Links

This is a really provocative post and has me thinking. I do miss Twitter, but I’m not sure the Twitter I miss is an app or a point in time.

“We don’t write code anymore, freelance budgets have turned to token spend, our email inboxes are stuffed with letters no one wrote, and our bosses make threats that we use the tech that usurps us or be fired. And the tech is effective — all of our last-season nervous laughter about spicy autocorrect echoes off austere walls as agents write more and better code each day.”

Great post from John Gruber, with a very plainspoken — and humorous — critique of Anthropic’s public comments about their watermarking.

I love these animated maps that show journeys from fiction in the real world. Reminds me a lot of Mapalong.

This is a really neat concept. Datatype is a variable font that turns text into charts. Bookmarking this as something to consider for future projects.

A TTF font that hides what you type from AI. Each letter contains a decoy. Pretty neat idea, and might be helpful in the robot uprising.

“Culture can give birth to something that hasn’t been seen, hasn’t been appropriated, hasn’t been followed to death.”

Mastodon has been my mental model for social media federation, so I thought of federation in terms of instances. This enlightening blog post explains why the concept doesn’t make sense in the Atmosphere.

Great article about why map clusters are poor UX with some modern recommendations.

A native font management app for macOS that looks pretty great.

“The internet you grew up on isn’t dying. A commercial veneer glued on top of it is.”

This project lets you use the LLM that’s already on your Mac.

“The reason that tech generally — and coders in particular — see LLMs differently than everyone else is that in the creative disciplines, LLMs take away the most soulful human parts of the work and leave the drudgery to you. And in coding, LLMs take away the drudgery and leave the human, soulful parts to you.”

“The following initially appeared on the personal website of Linds Redding, the former Saatchi & Saatchi and BBDO art director who died in 2012, aged 52, following a cancer diganosis and chemotherapy. It’s an intriguing reflection on his career, penned after realising his time was nearing an end.”

This is a great resource for “my users already have this font” organized by typeface classification.

“I’ve written about this before, but every child is born loving to draw. They draw on everything. They demand crayons in restaurants. They draw on your walls. You should let them do so. Fuck your walls. It’s easier to eventually paint over a wall, than to rebuild a child’s confidence.”

“After 20 years of shipping web applications, I have never seen fewer crashes and bugs make it to production.”

This pixel-perfect, three-dimensional map of NYC is very fun to play with.

“Google is a guest on the web, as we all are. Guests don’t make the rules.”

“The narrative from the AI labs is dazzling: build AGI, unlock astonishing productivity, and watch GDP surge. It’s a compelling story, especially if you’re the one building or investing in the new thought machines. But it skips the part that makes an economy an economy: circulation.”

“How to win the war for the soul of the internet and build the web we want.”

This is a great article from Doug Wilson based on a series of interviews with Tobias Frere-Jones about the history of the now-ubiquitous typeface Gotham.

“Social media promised connection, but it has delivered exhaustion.”

I really like Josh Brake’s comparison of e-bikes to AI. This might sound strange or even forced, but it’s a useful metaphor due to how actual e-bikes require effort (pedaling), and the assist is proportional to your effort. It feels like a boost, not a replacement.

NPR’s short, early review of Silksong. “If Hollow Knight was demanding, Silksong is merciless.”

This is a pretty great post from Brad Frost about the history of themeable UIs, and it includes a bit of video game history for extra fun.

“I want you to visit my website. I want you to read an article from a search result, and then discover the other things I’ve written, the other people I link to, and explore the weird themes I’ve got.”

This post covers a lot, including early web and Bitcoin, but really nails the weird AI hype we’re all drowning in right now, and puts words to what so many of us feel, which is that it’s simply not living up to the hype.

Fantastic introduction to SVGs by Joshua Comeau, who has made a name for himself with these kinds of wonderful interactive tutorials.

Troy Hunt of Have I Been Pwned gets pwned himself with a clever phish. The thing that stands out to me is that 1Password not auto-filling sends a much weaker signal than it used to. In the past, that would be a massive red flag, but we’ve come to expect it due to a combination of 1Password degrading over the years and legitimate websites using multiple domains with the same credentials.

“All of the tournament’s iconic posters in one place.”

“Most websites are awful. Not just slow – awful. Bloated, fragile, over-engineered disasters. They load slowly, render erratically, and hide their content behind megabytes of JavaScript. They glitch on mobile. They frustrate users and confuse search engines. They’re impossible to maintain. And somehow, we’re calling this progress.”

This is perhaps the best job post I’ve ever seen. I love Amit’s writing.

This is probably the best article I’ve read about younger generations and their relationship with work.

Really good article by Mandy Brown about AI and other topical subjects. “Engaging with AI as a technology is to play the fool.”

There are only 11 so far, but these are quite fun. I especially like the phonetic drum machine.

“The worst of the internet is continuously attacking the best of the internet.”

“If you do not recognize that mass destruction of fundamental concepts of democracy and the US Constitution happening right now, you are either willfully ignorant or just plain stupid. I can’t put it any clearer than that.”

Tracking the progress of Project 2025, a detailed plan to unravel the US government.

There are far more terrible things happening in the US right now, but this is comically embarrassing.

“Israel and Hamas have reached a ceasefire and hostage deal. This deal will halt the fighting in Gaza, surge much-needed humanitarian assistance to Palestinian civilians, and reunite the hostages with their families after more than 15 months in captivity.”

Take it from Laura, who has more Twitter cred than most of us, you don’t have to stay on Twitter. It’s gone. RIP.

Daniel Mangum wrote about hosting a website on Bluesky. This is not an intended use, but it’s interesting nonetheless.

Really lovely post from Craig Mod. “In memory of my friend.”

“It is with a heavy heart that I share that Enrique Allen passed away this week after a crushing battle with cancer.”

A faithful reproduction of the bitmap version of the Chicago typeface created by Susan Kare for Apple Computer in 1984.

This is one of the most detailed and thorough summaries of the WordPress drama I’ve read.

Fun article that explores the ways mystery and intrigue are used in Breath of the Wild and A Link to the Past.

“An open future for social networks.”

“OpenFreeMap lets you display custom maps on your website and apps for free.”