Playing around with the new dataset from Overture Maps, a project started a couple years go between Microsoft, Meta, Amazon, and others. I can download and query the data, but doesn’t seem like it can really be used if you don’t bring a lot of cash with you.

I’ve tinkered with smaller Llama models, on my Mac and Linux servers, so I thought I’d try Llama 3.1. No surprise the 405-billion parameter model is huge, a 200+ GB download. But even the 70b model seems too much for my M3 with 48 GB RAM. Going to stick with cloud models for the foreseeable future.

There are some wild numbers in this report at Bloomberg about Apple’s spending on TV+ content. Reaffirms my belief that Apple has lost their focus. Too much attention on services, sometimes to the detriment of core platforms, developers, and users.

Mark Zuckerberg writes about Llama 3.1 in a Threads post using images of text instead of a blog. He makes a point that he’s mentioned in recent interviews too, about not wanting to be locked in by platform vendors like Apple: One of my formative experiences has been buildin...

Following politics sort of obsessively, senate races, the 2020 primaries, I thought I knew a few things about Kamala Harris, but I’m still learning. Just read this essay by her from Elle in 2019, on being a stepmom — “Momala”.

Back down the rabbit hole of HTTP signatures + ActivityPub today. Fixed an issue, and reviewed the new community group draft. Don’t feel great that my code mostly resembles the make friends and verify requests blog post from 6 years ago rather than newer docs.

It’s such a good feeling to have the Biden reelection campaign drama behind us. It was going to be a slog, and I’m sure Joe knew it. No rush to pick a VP for Kamala Harris. Let’s take a deep breath. And Joe can focus on doing the job, and hopefully get a well-deserved break from the chaos too. 🇺🇸

Micro.blog has a couple options for creating redirects, but adding pages to your blog navigation that go somewhere else hasn’t been intuitive before now. I’ve added a new option that makes this much more discoverable.

Wow. 🇺🇸

Rewatched Twister (singular) this week. It holds up! Went to see Twisters (plural) tonight and it’s also good. Sort of a remake and sort of a sequel, but it works. 🍿

With the release of GPT-4o-mini, I’m updating some of the models used in Micro.blog. It’s really nice to see the price decrease. Hopefully that is translating to more efficient, less energy use on the servers too.

I was trying some new things with Micro.blog themes and rediscovered that I had made a page that is just recent photos in the blog post category Coffee. This kind of thing is why you should have your own blog. 🙂

I don’t see myself buying a Vision Pro soon or ever, but love that a hot air balloons video is in the next batch of immersive content. Seems like a great fit. But also, maybe Apple is overthinking this… Any and all content would probably help.

Started a Micro.blog experiment that renders a snapshot of your blog post as an image, which could be used for Open Graph previews or thumbnails in the UI. Not sure the best form this should take when it’s live. Suggestions? If you could have a little thumbnail of any web page, how would you use it?

Hard to believe it’s only been 4 days since I blogged that the debate is over about the nominee. Schiff’s statement + Pelosi saying he can’t win + Biden getting COVID… At this point, it’s like swimming upstream. Might be time to call it. 🇺🇸

In Dallas for a few days. Iced latte outside at Ascension, near White Rock Lake. ☕️

Downtown from old east Dallas. Some yellow in the sky before sunset.

At Micro.blog we’ve used Sticker Mule for a while. A few years ago, I remember reading something about the founder supporting Trump. We actually talked about it internally. Do we care about the political opinions of companies that make a product we pay for? Ultimately, I dec...

Finally some good news. We need more big plans like this:

President Biden is finalizing plans to endorse major changes to the Supreme Court in the coming weeks, including proposals for legislation to establish term limits for the justices and an enforceable ethics code, according to two people briefed on the plans.

He is also weighing whether to call for a constitutional amendment to eliminate broad immunity for presidents and other constitutional officeholders…

It’s a high bar to pass a constitutional amendment, but this is the right path anyway. 🇺🇸

Om Malik blogging about the Taboola deal:

Apple’s decision to strike a deal with Taboola is shocking and off-brand — so much so that I have started to question the company’s long-term commitment to good customer experience, including its commitment to privacy.

Apple was a great company when their business was aligned with their values and the interests of customers and developers. Services and ads have pulled them too far off track.

John Gruber blogs that it’s the guns: The truth is that our nation, great though it is in so many ways, has a horrific history of political violence and a seemingly innate obsession with firearms. […] Tomorrow morning Chuck Schumer should put on the floor of the Senate a la...

The new Overcast is looking good! Smooth upgrade. From Marco’s blog post:

For Overcast to have a future, it needed a modern foundation for its second decade. I’ve spent the past 18 months rebuilding most of the app with Swift, SwiftUI, Blackbird, and modern Swift concurrency.

I’ve recorded a short 2-minute video to show how we’ve updated Micro.blog’s editor layout for blog theme templates. Simpler, faster. You can find it on YouTube here.

Finished reading: The Terraformers by Annalee Newitz. I enjoyed the first half of this book. But after the time jump, for me it couldn’t recapture what had worked in the opening characters and story. 📚

From the news blog:

We’ve updated how blog themes are edited. If you don’t have a custom theme, Micro.blog will now create a placeholder one for you, with an “Open” button to edit any templates. There’s a new sidebar of template names, faster search, and faster CSS editing.

Micro.blog News https://news.micro.blog/2024/07/15/weve-updated-how.html

There are a bunch of little tweaks to make themes easier to use. Going to try to do a video tomorrow to help explain it.

My blog has probably shifted way too much to the political, but that’s how it goes in an election year. Personal blog, personal opinions. But I’ve got some new Micro.blog improvements to talk about this week! Starting tomorrow.

Chris Enns:

I wish we could have a day or two each month where we all collectively agreed to post about things we enjoy, love, appreciate, or celebrate. No rage farming, click baiting, or rants allowed. Just for one day.

That would be nice! I might fail at this test, but it’s a good goal.

Just watched Biden’s statement on the shooting. Very good. He is the President and our Democratic nominee. To me, the debate about replacing him is over. The campaign is chaotic enough already. I still think he can win, but it’s going to be close, and it’s going to be work. 🇺🇸

Saying that Trump is a threat to democracy is not a call for violence. He caused January 6th. He refuses to accept the last election or the next one. He is chaos. Even after being shot, he’s shouting “fight” to the crowd. Everything he touches becomes more dangerous. Vote. 🇺🇸

Just posted a new Core Intuition: A Billion-Dollar Flop. We check in about the Vision Pro, then think about how Apple plays the long game and what we can learn about balancing marketing features vs. app polish.