💬 Quotes
“I don’t believe writing for an audience means giving in to the system. I do believe you have to write for yourself, but you have to do it with the intention that there will be a reader at the end.”
💬 William Gallagher
David Fisher has the scoop this morning in the NZ Herald about Auckland Mayor Wayne Brown’s WhatsApp comments to his ‘Grumpy Old Men’ tennis mates about having to cancel their game on Friday because of having to deal with media ‘drongos’ requests about the flood. This will embolden more people to call for his resignation. And when Wayne loses the Herald he is in trouble…the detail about Brown begging Fish not to run it is instructive.
💬 Wayne Hickey
The article ….
🔗 Auckland floods: Mayor Wayne Brown’s 30min phone call with the Herald.
… which I haven’t read because it is paywalled, opens with these words …
Is The Stream As A Design Paradigm Over?
Om asking the question as he weighs in on Ben Werdmuller’s post asking whether the ‘stream’ needs to give way to a new way of organizing?
I think no - but I understand the challenge, which is why I have been going back over my old posts and trying to get rigorous with
Categories and
Search
.. so that I can find stuff (and I recognize that it is really only me that looks to navigate the 7,000 plus posts (I know - I know)).
This is also why I am looking for ways to bulk manage my posts - so i can recategorize, without going one at a time …
AND - I am not the only one, @dave also posted this today
Would someone please make a ChatGPT product that can be pointed at specific websites, and allow intelligent queries against the contents. I’d love to explore the site I’ve been writing for 28.5 years, scripting.com. Let me know. It’s worth $ to me.
💬 Dave Winer
I have not been blogging for 28.5 years and what I have got has been - well, lets call it ‘distributed’ - but slowly bringing it all together to make more sense and a flow.
By the way - the reason I think that the stream should not go is because it works. It’s how the social world works, its how places like micro blog work - and it makes sense. You go to that person’s blog and you find the very latest thoughts right there at the top of the page.
I know that it is not only one way to organize your thinking - but if we also tag, categorize, highlight posts we want to share more and and and … anything else that you may want to use - it all helps - but no single process works because you don’t know what the person visiting your blog is looking for - so you can’t organize in anticipation.
Streams controlled by algorithms or selectively highlight just part of ‘the hose’ or offer no other way to get at the thinking - yeah - not good. But as a first port of call - I cant see a way to improve - until we all have our own person AI that can make sense of our blathering - no point in me asking - hopefully someone will listen to Dave:)
💬 Wise words from a wise bloke who wrote about what he saw around him. Sadly, despite being a widely read author, what he saw around him then you can still see around you now.
💬 I have referenced this before, but the #ReadWise quote popped up today - so for posterity. The key point is that until now - we had been training AIs to be ‘the best’. Now we are training them to be ‘good enough’.
‘Weather’ in New Zealand
Last night …
“A record amount of rain had fallen on Auckland in 24 hours - by 1am, the region had recorded 249mm of rain, smashing the previous 24-hour record of 161.8mm, back in February 1985. And monthly records have also been broken - the wettest January recorded at the Auckland Airport weather station until now was in 1986 with 20cm”
💬 The Met Office
The warnings started at 3pm - and it took Wayne Brown another 4 hours to issue a ‘shelter in place’ advisory - just before Elton John was taking the stage for his final tour …
Colossal failure of leadership in the mayors office — the nature of Brown is money first .. I wonder if he will be held to account?
This is how Jim Crow rolls on in the 21st century. Yes, it’s about the guns. But the guns are about the racism. If my fellow men weren’t so damned racist, so scared of “the other,” they wouldn’t be getting killy, fewer people would be getting killed, and de-escalation could begin.
As it is, you’re safer in Kyiv.
💬 Dana Blankenhorn
… without a shared understanding of where we are in life and what words mean to us, there’s no room for constructive interactions."
💬 Manuel Moreale
No argument.
“The day we started counting and displaying views was the day everything changed. Social circles were now judged by views and size—not actual engagement.”
💬 George Oates
Not here on MicroBlog. Here we “blog like it’s 1999” as @dave had it.
New Zealand | After Ardern
Written before Hipkins won the leadership.
“My current view is this cements the likelihood of a National-ACT victory on October 14, with no fundamental change in tax, Government spending or social policies, other than the reversal of Labour’s interest deductibility and bright-line measures, along with the truncation of Three Waters, the removal of the clean car rebate scheme and no follow-through on a levy on farm emissions.”
“From a purely political and financial view, it’s more likely to lower interest rates, increase residential land prices, increase net migration, increase nominal GDP, lower the Budget deficit, lower net debt-to-GDP, further restrict productivity growth, slow real wage growth and increase the emigration of young New Zealanders who come from renting families.”
💬 Bernard Hickey
Watching history repeat. … this from 5 years ago …
“I found out for the first time last night that the person who technically shuts the government down is me, which is kind of cool.”
💬 Mick Mulvaney
New Zealand | Thankyou Jacinda
The meaning and tragedy of Jacinda Ardern’s time as PM
“In the end, she deserves our utmost respect and thanks. She was instinctively extraordinary with her responses and leadership after the Christchurch attacks and the arrival of Covid.”
💬 Bernard Hickey
I can only agree.
“A hard-core group of 20 have so far stopped Mr. McCarthy, but 10 times that number supported him, including moderates, centrists, old- and new-style conservatives. The 200 have to find a way to re-establish their power and face down the fringe.”
💬 Peggy Noonan
P.S. - I do agree - but really, they haven’t so far have they? And there has been plenty of opportunity.