Links
If there’s ever an article I should print out and staple to my forehead, it’s this one.
🔗 Slack users horrified to discover messages used for AI training
I’d like to avoid jumping on the “I have everything AI” bandwagon, but I agree that Slacks use of private message data to train their LLM is a pretty significant breach of trust. A lot of sensative data runs through their system, and although they may be hosting it, it’s not theirs to do as they please. Maybe they think it’s within their right, what with their EULAs and everything, but if I were a paying customer — of enterprise software, if you remember — I’d make bloody sure that data is the customer and the customer’s own.
It’ll be interesting to see how this will affect me personally. We use Slack at work and I know management is very sensative about IP (and given the domain, I can understand). Maybe I’ll finally get to try Teams out.
🔗 Goodbye to Apple’s Smart Keyboard Folio, the best iPad Pro accessory
I’ve never considered hoarding accessories before, but I might start. The Smart Keyboard Folio is perfect for how I use the iPad: a great stand and decent enough keyboard that doesn’t get in the way when I just want to read.
Igore the click-batey headline: this is quite a good post. Really enjoyed it. And, on the whole, I agree with the author. Via Jim Nielsen’s notes
🔗 Hiss!
Seeing @Miraz’s post about the Morepork reminded me of this poem by C. J. Dennis that was read to us as a kid. It was in this beautifully illustrated picture book, with thick borders full of, I guess, the illustrations of the subject’s imagination.
On it, their producer was lamenting not having somewhere to post a link to something being spoken about. No mention of show notes because I’m not convinced “big podcast” even knows they exist.
I’ve complained about this before and I haven’t seen any improvements. It’s as if the concept of making show-notes or even a website containing the links you mention on your podcast never cross these producers minds. That it’s perfectly okay to read URLs aloud and expect people to remember. It’s such an odd phenomenon.
🔗 Crying Myself to Sleep on the Biggest Cruise Ship Ever
A really great read.
I’ve never been on a cruise. This, plus the many jokes I’ve heard from comedians that have worked cruises, is probably the closest experience I’ll ever get to cruising. After reading it, it’s definitely not for me.
🔗 Insanity in the Air: The crash of Pakistan International Airlines flight 8303
A facinating post. One of those posts where you know the writer knows what they’re talking about, and has clearly done a lot of research for the piece. Will definitely take a look at their other posts.
This is probably worth trying. I know for myself that I get lost in the day-to-day activities of work that I loose a sense on what we’ve accomplished during the week. Besides, Confluence has got this blogging feature which never seems to get used.
🔗 The internet used to be ✨fun✨
Lot of interesting posts here about the personal web, both current and old school. I’ve been ducking in and out of this for a week now. Via the HV Discord.
Via A Learning a Day by Rohan. It resonated with me as well.
🔗 RS.S Joy
This was shared in the Hemispheric View Discord a few days ago. A lot of really good blogs listed (enrolled? As in blogroll?) there. I took a look at it yesterday and was just ducking in and out of blogs for ages.
🔗 Pika
Seeing this makes me want to try it. I think I have a problem: I want to try all of the blogging CMSes. But I have no need for it now, so I’ll just keep a link to it here for later.
🔗 The amazing helicopter on Mars, Ingenuity, will fly no more
Ingenuity has been an incrediable achievement. The engineers at NASA should be so proud of themselves. It’s sad to see this chopper grounded now, but seeing it fly for as long as it did has been a joy. Bravo!
🔗 Let’s make the indie web easier
Inspiring post. I will admit that while I was reading it I was thinking “what about this? What about that?” But I came away with the feeling (realisation?) that the appetite for these tools might be infinite and that one size doesn’t fit all. This might be a good thing.
All you have to do is dream up a good URL at your domain and redirect it to the feed’s URL provided by whatever service you use to host your stuff. And then that’s where you tell folks to subscribe.
It’s easy to forget (like I do) that there’s nothing magical about an RSS feed. It’s just one more thing served by HTTP at a URL. And thus, is useable with the real magic here which is HTTP redirects.
This is a brilliant idea. The only thing I’ll add is just to make those RSS feeds discoverable.
🔗 Apple Watch Series 9 and Ultra 2 Ban Takes Effect; Apple Appeals
The ITC’s ruling was subject to a potential veto by U.S. President Biden by December 25th, but today, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative issued a statement that it has decided against vetoing the ITC ruling, meaning that the ruling is now final.
It seems odd to me that Apple was expecting a reprieve from the White House over this patient dispute with Masimo. Issuing a veto looks like choosing one US company over another. Doesn’t seem like good political optics to me. Maybe it seemed to Apple it was worth a shot. 🤷♂️
🔗 Hardcore Software: //build It and They Will Come (Hopefully) (paywall)
I remember this Build conference. I was using Windows 7 at the time and it was exciting to see Windows 8 previewed like this. It was a major departure from what I was used to, and I was eager awaiting the Ars Technica reviews of the OS, the apps, and how things like contracts will work for developers.
But… it was an excitement I had for others. I was less than excited about the idea of seeing the desktop take a backseat to this brand new world of Metro and touch based interactions. I guess I was not the only one.
It’s quite a shame really. The devs at Microsoft clearly put a lot of work into re-enginerring the entire OS.
It’s thoughtful posts like this that keeps me on Micro.blog.
Also, chalk me up as one who’d rather keep link previews out of the timeline. I posted a link in Discord and the preview was so obnoxious I wish I could hide it (really Discord? Why can’t I hide it?).
🔗 PlayStation is erasing 1,318 seasons of Discovery shows from customer libraries
The realization has forced people to more deeply scrutinize their digital media purchases and subscriptions and how they value digital content. It’s also leading to calls for investment in hard copies of media.
I still believe that it’s possible to have a (semi-)perminenant representation of media in the digital realm. You just need to make sure it’s in an open, non-DRMed, file that exists on your file system. I know, easier said than done. But it might be time for me to be better here than I have been.