FeedCity

There are all sorts of interesting quotes from Eddy Cue’s testimony today in the Google trial. From Mark Gurman’s reporting in Bloomberg:

“You may not need an iPhone 10 years from now as crazy as it sounds,” he said. “The only way you truly have true competition is when you have technology shifts. Technology shifts create these opportunities. AI is a new technology shift, and it’s creating new opportunities for new entrants.”

Great design isn’t defined by who knows your name, but by how well your work serves human needs. It’s measured in the problems solved, the frustrations eased, the moments of delight created, and the dignity preserved through thoughtful solutions. These metrics operate independently of fame or recognition.

Our obsession with visibility also creates a troubling dynamic: design that prioritizes being noticed over being useful. This leads to visual pollution, cognitive overload, and solutions that serve the designer’s portfolio more than the user’s needs.

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Man, this resonates:

At one end, you prioritise your own interests. Slap on the SPF and enjoy the cricket; ignore the emails; nip to Paris for the day. But egocentrism erodes social goods. It harms other people. So perhaps you reject it and skew the other way, anchoring your wellbeing to the trajectory of the world. But that undertow will easily drown you. The beneficence of caring only about others seems noble, but in truth few of us can endure that level of self-sacrifice. Total empathy harms you. And so most of us stumble in the fog between these extremes, recoiling from either end when the shame or the sadness becomes too much to bear. I plug away at my pleasant life with heartache for what’s happening to us. Perhaps you feel similarly, smiling but seconds from tears.

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An enjoyable guided tour of album artwork starting at the beginning of the twentieth century.

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Really happy for Dan Moren to make his Jeopardy appearance today. Congrats! I’ve set it to record. ☕️

Last Friday I published my second Cybersecurity Friday post with three more key steps for cybersecurity. In summary:1. Different email address for each account, AKA email masking. Use or create a different email alias for each service you sign-up for.2. Different password for each account. This is a well known security technique against credential stuffing attacks.3. Use a password manager to autofill. Always using a password manager to autofill your login username (or email) and password can be a very effective method of reducing the chances of being phished.Full post with details: https://tantek.com/2025/122/b1/more-steps-indieweb-cybersecurity#CyberSecurity Friday #cyber #securityPreviously: https://tantek.com/2025/055/t1/three-steps-indieweb-cybersecurity

📗 Want to read Things Become Other Things by Craig Mod ISBN: 9780593732540

A good overview of how large language models work:

The words flow together because they’ve been seen together many times. But that doesn’t mean they’re right. It just means they’re coherent.

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My current collection of 9 standard typewriters clocks in at 289.6 pounds (131.6 kg). Which one(s) should I take to the type-in at Vromans Bookstore this Saturday, May 10th at 1:00pm? Which machines are you bringing? Front row (left to right): ’51 Remington Super-Riter, ’56 Remington Standard, ’55 Royal HH, ’58 Royal FP (gray, 16″ … Continue reading

When I did the rewrite of the nightly mail app, I didn't convert the app that builds the nightly RSS feed of the mail page. Wasn't sure if anyone was using it. I heard from a reader who missed it, so I got it running, knock wood, Murphy-willing.

Tuesday session

FediForum has regrouped and is coming back, June 5-7. I might be traveling those days but I’ll be joining as internet connectivity allows. They’ve also got an impressive new advisory board.

Raining at Lazarus. ☕️

Preamble In Summer 2014 I installed it and started playing Clash of Clans. To keep in touch with my godson, which kind of worked. In January 2024 I quit. At the time I said: I stopped playing regularly a few months ago. I look periodically but I’ve lost the habit. Probably I’ve replaced it with...

A wild story in Rolling Stone: People Are Losing Loved Ones to AI-Fueled Spiritual Fantasies. I use ChatGPT throughout the day and it’s hard to imagine it going off the rails this badly: …anecdotes about loved ones suddenly falling down rabbit holes of spiritual mania, supe...

Manton says he runs his posts through ChatGPT before publishing.

I do it the other way, I use it for background info on the things I'm writing about as I write, more and more. I used to use Wikipedia that way. I would love to include links to some of my conversations, but I find their shared links are unreliable, I keep hearing from people who couldn't read them.

Here's an experiment, two such backgrounders I had Claude.ai write for me for a pice I was writing (not published).

Claude.ai on the future of Chrome re antitrust case Google lost.

Claude.ai on claims Bluesky makes about being billionaire-proof.

I wonder if people can read those.

Gravatar has always been about giving people control over their identity online. One avatar, one profile, synced across the web, verified connections, with a fully open API. Gravatar is a true open identity layer for the internet, and now for AI.  For developers, we’ve rolled out mobile SDKs and a revamped REST API that lets … Continue reading Remember Gravatar? →