I really can’t handle Christmas advertisements in November. They are the absolute worst. There’s just no need for it.
The Apple Pencil has never really cliched with me. Partly because I don’t draw much anymore and my handwriting is probably beyond the counts of Apple’s algorithms. And yet I am drawn to the Apple Pencil Pro for the iPad Pro.
Bought a set of washers off Amazon. Cleared up for people coming over and lost them, possibly to the bin. Ordered a second set. Eventually found that I didn’t need them and can no longer find the second set either. I must be losing my mind.
Just 1 of my 3 Hue Dimmer Switches doesn’t connect to the iOS home app. Connects to the Hue app, but not the Home App. Why? Who knows.
Brilliant concept for Mixed Nutz, combining different cartoon characters together. Pity it never saw the light of day.
Re-engaging with Pixelfed. However I would prefer to block accounts, in particular those sharing AI junk and expecting us to believe it’s photography.
It’s to be expected at this time of year but walking into the conservatory when it’s at 3C (37F) is still sudden shock to the system
“Dear Donald Trump, here’s how you can win that Nobel peace prize”
You want a unifying Palestinian leader with the stature and credibility to negotiate a proper peace deal with Israel in all of historic Palestine, and not just a ceasefire in Gaza? Barghouti is your man.
Brilliant piece by Mehdi Hasan in The Guardian.
I’ve reached the age where I understand what is meant by small print. It’s not so much small as unreadable.
According to MacRumours:
Apple researchers have released Pico-Banana-400K, a comprehensive dataset of 400,000 curated images that’s been specifically designed to improve how AI systems edit photos based on text prompts.
Poor naming aside, what is this for? Presumably the best ML editing is image enhancement not manipulation to the point of a photo realistic fake.
Absolutely incredible.
25 years, one website: ISS in Real Time captures quarter-century on space station - Ars Technica
In a world of bifurcated social media it’s possible to post to multiple sites with a single app or shortcut.
But of course it pays to check every word and all punctuation so you don’t spend the next 5 minutes making edits.
Really proud of her for these. They were so incredible.
Eight years ago according to Steve Herman, referencing the Guardian coverage:
Two years ago, Juli Briskman made headlines when she gave the finger to Trump as she cycled alongside the president’s motorcade in Virginia. The marketing company she worked for swiftly fired her. (She sued them.)
She couldn’t have imagined it at the time but Briskman, 52, has just won a local election – and she credits the incident for motivating her to run for office.
A decade later and we can still cheer Juli Briskman for doing what we would all have done given chance.
3 minutes on Instagram and I remember why I can’t look at that assault on my senses. More adds than content and rarely anything of any interest and certainly nothing of any significance.
Finished season 3 of Invasion on Apple TV (or Apple TV+, or whatever it’s called by the time you’re reading this) and I can’t say I fell the need for another season. There was no plan. No objective for the characters. And the season was filled by pep talks when a character questions themselves.
We should all raise our opposition to the disgusting concept that Apple Maps could soon be dotted with ads
Not really a gamer, but Playstation is still the only gaming platform I’ve ever used. Scary to see the PS2 being around for a quarter of a century
My endorsement of Croissant & Tapestry
I feel I need to provide my endorsement of apps Croissant and Tapestry for social media engagement. These apps are not new, but new to me.
If you’ve not come across either, then Croissant is a cross platform app for simultaneously sharing to Mastodon, Threads and Bluesky.
I have disabled cross-posting in Micro.Blog using Croissant for posting across the social media platforms. However I would really love to see Croissant grow to support posting to Micro.blog to avoid switching between the apps.
Tapestry is the inverse, pulling multiple feeds into one or more timelines of your choosing, including Micro.Blog. Unlike with RSS apps Tapestry supports personalisation on the different platforms, such as Micro.Blog bookmarks, Mastodon Boosts etc. The app syncs settings and timelines using iCloud, with options to read your entire timeline or custom timelines including content from today or the last hour. This single app has been a game changer to how follow people, using a single app rather than switching between them.
Found it impossibly difficult to make and share generic links to music on all services. It seems all good services want you to create an account, pay them money or both. Plus there’s plenty of bad ones that simply look like scams.
I won’t install macOS 26 or iOS 26 but somehow I will run the public beta of iPad OS on both iPads. No, I don’t understand my logic either. Must be the lure of multi-window on iPad OS 26.
Disabled cross-posting from Micro.blog in favour of using Croissant to cross post any relevant content. Other than my lack of posting any content at all, my challenge has been engagement across all social networks with inconsistent cross posts.
For example my Bluesky is just a stream of text without links or media. My expectation is that this will change.
From 512 Pixels, Boring Is What We Wanted. I don’t agree with the title but certainly agree with the need for incremental updates.
Updated Tapestry 1.4 from The Icon Factory has really changed the game, consolidating RSS, Mastodon and Micro.Blog and other social platforms in a single app with multiple timelines.
Interesting coincidental scheduling on BBC this evening
