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Feel free to play Guess the Location of this old photo (taken by me) if you want.

The love of humanity is a thing supposed to be professed only by vulgar and officious philanthropists, or by saints of a superhuman detachment and universality. As a matter of fact, love of humanity is the commonest and most natural of the feelings of a fresh nature, and al...

“Artificial in- telligence”? “Machine learning”? I say: daikaiju.

I’ve said most of what I have to say about machine learning, and there are plenty of other people doing the heavy lifting on that topic. Mike Sacasas had a typically wise and incisive post the other day, and The New Atlantis is hosting a council on AI ethics. I’d prefer to make this site a cabinet of curiosities. And when I do comment on AI it will be in the form of haiku, or, as I prefer to style the word, haiku.

Cynthia Khoo, writing for the Institute for Research on Public Policy’s Policy Options: If Bill C-22 passes as is, it could put in place one piece of a bigger cross-border law enforcement data-sharing system, as envisioned in the CLOUD Act and other international data-sharing treaties. Once completed, this system could further expose Canadian residents and […]⌥ Permalink

While I am criticizing the New York Times’ odd framing choices, here is a more substantial critique from Alejandra Caraballo: Over the last several years it has become readily apparent that there has been a shift in the editorial framing and focus of the New York Times when it regards issues relating to transgender people. […]⌥ Permalink

Some follow-up thoughts on my earlier piece, regarding the second-gen iPhone Air’s additional camera lens being a 0.5× ultra-wide, not a 3× or 4× telephoto: Ultimately, it’s the fact that I use my 0.5× lens not so much for photography but for scanning documents and notes, a...

Marcin Wichary is absolutely correct: Paste And Match Style solves one problem whole creating others.

Speaking of Mark Gurman, in the wake of Tim Cook’s unprecedented interview with the WSJ to warn that Apple is going to raise prices in response to the steep rise in RAM and SSD prices, he tweeted (XCancel link): Regarding Apple price hikes, have to imagine these are fair...

Mark Gurman, reporting for Bloomberg: Apple Inc. is preparing a second-generation iPhone Air for spring 2027, aiming to boost the appeal of the slimmed-down device, according to people with knowledge of the matter. Current prototypes of the new model, code-named V62, ad...

30-disc set includes:

• 4K restorations of Kubrick’s thirteen features and three shorts, with their original soundtracks alongside the 5.1 mixes, restored and remastered
• Over twenty-five hours of interviews, documentaries, and behind-the-scenes materials
  • Kubrick’s international version of The Shining
• A new 4K restoration of Vivian Kubrick’s behind-the-scenes documentary Making “The Shining”
• Newly recorded commentary tracks featuring filmmaker Lee Unkrich (editor of the book Stanley Kubrick’s “The Shining”) and author Michael Benson (Space Odyssey: Stanley Kubrick, Arthur C. Clarke, and the Making of a Masterpiece)

All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.

Galicia, May 2026.

From the video I waited 8 years to make this photograph.

Every Friday night around 5PM, before I’m about to make our pizza night martinis, I turn on KUTX and listen to “Old School Dance Party” — the “Happy Feet Dance Party with ever-lovin’ John E. Dee playing the music that got you in trouble.”  (More recently, Confucius Jones has been taking over as host.) One […]

Michael H. Keller, Eli Murray, Danielle Ivory, and Irineo Cabreros, New York Times (gift link): The surge in pedestrian deaths has baffled researchers. Most other wealthy countries haven’t seen similar increases, suggesting that possible culprits like smartphones don’t tell the whole story. Other likely causes of deadly crashes, such as drunken and distracted driving, have […]⌥ Permalink

Bharat Iyer: Let’s be real … if The Observer actually cared at all about your privacy, they wouldn’t share your personal data with ONE HUNDRED AND SIXTY ONE FUCKING PARTNERS. [...] Imagine if, upon purchasing a copy of the Sunday newspaper in 1791, you were followed aro...

Austria v. Australia! HItler’s birthplace v. the country where he currently lives in peaceful retirement. ⚽️

Finished reading: Turner and Constable: Art, Life, Landscape by Nicola Moorby. A wonderful book, especially fine on how each painter was moved by rivers: Turner the great Thames, Constable the humble Stour. Now I’m desperate to get back to London to see their paintings again with fresh eyes. 📚

And here is another short film, shot two years later, featuring Dorothy L. Sayers and the cast of her wonderful play The Zeal of Thy House — take a look at the wings on those angels. (At the end there is footage from her far less successful play The Devil to Play.) I don’t know that there is any other film of Sayers and Eliot from that era.

Louis CK: Everything is amazing and nobody is happy.