The best Prime Day deal is Apple’s AirPods Pro (2nd gen) on sale for $169 (32% off) — I think that’s the lowest price I’ve ever seen.
Subscribe
Jason Kottke's weblog, home of fine hypertext products since 1998
- Public lists
-
Featured
- Fetched
Immunotherapy Is Changing Cancer Treatment Forever. “Immunotherapy…has produced breakthroughs for previously untreatable...
Immunotherapy Is Changing Cancer Treatment Forever. “Immunotherapy…has produced breakthroughs for previously untreatable forms of the disease, especially in liquid tumors like leukemia and lymphoma and skin cancers like melanoma.”
On Politics and Poetry
In order for me to write poetry that isn’t political
I must listen to the birds
and in order to hear the birds
the warplanes must be silent.
Tags: Marwan Makhoul · poetry · politics
Scientists extracted DNA from an exceptionally preserved woolly mammoth. “A complete genome...
Scientists extracted DNA from an exceptionally preserved woolly mammoth. “A complete genome has been extracted from a 52,000-year-old woolly mammoth, which might bring us closer to resurrecting the species.”
Jimi Hendrix Goes Acoustic
A true master of the electric guitar, Jimi Hendrix missed the era of MTV Unplugged by almost 20 years and video & audio clips of him playing an acoustic guitar can be difficult to find. Open Culture recently collected a pair of videos of Hendrix unplugged.
While Hendrix did more than anyone before him to turn guitar amps into instruments with his squalls of electric feedback and distorted wah-wah squeals, when you strip his playing down to basics, he’s still pretty much as good as it gets.
A YouTube commenter said:
Jimi could make an acoustic sound like an electric, and an electric like something else.
P.S. Here are several clips of another otherworldly musician playing an acoustic guitar…his name is Prince (and he is funky).
Tags: Jimi Hendrix · music · Prince · video
In this interview, Errol Morris talks about truth, documentary filmmaking, and AI....
In this interview, Errol Morris talks about truth, documentary filmmaking, and AI. “Truth, I like to remind people — whether we’re talking about filmmaking, or film journalism, or journalism, whatever — it’s a quest.”
Important not to forget with all that is going on: Republicans will...
Important not to forget with all that is going on: Republicans will likely try to end almost abortion access in the US if the elections go their way this fall. Those are the stakes, period.
E.B. White Writes to a Man Who Has Lost Faith in Humanity
From Shaun Usher’s Letters of Note, here’s a letter written by E.B. White in 1973 to a man who said he had “lost faith in humanity”. It begins:
As long as there is one upright man, as long as there is one compassionate woman, the contagion may spread and the scene is not desolate. Hope is the thing that is left to us, in a bad time. I shall get up Sunday morning and wind the clock, as a contribution to order and steadfastness.
God, I hope he’s right.
Tags: E.B. White · Shaun Usher
If you’re on Bluesky, you can follow the Downticket Democrats bot: “I...
If you’re on Bluesky, you can follow the Downticket Democrats bot: “I share donation links to US Democrats running for legislative seats in competitive districts.”
After 12 years, Pete Wells is stepping down as the NY Times’...
After 12 years, Pete Wells is stepping down as the NY Times’ restaurant critic. “I realized I wasn’t hungry. And I’m still not, at least not the way I used to be.” But also: “My cholesterol, blood sugar and hypertension were worse than I’d expected.”
Nothing About the Attempted Assassination Redeems Trump. “That Trump is a victim...
Nothing About the Attempted Assassination Redeems Trump. “That Trump is a victim does not obligate anyone to forget the millions of people he would make victims if given the opportunity.”
It’s Random Midsummer Shopping Day Again! (AKA Prime Day)
For the last few years, Amazon has spent a couple of summer days putting a bunch of their most popular items on sale for their Prime members. This year, Prime Day runs from July 16-17 and includes a number of things that I can personally recommend (or are currently covetin...
“15 Books About Appalachia to Read Instead of Hillbilly Elegy”
From Kendra Winchester at Book Riot:
Since Hillbilly Elegy came out in 2016, I’ve experienced countless people claiming to now “understand” where I come from and what Appalachian people are like. But they don’t think of my childhood watching my dad lose himself while arra...
Investigation Finds Secret Service Failed To Account For Nation’s 393 Million Guns....
Investigation Finds Secret Service Failed To Account For Nation’s 393 Million Guns. “The Secret Service failed to heed the real threat posed to the former president by the hundreds of millions of firearms in the hands of everyday Americans.”
There’s a 25th anniversary edition version of Brian Greene’s The Elegant Universe...
There’s a 25th anniversary edition version of Brian Greene’s The Elegant Universe coming out. I devoured this book when it first came out and I still have not read an easier-to-understand summary of modern physics and quantum mechanics.
Baltic Ice
Oh, I really like this particular image from Bernhard Lang’s series of aerial photographs of sea ice in the Baltic (part one, part two). (via colossal)
Tags: Bernhard Lang · photography
Cyanokites are a collection of five paper kites of different shades of...
Cyanokites are a collection of five paper kites of different shades of blue, a sly homage to the cyanometer, an instrument designed to measure the blueness of the sky.
Printernet: Get a custom print version of your reading list sent right...
Printernet: Get a custom print version of your reading list sent right to your door. Each issue has five slots you can fill with any text-based content (articles, etc.)
Molly White: Fighting bots is fighting humans. “Any attempt at limiting bot...
Molly White: Fighting bots is fighting humans. “Any attempt at limiting bot access will inevitably allow some bots through and prevent some humans from accessing the site, and it’s about deciding where you want to set the cutoff.”
The Cleverness of the Axe
There’s a version of The Woodcutter and the Trees series of fables that I ran across the other day that’s particularly relevant to this moment in history:
The forest was shrinking, but the trees kept voting for the axe; for the axe was clever and convinced the trees that because his handle was made of wood, he was one of them.
Or perhaps it’s always resonant because some variation of it has been told for thousands of years now.
Illustration in the triptych above by Ferdinand Hodler.
Area codes that are also HTTP response headers. For instance, 404 (Not...
Area codes that are also HTTP response headers. For instance, 404 (Not Found) is an area code in Atlanta and 406 (Not Acceptable) is the area code for Montana.
Reading Miranda July’s All Fours
Links:
Miranda July, All Fours (There’s also a sizable free sample on Libby)
NYT: The Women Rethinking Marriage and Family Life Because of Miranda July (“the talk of every group text”)
Yale Review: The novelist on the difference between emotional honesty and autobiography
Have you read it? What did you think?
Tags: All Fours · books · diary comics · Miranda July
💬 Join the discussion on kottke.org →
This Crystal Fragment Turns Everything You See Into 8-bit Pixel Art, and...
This Crystal Fragment Turns Everything You See Into 8-bit Pixel Art, and It’s Fascinating. “The lens minecrafts scenery without electricity.”
Gene Kelly Doesn’t Want to Perform Singin’ in the Rain on the Muppet Show
The legendary dancer, actor, and singer Gene Kelly appeared on The Muppet Show in season five, in what turned out to be the last episode of the show ever filmed. The episode’s gag involved Kelly being under the impression he was turning up to watch the show and not perform. Kermit tricks him into it, but in the final act, Kelly refuses to do his most famous song, Singin’ in the Rain. Until…
As Jonathan Hoefler said about this bit on Threads:
For all the satire and irony and anxiety that shaped Gen X, we were so lucky to grow up with the gentleness, wit, kindness, and respect of Jim Henson, the Children’s Television Workshop, and public television generally. How lovely is this?
Tags: dance · Gene Kelly · music · The Muppets · TV · video
Enduring 129°F in Death Valley. “The breeze only makes things worse, by...
Enduring 129°F in Death Valley. “The breeze only makes things worse, by blasting apart the thin and fragile atmosphere of cooled air that millions of your pores produce by sweating. Your heart hammers faster and faster. Your cognition starts to blur.”
Ayo Edebiri Browses the Criterion Collection
As if we needed more reasons to love her, Ayo Edebiri is a total film dork. First, there’s the account on Letterboxd — her review of Empire Strikes Back: “this movie is great but I was really shocked by how ugly Yoda was sorry if that pisses anybody off but I had only seen...
There’s a Devil Wears Prada sequel coming… “Gird your loins.”...
There’s a Devil Wears Prada sequel coming… “Gird your loins.”
XKCD: A Crossword Puzzle
Although I am slightly disappointed this isn’t a “real” crossword puzzle, I do admire Randall Munroe’s commitment to the bit. And then there’s the gray letters…
Tags: crossword puzzles · games · Randall Munroe · XKCD
I’ve linked to these before, but the Do Not Reply images (which...
I’ve linked to these before, but the Do Not Reply images (which gently dunk on social media reply guys) are now available on their own site — and you can order IRL stickers too.
The Teasingest Teaser Trailer for Severance Season Two
Well, the teaser trailer answers almost no questions about the second season of Severance, so job well done with the teasing there lads. Here’s one thing though: the season starts on January 17, 2025 on Apple TV+. Oh, and this:
In season two, Mark and his friends learn t...