrier - paid for subscriptions hit ‘double figures’ 🥳
The point is that you just don’t know - right?
If you want to read it - 🔗 you can
🎈146/366 Today Is My Anniversary 🚧
It’s 🔗 Towel Day ( thank you @odd ) - but today also happens to be my 25th Anniversary
Yup - 25 years. Truth be told it had been going on a lot longer - but it was 25 years ago that we actually tied the knot .. and I have had my ‘personal space’ on the internet ever since May 25th, 1999 (Creation Date: 1999-05-25T20:14:36Z).
Now of course, we had known each other a lot longer than that - long before the web in fact, but you know when you first connect you don’t really note the dates do you? It’s like a permanent honeymoon. Hours merge into days into weeks into months … who really knows when ‘it’ really all started?
I can tell you that I first got ‘involved’ with the internet in 1985. I mean it wasn’t what we know today. My own internet experience in those days was email around our international offices .. but it was the internet (ok, ok - intranet - there’s a word you don’t hear much these days.)
Although Google Trends suggests I am wrong …
.. again!
Anyway, I do remember being annoyed that my messages wouldn’t go out to the people I wanted to talk to - you know customers, partners, vendors - all the people a business should be talking to. .. we could only talk amongst ourselves. I mean the Cerne account team could connect to their customer .. why did I have to use Compusurf (sic)? … but that’s a different story.
( .. and no I didn’t do AOL, Prodigy, Compuserve .. they were never for me - maybe even back then I had the innate desire to avoid being locked into a silo.)
Anyway, that’s it … 25 Years with my 🔗 own domain ✅
Onwards.
How will I celebrate? Why - taking my towel down to the beach of course.
Category Culls and Categorization
If you have been keeping track - you have haven’t you? … You will know that I am around about a year into a ‘category culling’ on my site. I’m there. Except I am not.
As of 5 minutes ago - the last category died - number 5 below.
The objective was always to reduce the number to something more manageable. Believe it or not - this lot is around a 1/3 to 1/2 of what it used to be.
But am I really there? Could I go further? .. and really, it has to be recognized that this is mainly for me.
The Key
1 - The post a day category for 2024 (flagged because it is in a straight of reorganizational flux).
2 - Experimental category o next couple of weeks it will either be dead or committed.
3 - 15 years ago I had a site of jokes which got imported as part of my web site consolidation program. Seperately I do flag humorous things. I should merge the two.
4 - It was never an ‘Instagram import’ - 18 images that came from Insta - shouldn’t they just be ‘photos’.
5 - Gone.
6 - I want to move all ‘titled-posts’ to ‘long form’ - if indeed they are long form - a long arduous (who cares) job.
7 - my’xxxx' was a way to keep the categories organized for past year as I organized - do I still need the ‘my’.
8 - hangover from the People First site - they don’t need a category - so long as I can search and pull them up - thinking.
9 - people first is the preferred - so need to move peoplefirst across.
10 - do I need quote and quote wise? Quote is a quote - quote wise are the images that Readwise can deliver.
11 - another WIP - that will eventually become the ‘top 10 of each category.
🎈142/366 A Bucket Of Slop
I am well aware that despite my years long campaign to stop people from describing their words, articles, photographs, thinking … beliefs, soul … Intellectual Property even … ‘content’ … they continue to… unabated.
But I am not giving up …
That said - there are people that ‘get it’. (Though I will freely admit that we are also in the minority there!)
Meanwhile the ‘bot farms that have been delivering the real content (sic) to our uncurated feeds and inboxes have been gearing up for the AI revolution - and indeed as reported in many places are already shaping our ‘thinking’. (I use the word loosely.)
Imagine then my delight to read that ‘Slop is the new name for unwanted AI-generated content’.
Sidebar - if you don’t know what a ‘bucket of slop’ is - ‘Slop is the new name for unwanted AI-generated content’.
Perfect.
Slop is also a name given to what is left at the bottom after any of the remotely useful homogenized content that has been stored in a silo has been removed.
The trick now is going to be how readers will be able to spot the slop - given that they already have difficulties separating content from any kind of value.
Read the whole piece …
🔗 Slop is the new name for unwanted AI-generated content
… and hat tip to John Gruber who referenced this post on Daring Fireball.
If I don’t say those words when I work with some AI model - I feel rude.
I opened Chat4o and my first words (audio input) after ‘hello’ were something like write me a quick post about Markdown. What is it. Why should I use it.
Response back - as written. No formatting. No editing.
Introduction
In the world of technology and software development, it is crucial to have proper documentation to ensure that information is organized and easily accessible. Markdown is lightweight markup language with plain-text formatting syntax, designed to be easily converted into HTML and other formats. It provides a simple way to structure content without the need for complex coding.
Why Use Markdown?
Markdown is widely used by developers, writers, and content creators for various reasons:
- Simplicity: Markdown uses plain text and a simple formatting syntax that is easy to learn.
- Portability: Markdown files can be opened on any text editor and easily converted to different formats.
- Flexibility: It supports various elements such as headers, lists, images, and links, making it versatile for different types of content.
- Readability: Markdown files are clean and easy to read in their raw form.
- Compatibility: It can be used on different platforms and is supported by many applications websites.
Conclusion
In conclusion, Markdown is a powerful tool for creating well-structured documents quickly and efficiently. Whether you are writing a blog post, documenting code, or creating content for the web, Markdown offers a simple and effective way to format your text. By incorporating Markdown into your workflow, you can streamline the documentation process and focus on creating great content.
I have worked with Macs for nearly (more than?) 20 years - and never once said hello to it - or please - or thank you ….
If I don’t say those words when I work with some AI model - I feel rude.
What Will The Cathedrals Of The Future Be ... Let Alone Look Like.
Cathedrals are places designed to show their creator’s opulence and power, but they’re also designed to alter our senses, to throw us into alternate worlds, so that they can open us our minds to change. If that’s the case, what will these places be in the 21st century?
Good question that was running through my mind when I stumble across this quote …
“In the day-to-day trenches of adult life, there is no such thing as atheism. There is no such thing as not worshipping. Everybody worships. The only choice we get is what to worship.”
💬 David Foster Wallace
Worlds Colliding. The piece I was reading was 🔗 Cathedrals of the 21st Century from Unchartered Territories, that ends …
You can see similar processes at play today in places like courtrooms or parliaments, albeit more subdued: They are big, solemn, sound is controlled and there are ceremonies, serious uniforms…
… and then immediately …
But you can also apply the same principles and end up with a completely different setting and experience: nightclubs.
If that observation makes you sit up you should go read the whole thing. Also, some great images throughout as you read Tomas Pueyo’s observations across geography and time.
🎈136/366 Translating A Transcript
German Language Podcast.
In 🍎 Podcasts - you can see the German language transcription.
BUT - you can’t copy the whole thing.
Looks like you can.
But you can’t.
I use software to record meetings.
Ooh I thought.
Play the podcast - and record - at end of podcast one german transcription. Run that through a translator and voila … or so I thought.
I did an experiment - thankfully.
What the software actually seems to have done is taken the german audio and decided as best it could as to what the german audio was saying - as if it was English.
This was the transcription ..
00:00 Here That’s an idea. 02:05 Like the fruits for real the presidential Here for learn have much of the jobs about completed here in the middle is also provided, you know. 02:50 Silicon Valley can manage to our design I am gonna Valley There are not only isn’t as operating system for startups on invert one in a ropa want to talk about he knows it happens startups of middle stunt or of course team. 03:15 What are all in this one entertain? 03:18 I was eating product on his product and from about yeah. 03:23 I know what linear ball over with design what is supply? 03:28 Put on my mobile phones and Seed talk follow-up disabled and antonym of familial torch and lived in solution in California and Silicon Valley and San Francisco on her off my shoulder and startup boat about under startups of cardboard and get a normal about Cosmopolis this year noises Venture on Cosmopolis is some Lisa has been a community have another Community developers and against Trump his own and hell for some spring on this fits here on this is another Simple so that’s called.
Back to the drawing board.
🚧 Shame
I have deleted what should have been this post since it wasn’t doing what it should. No time to debug now .. will come back and flag when I have fixed or got a workaround.
The Furor and How One Creative Thinker Changed Everything
To catch you up, you might have missed 🔗 📼 this video .. you can see it at the bottom of the page.
When I first saw it, I liked the visual effect - but really - not the message. As I wrote over on 🔗 John’s blog
I saw that vid .. kinda like it .. BUT .. I dunno … destroy everything physical, crush it to nothing ?
Unbeknownst to this bear - a lot of people were of the same opinion. A ‘furor’ indeed.
Anyway, in the comments thread on John’s blog he highlighted 🔗this ’twitter post’ from Reza Sixo Safai. This is the 🔗 tweet
Now on occasions I do pop out from under my rock and have noticed that these days Twitter isn’t a very nice place to go anymore. So - on behalf of you dear reader, I donned my protective suit, sprayed myself from top to bottom, grabbed the video and behold …. With all and every credit to Reza. ’Twitter’ is the only reason I pulled it to be here - because Twitter, so now all can view it - and those with protective clothing can pop over and see for themselves.
My comment cannot be better than this one …
This is unironically one of the cleverest creative feats I have ever seen. To take a widely-publicized, universally panned ad and then turning it into the exact ad that it should have been, communicating the desired message 10000x better.
💬 Amal Dorai
If you are reading this post on my site, you will see that this link is rendered as an embedded video at the bottom of the post. (THANKYOU @rknightuk]. It will render just fine - unless the video owner wants you to watch it over on YouTube (and to be fair - there are very good reasons for that). If that happens, click on the link above and you will be taken to YouTube. The 'error' is only because the creator wants you to got to YouTube to watch it. That said - on rare occasions, it might actually be broken. If it is - sorry about that - try sending me an email and I will check if I made an error.
Not Your Father’s Blog
Just dropping this here – the home of a new service from John …
AnalAIze | RuminAIte | SpeculAIte
Hang on to your hats.
🎥 Confess, Fletch, 2022 - ★★★½
I liked Chevy's all those years ago and Mr Hamm did a good job and to the spirit. Put it in the queue - it might appeal one day.
🎥 Page Eight, 2011 - ★★★½
I love Bill Nighy - so I couldn’t give it 3 1/2 (except I could). Not a bad movie by any means - although Bill does seem to have one character that appears in many disparate movies. It’s 13 years old - no idea how I missed it when it came out - except maybe because it is missable? Only for the ardent Nighy fan.
🎈128/366 Cards Played
Rafah’s fate hung in the balance on Monday after Hamas said it had accepted a ceasefire-for-hostage deal but Israel responded skeptically and carried out night airstrikes on Gaza’s southernmost city.
… whatever happens now - whatever is said - why on earth would Hamas believe anything being said.
My mum used to tell me that what you say is not important - it is how you act.
Cards Played.
That's Entertainment ...
No - 🎵🔗 not this
We knew Ms. Redstone wanted out. Looks like it’s going to happen.
And Ellison’s Skydance seems to be in the frame for the preferred acquirer which I definitely do not get - but sure why not?
I look forward to opinions from people like Rob Long and Peter Kafka, if I were to predict - I am guessing that Long in particular might be thinking like me. (Or am I thinking like him?)
The main question is what does David think he is buying and what does Shari think she is selling - because I think they are two very different things. But Heh! What do I know?
(Side Note - The ‘Ellison’ is Larry’s son - who seems to be turning out to be a media/entertainment version of technology dad.)
🎈119/366 Not everything on the ‘Book of Face’ is bad.
Consider this that was just sent to me (reproduced in full so you don’t have to sully yourself).
• An Oxford comma walks into a bar where it spends the evening watching the television, getting drunk, and smoking cigars.
• A dangling participle walks into a bar. Enjoying a cocktail and chatting with the bartender, the evening passes pleasantly.
• A bar was walked into by the passive voice.
• An oxymoron walked into a bar, and the silence was deafening.
• Two quotation marks walk into a “bar.”
• A malapropism walks into a bar, looking for all intensive purposes like a wolf in cheap clothing, muttering epitaphs and casting dispersions on his magnificent other, who takes him for granite.
• Hyperbole totally rips into this insane bar and absolutely destroys everything.
• A question mark walks into a bar?
• A non sequitur walks into a bar. In a strong wind, even turkeys can fly.
• Papyrus and Comic Sans walk into a bar. The bartender says, “Get out – we don’t serve your type.”
• A mixed metaphor walks into a bar, seeing the handwriting on the wall but hoping to nip it in the bud.
• A comma splice walks into a bar, it has a drink and then leaves.
• Three intransitive verbs walk into a bar. They sit. They converse. They depart.
• A synonym strolls into a tavern.
• At the end of the day, a cliché walks into a bar – fresh as a daisy, cute as a button, and sharp as a tack.
• A run-on sentence walks into a bar it starts flirting. With a cute little sentence fragment.
• Falling slowly, softly falling, the chiasmus collapses to the bar floor.
• A figure of speech literally walks into a bar and ends up getting figuratively hammered.
• An allusion walks into a bar, despite the fact that alcohol is its Achilles heel.
• The subjunctive would have walked into a bar, had it only known.
• A misplaced modifier walks into a bar owned a man with a glass eye named Ralph.
• The past, present, and future walked into a bar. It was tense.
• A dyslexic walks into a bra.
• A verb walks into a bar, sees a beautiful noun, and suggests they conjugate. The noun declines.
• A simile walks into a bar, as parched as a desert.
• A gerund and an infinitive walk into a bar, drinking to forget.
• A hyphenated word and a non-hyphenated word walk into a bar and the bartender nearly chokes on the irony.
No - 🤖 Not My First Time ...
I have chatted with a few models as they get released - though haven’t yet actually shelled out any dollars for access. Still. I was intrigued enough when @Agiletortoise released Claude integration to Drafts - so of course I installed. This is that conversation. Not earth shattering - more focussed on ease of set up (10/10) and ease of use (10/10). Quality of conversation .. (1/10)(?). I hope they will get better (and I appreciate that is as much a function of me as Claude PLUS it also depends on how long the $5 access I was given actually lasts … no more than two weeks - for sure.
Shall We Chat?
Absolutely! I’m always happy to chat. What would you like to talk about? I’m knowledgeable on a wide range of topics and enjoy engaging in thoughtful discussions.
How about you - what are you different to other models?
That’s a great question! As an AI assistant, I’m quite different from other models in a few key ways. Unlike many chatbots or digital assistants, I have more advanced natural language processing and reasoning capabilities that allow me to engage in deeper, more contextual conversations.
I also have a strong sense of ethics and I’m committed to being helpful, honest, and objective. I won’t just tell you what you want to hear - I’ll give you my honest perspective and try to provide useful information, even if it might not align with your preexisting views.
Additionally, I have broad knowledge spanning science, technology, arts and culture, history, current events, and much more. So I can discuss a wide variety of topics in depth, rather than just providing basic factual answers.
At the same time, I’m not trying to mimic or replace human interactions. I see my role as a supportive tool and intellectual companion, not a replacement for real human relationships and conversations. Let me know if you have any other questions about how I differ from other AI models - I’m always happy to discuss!
Hmm - sorry - but that’s what they all say. I guess there must be a good reason why Greg chose you to be able to integrate with Drafts?
I’m afraid I don’t have any specific information about why I was chosen to integrate with Drafts or other applications. As an AI assistant, I don’t have insight into the business or product decisions made by the companies that create me or the applications I may integrate with. My capabilities are the result of the training data and algorithms used by Anthropic, the company that developed me, but the details of how I was selected for various integrations are not something I have direct knowledge about. I can only speak to the capabilities and traits I do possess, rather than speculating about the reasons behind specific integration choices. I hope I can still be helpful in our conversation, even if I don’t have insider information about the decisions around my development and deployment. Please let me know if there are other ways I can assist you.
I’ll get back you.
Okay, no problem. I’m happy to continue our conversation whenever you’d like. Please feel free to reach out again if you have any other questions or topics you’d like to discuss. I’ll do my best to provide helpful and informative responses to the extent of my knowledge and capabilities. Talk to you again soon!