Sign up

Daring Fireball

Not verified No WebSub updates No webmention support Valid

By John Gruber

Rights
Copyright © 2026, John Gruber
Public lists
davewiner/blogroll Manton Reece - Blogroll
Fetched

Daring Fireball Valid
Text • Daring Fireball Department of Commerce

[Sponsor] npx workos: An AI Agent That Writes Auth Directly Into Your Codebase

workos.com/docs/authkit/cli-installer?utm_source=tldrdev&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_campaign=q12026

npx workos launches an AI agent, powered by Claude, that reads your project, detects your framework, and writes a complete auth integration directly into your existing codebase. It’s not a template generator. It reads your code, understands your stack, and writes an integration that fits.

The WorkOS agent then typechecks and builds, feeding any errors back to itself to fix.

See how it works →

 ★ 

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

★ HazeOver — Mac Utility for Highlighting the Frontmost Window

What HazeOver does is highlight the active window by dimming all background windows. That’s it. But it does this simple task with aplomb, and it makes a significant difference in the day-to-day usability of MacOS.

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

Unsung Heroes: Flickr’s URLs Scheme

unsung.aresluna.org/unsung-heroes-flickrs-urls-scheme/

Marcin Wichary, writing at Unsung (which is just an incredibly good and fun weblog): Half of my education in URLs as user interface came from Flickr in the late 2000s. Its URLs looked like this: flickr.com/photos/mwichary/favorites flickr.com/photos/mwichary/sets flickr...

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

ChangeTheHeaders

underpassapp.com/news/2025/3/4.html

During the most recent episode of The Talk Show, Jason Snell brought up a weird issue that I started running into last year. On my Mac, sometimes I’d drag an image out of a web page in Safari, and I’d get an image in WebP format. Sometimes I wouldn’t care. But usually when I...

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

Welcome (Back) to Macintosh

take.surf/2026/03/01/welcome-back-to-macintosh

Jesper, writing at Take:

My hope is that Macintosh is not just one of these empires that was at the height of its power and then disintegrated because of warring factions, satiated and uncurious rulers, and droughts for which no one was prepared, ruining crops no one realized were essential for survival.

My hope is that there remains a primordial spark, a glimpse of genius, to rediscover, to reconnect to — to serve not annual trends or constant phonification, but the needs of the user to use the computer as a tool to get something done.

 ★ 

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

SerpApi Filed Motion to Dismiss Google’s Lawsuit

serpapi.com/blog/google-v-serpapi-motion-to-dismiss-why-were-in-the-right/

Julien Khaleghy, CEO of SerpApi: Google thinks it owns the internet. That’s the subtext of its lawsuit against SerpApi, the quiet part that it’s suddenly decided to shout out loud. The problem is, no one owns the internet. And the law makes that clear. In January, we pr...

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

‘Anthropic and Alignment’

stratechery.com/2026/anthropic-and-alignment/

Ben Thompson, writing at Stratechery: In fact, Amodei already answered the question: if nuclear weapons were developed by a private company, and that private company sought to dictate terms to the U.S. military, the U.S. would absolutely be incentivized to destroy that c...

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

WSJ: ‘Trump Administration Shuns Anthropic, Embraces OpenAI in Clash Over Guardrails’

wsj.com/tech/ai/trump-will-end-government-use-of-anthropics-ai-models-ff3550d9

Amrith Ramkumar, reporting for The Wall Street Journal (gift link): Trump’s announcement came shortly before the Pentagon’s Friday afternoon deadline for Anthropic to agree to let the military use its models in all lawful-use cases, a concession the company had refused t...

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

Seasonal Color Updates to Apple’s iPhone Cases and Apple Watch Bands

macrumors.com/2026/03/02/iphone-cases-apple-accessories-new-colors/

Joe Rossignol, MacRumors:

A seasonal color refresh arrived today for a variety of Apple accessories, including iPhone cases, Apple Watch bands, and the Crossbody Strap. All of the accessories in the latest colors are available to order on Apple.com starting today.

 ★ 

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

Apple Introduces New iPad Air With M4

apple.com/newsroom/2026/03/apple-introduces-the-new-ipad-air-powered-by-m4/

Apple Newsroom: Apple today announced the new iPad Air featuring M4 and more memory, giving users a big jump in performance at the same starting price. With a faster CPU and GPU, iPad Air boosts tasks like editing and gaming, and is a powerful device for AI with a faster...

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

Apple Introduces the iPhone 17e

apple.com/newsroom/2026/03/apple-introduces-iphone-17e/

Apple Newsroom: Apple today announced iPhone 17e, a powerful and more affordable addition to the iPhone 17 lineup. At the heart of iPhone 17e is the latest-generation A19, which delivers exceptional performance for everything users do. iPhone 17e also features C1X, the l...

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

Sentry

sentry.io/resources/ios-workshop-jan-2026/?utm_source=daringfireball&utm_medium=paid-display&utm_campaign=general-fy27q1-evergreen&utm_content=static-ad-mobilerss-trysentry

My thanks to Sentry for sponsoring last week at DF. Sentry is running a hands-on workshop: “Crash Reporting, Tracing, and Logs for iOS in Sentry”. You can watch it on demand. You’ll learn how to connect the dots between slowdowns, crashes, and the user experience in your iOS app. It’ll show you how to:

  • Set up Sentry to surface high-priority mobile issues without alert fatigue.
  • Use Logs and Breadcrumbs to reconstruct what happened with a crash.
  • Find what’s behind a performance bottleneck using Tracing.
  • Monitor and reduce the size of your iOS app using Size Analysis.

I know so many developers using Sentry. It’s a terrific product. If you’re a developer and haven’t checked them out, you should.

 ★ 

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

The Talk Show: ‘Bad Dates’

daringfireball.net/thetalkshow/2026/02/28/ep-442

Jason Snell returns to the show to discuss the 2025 Six Colors Apple Report Card, MacOS 26 Tahoe, Apple Creator Studio, along with what we expect/hope for in next week’s Apple product announcements.

Sponsored by:

  • Notion: The AI workspace where teams and AI agents get more done together.
  • Squarespace: Save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain using code talkshow.
  • Sentry: A real-time error monitoring and tracing platform. Use code TALKSHOW for $80 in free credits.
 ★ 

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

Trump’s Enormous Gamble on Regime Change in Iran

theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/02/trumps-iran-regime-change-attack-gamble/686190/?gift=aQyUJR7AIw1mJWdQ6Ed6yOWB4bfod1kQqCyz2RXbHaY

Tom Nichols, writing for The Atlantic:

When the 2003 war with Iraq ended, U.S. Ambassador Barbara Bodine said that when American diplomats embarked on reconstruction, they ruefully joked that “there were 500 ways to do it wrong and two or three ways to do it right. And what we didn’t understand is that we were going to go through all 500.”

 ★ 

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

West Virginia’s Anti-Apple CSAM Lawsuit Would Help Child Predators Walk Free

techdirt.com/2026/02/25/west-virginias-anti-apple-csam-lawsuit-would-help-child-predators-walk-free/

Mike Masnick, writing for Techdirt:

Read that again. If West Virginia wins — if an actual court orders Apple to start scanning iCloud for CSAM — then every image flagged by those mandated scans becomes evidence obtained through a warrantless government search conducted without probable cause. The Fourth Amendment’s exclusionary rule means defense attorneys get to walk into court and demand that evidence be thrown out. And they’ll win that motion. It’s not even a particularly hard case to make.

 ★ 

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

How to Block the ‘Upgrade to Tahoe’ Alerts and System Settings Indicator

robservatory.com/block-the-upgrade-to-tahoe-alerts-and-system-settings-indicator/

Rob Griffiths, writing at The Robservatory: So I have macOS Tahoe on my laptop, but I’m keeping my desktop Mac on macOS Sequoia for now. Which means I have the joy of seeing things like this wonderful notification on a regular basis. Or I did, until I found a way to bloc...

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

★ A Sometimes-Hidden Setting Controls What Happens When You Tap a Call in the iOS 26 Phone App

Apple’s solution to this dilemma — to show the “Tap Recents to Call” in Settings if, and only if, Unified is the current view option in the Phone app — is lazy. And as a result, it’s quite confusing.

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

TUDUMB

spyglass.org/netflix-warner-bros-paramount-deal/

MG Siegler, writing at Spyglass:

Of course, Netflix could have absorbed such a cost. It’s a $400B company (well, before this deal, anyway) — double Disney! Paramount Skydance? They’re worth $11B. Yes, they’re paying almost exactly $100B more than they’re worth for WBD. Yes, it’s looney. But really, it’s leverage.

To be clear, Netflix was going to pay for the deal with debt too, but they have a clear path to repay such debts. They have a great, growing business. They don’t require the backstop of one of the world’s richest men, who just so happens to be the father of the CEO. How on Earth is Paramount going to pay down this debt? I’m tempted to turn to another bit of Paramount IP for the answer:

  1. Step one
  2. Step two
  3. ????
  4. PROFIT!!!
 ★ 

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

Block Lays Off 4,000 (of 10,000) Employees

cnbc.com/2026/02/26/block-laying-off-about-4000-employees-nearly-half-of-its-workforce.html

CNBC: Block said Thursday it’s laying off more than 4,000 employees, or about half of its head count. The stock skyrocketed as much as 24% in extended trading. “Today we shared a difficult decision with our team,” Jack Dorsey, Block’s co-founder and CEO, wrote in a lett...

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

Apple Announces F1 Broadcast Details, and a Surprising Netflix Partnership

sixcolors.com/post/2026/02/apple-announces-f1-details-and-a-surprising-netflix-partnership/

Jason Snell, writing at Six Colors:

Perhaps the most surprising announcement on Thursday was that Apple and Netflix, which have had a rather stand-offish relationship when it comes to video programming, have struck a deal to swap some Formula One-related content. Formula One’s growing popularity in the United States is due, perhaps in large part, to the high-profile success of the Netflix docuseries “Drive to Survive.” The latest season of that series, debuting Friday, will premiere simultaneously on both Netflix and Apple TV. Presumably, in exchange for that non-exclusive, Apple will also non-exclusively allow Netflix to broadcast the Canadian Grand Prix in May. (Insert obligatory wish that Apple and Netflix would bury the hatchet and enable Watch Now support in the TV app for Netflix content.)

What a crazy cool partnership.

 ★ 

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

Energym

aicandy.be/giorgio-1

“An interview from 2036 with Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and Sam Altman.” This is what AI video generation was meant for.

 ★ 

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

Netflix Backs Out of Bid for Warner Bros., Paving Way for Paramount Takeover

nytimes.com/2026/02/26/business/warner-bros-discovery-paramount-deal-netflix.html?unlocked_article_code=1.PVA.3639.2yWKES49z8Os

The New York Times: Netflix said on Thursday that it had backed away from its deal to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery, a stunning development that paves the way for the storied Hollywood media giant to end up under the control of a rival bidder, the technology heir David ...

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

iPhone and iPad Approved to Handle Classified NATO Information

nr.apple.com/Do0I6B8WX0

Apple Newsroom:

Today, Apple announced iPhone and iPad are the first and only consumer devices in compliance with the information assurance requirements of NATO nations. This enables iPhone and iPad to be used with classified information up to the NATO restricted level without requiring special software or settings — a level of government certification no other consumer mobile device has met.

That’s nice, but the iPhone is only the second phone to be approved for handling classified information for the Board of Peace. The first, of course, was the T1.

 ★ 

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

‘Steve Jobs in Exile’

geoffreycain.net/steve-jobs-in-exile/

New book, shipping May 19, from author Geoffrey Cain:

For twelve years, from 1985 to 1997, Jobs wandered the business wilderness with his new venture, NeXT. It was a period of spectacular failures, near-bankruptcy, and brutal humiliation. But out of this crucible of defeat emerged the visionary leader who would go on to create the iPod, iPhone, and iPad, transforming Apple into the most valuable company on earth.

Drawing on previously unpublished materials and new interviews with the key players, Geoffrey Cain reveals the untold story of Steve Jobs’s “lost decade” — the formative years that shaped the icon we thought we knew.

Afterword by Ed Catmull, who was obviously intimately familiar with Jobs in that era. And via Cain’s post on LinkedIn announcing the book, the foreword is by NeXT cofounder Dan’l Lewin.

 ★ 

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

Microsoft Adds Additional Markdown Features to Windows Notepad

blogs.windows.com/windows-insider/2026/01/21/notepad-and-paint-updates-begin-rolling-out-to-windows-insiders/

Still feels a bit ridiculous to me that Markdown is now an editing mode in Notepad.

 ★ 

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

Prediction ‘Market’ Kalshi Accuses MrBeast Editor of Insider Trading

npr.org/2026/02/25/nx-s1-5726050/kalshi-insider-trading-enforcement-actions

Bobby Allyn, reporting for NPR:

An editor who works for YouTube’s biggest creator, MrBeast, has been suspended from the prediction market platform Kalshi and reported to federal regulators for insider trading, Kalshi officials said on Wednesday. It’s the first time the company has publicly revealed the results of an investigation into market manipulation on the popular app.

The MrBeast employee, who Kalshi identified as Artem Kaptur in regulatory filings, traded around $4,000 on markets related to the streamer, the company said. Kalshi investigators discovered that Kaptur had “near-perfect trading success” on bets about the YouTuber’s videos with low odds, making the wagers appear suspicious, according to company officials.

Call these things what they are — prediction casinos, not prediction markets — and the problems come into focus.

 ★ 

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

Research Firm Says Podcasts Have Passed AM/FM Talk Radio in Spoken-Word Listening Time

edisonresearch.com/podcasts-lead-am-fm-in-spoken-word-listening-marking-a-first/

Edison Research: In 2015, AM/FM radio accounted for 75% of the time Americans spent with spoken-word audio sources. AM/FM radio was not only the most dominant spoken-word audio listening platform, but it was fully sixty-five percentage points higher than podcasts, which ...

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

New York Sues Valve, Says Its ‘Loot Boxes’ Are Gambling

reuters.com/legal/government/new-york-sues-video-game-developer-valve-says-its-loot-boxes-are-gambling-2026-02-25/

Reuters:

New York’s attorney general sued Valve, a video game developer whose franchises include Counter-Strike, Team Fortress and Dota, accusing it of promoting illegal gambling and threatening to addict children through its use of “loot boxes.” In a complaint filed on Wednesday in a state court in Manhattan, Attorney General Letitia James said Valve’s loot boxes amounted to “quintessential gambling,” violating the state’s constitution and penal law, with valuable items often hard to win and many items worth pennies.

 ★ 

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

‘H-Bomb: A Frank Lloyd Wright Typographic Mystery’

inconspicuous.info/p/h-bomb-a-frank-lloyd-wright-typographic

When re-hanging signage, “Mind your P’s and Q’s” ought to be “Mind your H’s and S’s”.

 ★ 

Daring Fireball Valid
Text John Gruber

Terry Godier: ‘Phantom Obligation’

terrygodier.com/phantom-obligation

Terry Godier, in a thoughtful essay on the design of RSS feed readers: There’s a particular kind of guilt that visits me when I open my feed reader after a few days away. It’s not the guilt of having done something wrong, exactly. It’s more like the feeling of walking in...