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Dec 16, 2024: Flat tax rate is an ‘attractive idea’, Kemi Badenoch says | Kemi Badenoch From the department of batshit Tories, we bring you this: At the moment, we …

Dec 8, 2024: I’m going to make a subclause of Betteridge’s Law for this one which changes “no” to “nothing good”.

Nov 10, 2024: Meanwhile, the billionaires would very much like you to know it’s now illegal not to give them your money.

Oct 27, 2024: It’s nearly November and I’m wearing a t shirt. Global warming, eh? Not a fan.

Oct 26, 2024: The jay is visiting

Oct 26, 2024: Bunny ears biker

Oct 25, 2024: If you know you know

Oct 25, 2024: Matt Mullenweg in "shuts up" shock Mullenweg Criticized for 1st Amendment Claims Mullenweg on Sunday published a blog post claiming that WP Engine’s lawsuit against him and Automattic …

Oct 21, 2024: Oh god oh god the NHS Change project has a website where members of the public can suggest ideas for the NHS AND ALL OF THEM ARE BEING PUBLISHED. At …

Oct 20, 2024: Elon Musk knows nothing Opinion | I ran Twitter’s civic integrity team. Elon Musk knows nothing about how elections are run.: Musk also called it “weird” that Dominion …

Oct 20, 2024: Sauce, goose, gander Regarding our Cease and Desist letter to Automattic | WP Fusion: The events of the past month have made me realize a few things: I don’t trust Matt. …

Oct 19, 2024: Fashion Renagades of 80s London, at the Fashion + Textile Museum.

Oct 17, 2024: On Safari (Matt Mullenweg edition) Samantha Cole at 404 Media – Employees Describe an Environment of Paranoia and Fear Inside Automattic Over WordPress Chaos: In July, before the …

Oct 15, 2024: Dave W Dan Gillmor on Dave Winer’s 30 years of blogging: I became a blogger because of Dave. So, in a sense, did I. The first blogging platform I …

Oct 13, 2024: Matt Mullenweg and WordPress Hijack the Advanced Custom Fields Plugin – Pixel Envy It is nearly impossible to get me to feel sympathetic for anything …

Oct 13, 2024: Because I might be moving from WordPress to Micro.blog, I have imported all the posts from my main domain – so if I do switch off WordPress, …

Oct 13, 2024: This was probably about the time that I first discovered Linux. It looks very old-fashioned now, but at the time, GNOME was pretty comparable to …

Oct 13, 2024: An IndieWeb reader: My new home on the internet • Aaron Parecki People on blogs feel slightly less performative than people on big social networks. …

Oct 13, 2024: With the current lack of trust over Mat Mullenweg’s stewardship of WordPress, I’m investigating whether I can use Micro.blog as an …

Oct 13, 2024: Ten Blue Links "my god, what have I done?" edition 1. Well who could possibly have seen this coming? I wrote a while ago that the era of major levels of affiliate revenue for publishers was going to …

Oct 6, 2024: Ten Blue Links, literary salon Edition 1. Apple’s built in apps can do (almost) everything One of the characteristics of hardcore nerdery is the tendency to over engineer your systems. …

Sep 28, 2024: Ten Blue Links “reinventing drink ordering” Edition 1. Inventing the future If there is a book about Apple, I have probably read it. On my first day working at the company in 1989 I was given the …

Sep 20, 2024: Ten Blue Links, "Turn to the left" edition QuickTime My first look at QuickTime came before it was publicly released. I was working at Apple in IS&T in 1990, and we had a session one …

Sep 15, 2024: Ten Blue Links, “hell of a lot of Apple here, Ian” edition 1. Oh was there some new Apple stuff? Apparently there was. I didn’t get chance to watch the keynote live — I was in Amsterdam for a conference — but …

Sep 14, 2024: Hospitals I have always felt at home in hospitals. As a small child, my mother - a psychiatric nurse - would take me to work with her on Wednesdays, to collect …

Sep 14, 2024: "Ireland doesn't want the money" John Gruber on the EU ruling that Apple owes 13bn euro in taxes to Ireland: Ireland doesn’t want the money... What a great win for Margrethe …

Sep 14, 2024: Founder Mode, hackers, and being bored by tech I could – and probably should – write an entire essay about the cult of the founder in Silicon Valley, how it developed and the damage it …

Sep 7, 2024: Why do people get the history of Apple so wrong? Dave Winer (who really should know better): Graham uses Steve Jobs as an example. He knew what was and wasn't an Apple product. A hired CEO would have …

Sep 4, 2024: DOJ, Nvidia, and why we restrict monopolies A 1600, a group of English merchants were granted a royal charter, a legal document which allowed them to venture to foreign lands and seek trade. …

Sep 1, 2024: Ten Blue Links, “I was a teenage anarchist” edition 1. Model collapse isn’t just for AI When a large language model starts to ingest a lot of content written by either itself or other large language …

Aug 25, 2024: Ten Blue Links, "Cthulhu lives!" edition 1. The smartest comment you will read about AI and art this week From the wonderful Laurie Anderson, about an AI version of her late husband, Lou …

Aug 18, 2024: Ten Blue Links, "Gnarls Barkley is innocent" edition 1. Just because we killed you doesn't make us liable Dr. Kanokporn Tangsuan died after eating a meal at a Disney resort. Her family claims this is …

Aug 11, 2024: Ten Blue links, "so much Apple, so little time" edition 1. IBM 1956 = Google 2024 (and Apple, and Microsoft, and and and) As I've noted before, you are likely to read an awful lot of bad punditry about …

Jul 28, 2024: Ten Blue Links, "Sunday is the new Friday" edition Yeah, this one is late. I'm doing some extra work, OK? Anyway, onward. 1. Nerdy. Very nerdy First something nerdy. Very nerdy. Of course, it’s from …

Jul 20, 2024: Taboola targeting Eric Seufert, on Threads: Regarding Taboola’s partnership with Apple: I’ve seen people claim that this is somehow hypocritical from a privacy …

Jul 19, 2024: Ten Blue (Screen of Death) Links, "Why is my PC not working?" edition 1. Oh come on, Apple Back when Apple changed its app guidelines to permit emulators and HTML 5-based mini games it looked like the dawning of just a …

Jul 17, 2024: I wouldn’t say that Apple using Taboola is going to make me rethink my Apple usage, but it’s definitely an indication that “we focus …

Jul 17, 2024: Block, block and block again Jack Dorsey, Bluesky, decentralised social networks and the very common crowd – Attack of the 50 Foot Blockchain: There’s a kind of person who is the …

Jul 12, 2024: Ten Blue Links, "Three Lions On My Shirt" edition 1. Couldn’t happen to a nicer billionaire What’s interesting about the European Commission’s charges against Twitter (which I refuse to call X because …

Jul 7, 2024: Ten Blue Links, "delayed by the election" edition 1. I'm shocked, shocked I tell you Surprise! The use of energy-intensive AI to make stupid graphics that look instantly like AI and write words that …

Jun 30, 2024: Ten Blue Links, Infamy, infamy, they’ve all got it infamy edition 1. Oh Perplexity, why must you test me so? I have been a big proponent of Perplexity for a while, mostly because I found it incredibly useful as a …

Jun 27, 2024: Microsoft 1998 = Apple 2024 Daring Fireball: European Commission Launches Investigation Against Microsoft for Integrating Teams With Office: My read on this is that the EC’s …

Jun 22, 2024: Apple delays AI in the EU. Maybe. Another day, another spat between Apple and the EU. I'm not going to focus on the ridiculous idea that the DMA Is too vague, or that someone EU law is …

Jun 21, 2024: Ten Blue Links “Liberation Serif is cool now” edition 1. Dell to employees: “screw you”. Employees to Dell: “you first” Everyone enjoys seeing a few chickens coming home to roost, and especially when the …

Jun 7, 2024: Ten blue links, "what a beautiful day, hey hey" edition 1. Looks like a publisher, is actually an AI content farm I'm still hearing about publishers who think the answer to their prayers is replacing human …

Jun 2, 2024: Weeknote, Sunday 2nd June 2024 First of all, how the hell is it June already? Is it just me? Is time passing at a ludicrously fast pace? OK, maybe it is just me. This week was, in …

May 31, 2024: Ten blue links, just when I thought I was out edition There’s a lot of AI in this edition. Sorry. One day I’ll stop talking about it, probably when silenced by the machines. For those whose interests are …

May 29, 2024: Google lies If you are interested in any way in the worlds of SEO -- black, white, and every shade in between -- you are going to be aware of the massive leak of …

May 27, 2024: Weeknote, Bank Holiday Monday 27th May 2024 It’s been a while since I wrote a proper Weeknote. To be honest, I am struggling with them a bit – I’m working at an actual company four days a week, …

May 26, 2024: Ten Blue Links, All Your Computer Screengrabs Are Belong To Us edition What a weird week. You might have noticed Microsoft had a few announcements. I’m not going to dwell on them – but what I will say is that moving …

May 19, 2024: Hate to say I told you so I don't think I was the first person by a long way to draw the conclusion that AI posed an existential threat to the publishing industry. While far …

May 12, 2024: Some thoughts about Apple’s new iPads Mark Gurman’s last minute “maybe an M4…” rumour turned out to be absolutely correct. No one would have batted an eyelid had the company gone with an …

May 11, 2024: Ten Blue Links, "Did they really crush that lovely piano?" edition 1. Yes, Apple, we're also talking about you Cal Newport reckons that it's time to dismantle the technopoly. Taking a cue from Neil Postman's (great) …

May 7, 2024: That time in the 90s I persuaded a Japanese film crew that my friend was Richard Branson, inadvertently foreshadowing the “geek pie” incident in …

May 7, 2024: On the iPad becoming a Mac Jason Snell wants the iPad to be able to be a Mac: The iPad no longer feels like the future of computing, and that’s fine. The Mac is here to stay, …

May 5, 2024: I’m sure that Nick Bostrom’s move from AI doomer to “maybe AI is going to save us” has absolutely nothing to do with AI making …

May 5, 2024: This sounds bad, but kudos to Dropbox for being transparent about it – and from what they say it sounds like other services (i.e. storage) were not …

May 5, 2024: One of these days I am going to have to write up how I’ve turned Obsidian into the best environment for writing I’ve ever used. Today is …

May 5, 2024: Ten Blue Links, Sunday rail replacement bus service edition I managed not to do any writing at all this week, as I'm off work over the coming days and so didn't have a lot of time. But I can't miss out on my …

Apr 27, 2024: Why do people try and forbid linking? Websites That Forbid Other Websites From Linking to Them – Pixel Envy: Some of these are even more bizarre than a blanket link ban, like Which? …

Apr 26, 2024: Ten Blue Links, “gosh is that the time” edition 1. Who among us has not been surprised by needing people to do things Spotify's Daniel Ek is shocked, shocked I tell you, that laying off 1,500 …

Apr 21, 2024: Weeknote, Sunday 21st April 2024 This has been a week of feeling my age – but also wondering exactly what that means. I'm currently working with a small editorial team who are, …

Apr 21, 2024: Informed Consent and Privacy – Pixel Envy Informed Consent and Privacy – Pixel Envy: Meta is probably one of the more agreeable players in this racket, too. It hoards data; it does not share …

Apr 19, 2024: Did IQs drop sharply while I was away? AppleInsider: –"EU's antitrust head is ignoring Spotify's dominance and wants to punish Apple instead": Speaking to CNBC the EU's Margrethe Vestager …

Apr 19, 2024: Ten Blue Links, “my, how you have changed!” edition 1. Four years is a long time in tech punditry I'm going to break one of my self-imposed rules and include a link to a piece I wrote, on how John …

Apr 19, 2024: What a difference four years makes John Gruber in 2020 on the tracking industry led by Facebook: The entitlement of these fuckers is just off the charts. They have zero right, none, to …

Apr 17, 2024: On the fine art of technology reviews Nearly thirty years ago I reviewed my first product. It was a Lexmark solid ink inkjet printer, created for designers to do lower-cost but higher …

Apr 12, 2024: Ten blue links, it's been a while edition Yes, it really has been a while. Sorry about that: I started a new job and have been knee-deep in the glorious moment called "the first couple of …

Apr 1, 2024: Antitrust, Meta, Apple and more John Gruber: More on the EU’s Market Might: If they follow through with a demand that Photos be completely un-installable (not just hidable from the …

Mar 29, 2024: Ten Blue Links, Country Life Edition Currently holed up in Suffolk. And I almost got away without mentioning Apple… 1. The Atlantic gets it AI "will change the way people find us, it will …

Mar 24, 2024: Weeknote, Sunday 24th March 2024 BOY that was a week. You might have noticed that I didn’t write a weeknote last weekend… well there’s lots of things going on at the moment that I …

Mar 24, 2024: A History of United States v. Microsoft – Pixel Envy A History of United States v. Microsoft – Pixel Envy: In other words, how much is it okay for a first party to advantage themselves over third …

Mar 23, 2024: Sky falls in, Walt Mossberg may be wrong Over on Threads, Walt Mossberg has commented on the Apple/DOJ case. First up, if you do not respect Walt's opinions, you're a fool. Walt is one of my …

Mar 22, 2024: A few thoughts on the Apple DOJ antitrust case, from someone who isn't riding his first rodeo From 1995 through to about 2008, I made my living from technology journalism (we called it “computer journalism” then, because technology really was …

Mar 15, 2024: Ten Blue Links, AI is bad now edition First up, apologies that there's been no long form post this week. I've had some family stuff which had to take priority over writing. Normal service …

Mar 14, 2024: Someone’s post just reminded me about “Will it blend?” and now I want to go back and watch things blending.

Mar 10, 2024: Weeknote, Sunday 10th March Last week we went to see Dune. It's a pretty amazing film, the kind that you just let wash over you and experience rather than trying too hard to …

Mar 8, 2024: Ten Blue Links, Too Much Apple Edition It's FRIDAY! 1. Substack now has three million paid subscribers I left Substack because I didn’t want to stay on a platform which lied about its …

Mar 7, 2024: On Apple terminating Epic’s E.U. Developer Account Daring Fireball: Apple Terminated Epic’s E.U. Developer Account: I guess Epic is implying that the EU government, not Apple, should have that …

Mar 6, 2024: The future of search-driven affiliate content This week, rather than focus on a single topic, I thought I would look at a couple of different things – and also point you in the direction of some …

Mar 3, 2024: Weeknote, Sunday 3rd March 2024 I'm a little bit tired: a two hour journey back from Folkestone this morning (thank you farmers, tractor convoys in a mediaeval walled city are fun) …

Mar 2, 2024: What's the sound? A screeching u-turn, followed by excuses Craig Grannell on Apple’s u-turn on web apps: Apple has performed a screeching U-turn on killing web apps, perhaps because the European …

Mar 1, 2024: Ten blue links, Folsom Prison Blues Edition 1. Oh, WordPress! Not content with their CEO getting into a stupid public spat with a user and apparently revealing information about them which …

Feb 29, 2024: The end of the line for Google “Personally, I don’t want the perception in a few years to be, ‘Those old school web ranking types just got steamrolled and somehow never saw it …

Feb 23, 2024: Ten Blue Links, "Gloom and doom" edition It's been a gloomy week. Sorry. 1. Surprise! Apple’s sync stuff is entirely cryptic The magnificent Howard Oakley, who knows more about the technology …

Feb 22, 2024: HouseFresh and the challenges of affiliate content You might have noticed a post from HouseFresh doing the rounds, especially if you have anything to do with creating content intended to generate …

Feb 18, 2024: Weeknote, Sunday 19th February 2024 The good thing about not writing a weeknote for a week is you have plenty of things to write about. The bad thing is that you have plenty of things to …

Feb 17, 2024: Michael Tsai - iOS 17.4 Changes PWAs to Shortcuts in EU Michael Tsai - Blog - iOS 17.4 Changes PWAs to Shortcuts in EU: Apple had two years or so to prepare for the DMA, but they “had to” to remove the …

Feb 17, 2024: Daring Fireball: The European Commission Had Nothing to Do With Apple’s Reversal on Supporting RCS Daring Fireball: The European Commission Had Nothing to Do With Apple’s Reversal on Supporting RCS: China, unlike the EU, seemingly knows how to draft …

Feb 16, 2024: Ten Blue Links, 12 Feb 2024: the work from home edit I like links. You like links. Everyone likes links! 1. The dirty fight of "return to office" I've written before that if you can't lead teams …

Feb 9, 2024: Ten Blue Links, "Tech is Bad Right Now" Edition I remain a technology optimist, but weeks like this give even me an “are we the baddies” moment or two. On to the links. 1. Sam wants more more money …

Feb 4, 2024: Weeknote, Sunday 4th February 2024 Quite a busy week, all told. I finished off a feature for PC Pro magazine, which will be the first freelance bit of tech journalism I’ve done for …

Feb 3, 2024: Some thoughts on Apple Vision Pro (and VR/AR in general) As many people have noted, the ultimate platform for augmented reality is something that is both portable (can be worn all the time) and invisible …

Feb 3, 2024: Ten blue links for 3rd Feb, 2024 I mentioned a while ago on Mastodon that I had such a backlog of stuff I had saved to read and could potentially write about that I was going to have …

Feb 1, 2024: Adapting to the new reality of search It’s obvious at this point that the landscape of search traffic for publishers is rapidly changing, and not generally for the better. Every SEO I know …

Jan 27, 2024: Some thoughts on Apple's response to the EU DMA There is always a point in every Robin Hood film where Robin stops robbing the rich to feed the poor and doffs his hat to King Richard, stepping back …

Jan 25, 2024: John Scalzi has a new Mac John Scalzi has done a terrific overview of the new 16in MacBook Pro (with M3 Max, naturally) that he recently acquired, and I agree with so many of …

Jan 24, 2024: The Mac Without the Mac, I wouldn’t have had a career. The first time I encountered a Mac was in 1986. As a fresh-faced know-it-all Humanities student, I had …

Jan 24, 2024: The information grey goo I’m broadly positive about the future of LLMs and AI, but no one should pretend there will not be difficulties or that the transition to using …

Jan 21, 2024: Weeknote, Sunday 21st January 2024 So much blood this week. Fortunately, all of it was removed from me under medical supervision. On Tuesday, I had a bit taken for blood tests. I have …

Jan 19, 2024: How to roll out AI in a creative business I talked recently about how changing the culture of learning in your business will be important if you will make the most of AI. But no matter what, …

Jan 18, 2024: AI is about people, not just machines It would be a little remiss of me if I didn’t mention the launch this week of Microsoft’s consumer and small business AI play. Microsoft Copilot Pro …

Jan 17, 2024: Apple's 27 per cent tithe 9to5Mac: Apple has also confirmed that it will charge a commission on purchases made through alternative payment platforms. This commission will be …

Jan 14, 2024: Weeknote, Sunday 14th January 2024 This week there were some exciting work-related developments which I can't really talk about yet, but I might be able to in the future. Or I might …

Jan 12, 2024: The continuing challenge of return to office This is the first post-Substack edition of my newsletter, the first one delivered via WordPress. At some point in the coming days, the Substack …

Jan 10, 2024: Finally, A Grocery Cart That Can Save Me From The Horror Of An Ad-Free Moment Of Existence Finally, A Grocery Cart That Can Save Me From The Horror Of An Ad-Free Moment Of Existence | Defector: This is one of those new technologies …

Jan 7, 2024: Weeknote, 7th January 2024 I was going to write a sort of yearnote last week, summing up 2023. I didn’t, in the end, mainly because I felt too tired of 2023 to want to write it. …

Dec 25, 2023: Christmasnote, 25th December 2023 Technically, I should have written this yesterday, but somehow Christmas Eve feels like an even less appropriate time to be writing than Christmas …

Dec 22, 2023: Substack and "platform risk" It’s quite ironic that I spend part of my professional life warning publishers and content creators about platform risk while publishing a newsletter …

Dec 20, 2023: Removing cloud storage providers from macOS One of Apple’s most annoying habits is changing things to make them harder for users to “make mistakes”. Almost without exception, these actually …

Dec 17, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 17th December 2023 I’ve been thinking a lot about how I use computers this week. As I have written before (at great length) I still use computers like I was a full-time …

Dec 13, 2023: What the Epic vs Google case means for content A games company and a search giant tussling over Fortnight doesn't sound like it has much to do with publishing. But it begins a process which could …

Dec 10, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 10th December 2023 On Tuesday, I attended (virtually, of course) an International Association of News Media (INMA) talk given by Benedict Evans on the future of news. I …

Dec 9, 2023: Pluralistic “If buying isn’t owning, piracy isn’t stealing” Pluralistic: “If buying isn’t owning, piracy isn’t stealing” (08 Dec 2023) – Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow: In Poland, a team of …

Dec 3, 2023: The MacBook Pro The MacBook Pro 16in which was effectively replaced by my MacBook Air M2 has been sitting in a corner for a while. I had wiped it completely – …

Dec 3, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 3rd December 2023 How did it get to be December already? And how did it get so cold? The Byte archive I was a fairly religious reader of Byte magazine from the early …

Nov 29, 2023: Open extensions on Firefox for Android debut December 14 (but you can get a sneak peek today) | Mozilla Add-ons Community Blog Open extensions on Firefox for Android debut December 14 (but you can get a sneak peek today): Starting December 14, 2023, extensions marked as …

Nov 29, 2023: How to get a glimpse of the post-Google future of search What does the search engine of the future look like? Forget 10 blue links...You can break down the creative process into three big chunks: research, …

Nov 27, 2023: Latenote, Monday 27th November 2023 Between getting ridiculously excited about the goings-on OpenAI, I didn't get a lot of writing done this week. There are definitely times when too …

Nov 22, 2023: What the heck is going on at OpenAI (and why should I care?) Confused? You should be. I'm deliberately not looking at Techmeme so I don't have to update this post for the fifth time.Twenty-four hours ago, this …

Nov 17, 2023: "Journalism is picking up the phone" Remembering the craft and process of original reporting can help build a loyal audience. So far this week, I have looked at a couple of strategies for …

Nov 16, 2023: Telling human stories: where AI ends and people begin The second area where humans can do a better job than an LLM: real life storytellingOne of the best parts of my last year working at Bauer was getting …

Nov 14, 2023: What kinds of content can humans do better than AI? Sometimes, you just need the human touch...What kinds of content can humans do better than AI? The last few posts here have, I have to admit, been a …

Nov 12, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 12th November 2023 This felt like a busy week, perhaps because it actually was On Monday I had a call with Peter Bittner, who publishes The Upgrade, a newsletter about …

Nov 7, 2023: John G on Monica Chin's review of the Surface Laptop Go 3 Daring Fireball: Monica Chin on the Microsoft Surface Laptop Go 3: ‘Why Does This Exist?': A $999 laptop that maxes out at 256 GB of storage …

Nov 6, 2023: What a 36 year old video can tell us about the future of publishing The future is arriving a little later than expected...I have had the best life. Back in 1989, I left polytechnic with my first class honours degree in …

Nov 5, 2023: On Steven Sinofsky's post on regulating AI Regulating AI by Executive Order is the Real AI Risk: The President’s Executive Order on Artificial Intelligence is a premature and pessimistic …

Nov 5, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 5th November Time passes. The highlight of this week was at the Royal Festival Hall on Monday, when we drove into London (more on that in a moment) to see Brian …

Nov 3, 2023: Importing Apple Notes into Obsidian is now easy Obsidian’s Importer Plugin Lets You Move Your Apple Notes to Any Note-Taking App That Supports Markdown - MacStories: Apple Notes doesn’t have …

Nov 2, 2023: Who would have thought Amazon would behave like this? Amazon deliberately deleted messages to hide dodgy business practices: The FTC also alleges that Amazon tried to impede its investigation into the …

Oct 31, 2023: AI content: Publishers' next burning platform moment LLMs remove a key competitive advantage of publishers. You need to find a new one.It still surprises me that I’m old enough to have been part of the …

Oct 29, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 29th October 2023 An abbreviated weeknote this time, as I've not long got back from Orford Ness. Orford Ness is a strange and interesting place. Used by the air force …

Oct 23, 2023: DOJ probing Tesla’s EV range cheating DOJ probing Tesla’s EV range after reports of exaggerated numbers - The Verge: The US Department of Justice (DOJ) is investigating the range of …

Oct 23, 2023: SEO will be over for publishers. You need to adapt. Position one for a query is no longer close to enoughI don't know of a single person in publishing who doesn't believe that large language models …

Oct 23, 2023: China launches investigation into iPhone maker Foxconn, says state media China launches investigation into iPhone maker Foxconn, says state media: China has launched an investigation into Apple iPhone maker Foxconn over …

Oct 22, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 22 October 2023 It's been a while...It’s been a while. I have missed the last couple of weeks not because I was too busy to write, but almost the opposite: I have …

Oct 22, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 22nd October It’s been a while. I have missed the last couple of weeks not because I was too busy to write, but almost the opposite: I have felt like nothing much …

Oct 17, 2023: The new Apple Pencil Apple has released a new Pencil for iPad and it’s weird. It looks like the Second Generation Pencil (the one which charges by sticking to the …

Oct 17, 2023: Coming soon This is Ian Betteridge's Three to Five.

Oct 16, 2023: Marc Andreessen's manifesto It would take a far, far longer post than I’m prepared to spend my time writing to go through Marc Andreessen’s “Techno-Optimist Manifesto” paragraph …

Oct 11, 2023: Publishers need to wake up to the truth about Google traffic Google-Extended does not stop Google Search Generative Experience from using your site’s content (searchengineland.com) Google explained that …

Oct 10, 2023: GitHub Copilot costs more per user than it charges Big Tech Struggles to Turn AI Hype Into Profits - WSJ: Individuals pay $10 a month for the AI assistant. In the first few months of this year, the …

Oct 10, 2023: The good use of ChatGPT for factual writing I’m not a huge fan of using ChatGPT for writing, because even leaving aside issues of accuracy, its style is stilted and just the wrong side of …

Oct 1, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 1st October 2023 How the heck is it October already? That's just not possible. It's been a relatively quiet week. On Tuesday I was going to go to Waterstones in …

Sep 26, 2023: Microsoft 365 Copilot shows you ads. Or does it? Ask Microsoft 365 Copilot in Windows if it shows you ads, and it gives you a pretty confused answer: But ask it a question about the specs of the …

Sep 24, 2023: In this week’s Weeknote, I’m doing some writing, walking around Sheppey, and being angry about repairability. …

Sep 24, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 24th September 2023 I spent Monday and Tuesday working on a short story submission. The workshop that I went to last week at the Barbican on horror was the last one a …

Sep 22, 2023: One of these days I am going to write something about the prophetic nature of Cronenberg’s “Videodrom” and “eXistenz”.

Sep 17, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 17 September 2023 I spent Monday down in Brighton visiting my friend Vicky, who I haven’t actually seen face to face for a ludicrous amount of time. Astoundingly, we …

Sep 15, 2023: Properties in Obsidian are a game changer I have been an on-again/off-again user of Obsidian for a couple of years and have lately been shifting a lot of my writing work to it, both blogging …

Sep 10, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 10th September 2023 I'm writing this slightly later than normal after we got back from a trip down to the Bristol to see our lovely friends. There's a bunch of pictures …

Sep 7, 2023: No, the UK government did not back down on its plans to spy on encrypted messages Many places reported that the British government had seen sense and backed down from its plans to require companies like Apple, Meta and Signal to …

Sep 7, 2023: Elon Musk deliberately sabotaged a Ukrainian attack New Musk biography offers fresh details about the billionaire's Ukraine dilemma | CNN Politics: Elon Musk secretly ordered his engineers to turn off …

Sep 5, 2023: Brexit making Windows worse in the UK Tom Warren, for The Verge: Microsoft will finally stop forcing Windows 11 users in Europe into Edge if they click a link from the Windows Widgets …

Sep 5, 2023: The anti-capitalist book of fashion Finished reading: The Anti-Capitalist Book of Fashion by TANSY E. HOSKINS 📚 I’m not exactly someone that knows a lot about fashion, but this is …

Sep 4, 2023: Do Interesting Finished reading: Do Interesting by Russell Davies 📚 I absolutely breezed through this, and enjoyed it greatly.

Sep 4, 2023: Resurrecting Technovia I have no idea where the name came from, but I started writing a blog called Technovia somewhere around the turn of the millennium. It started off as …

Sep 4, 2023: It's long past time for Apple to stop advertising on Twitter Mashable: Over the past 24 hours, the hashtag “BanTheADL” has been trending on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter. The trending …

Sep 4, 2023: Keanu just can’t be human. No human being can be this nice. twitter.com/LAPublicL…

Sep 3, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 3rd September 2023 Time is strangely stretching. When I started writing this post I had to check my calendar to see what I have done this week, and found that events I …

Sep 3, 2023: Goddamit I’m listening to The Kitchen Cabinet and they are talking about cheese and now all I want is cheese.

Sep 2, 2023: On the read later experience in Pocket and Readwise Om Malik on how the experience in Pocket has declined and his thoughts on Readwise Reader: To me, Pocket has always been a repository where I save, …

Sep 1, 2023: Apple explains why it abandoned iPhone CSAM detection Apple explains why it abandoned iPhone CSAM detection: “Scanning every user’s privately stored iCloud data would create new threat …

Aug 31, 2023: Ha ha ha ha nope X, Formerly Twitter, Plans to Collect User Biometric Data, Job, Education - Bloomberg: “Based on your consent, we may collect and use your biometric …

Aug 31, 2023: The Real Story of Elon Musk’s Twitter Takeover The Real Story of Elon Musk’s Twitter Takeover - WSJ: The way that Musk blustered into buying Twitter and renaming it X was a harbinger of the way he …

Aug 31, 2023: Microsoft seems really determined to give more people more reasons to avoid Windows like the plague. www.theverge.com/2023/8/30…

Aug 31, 2023: BTW, if you notice that I’m posting a bunch of little links, it’s because I’m going through the backlog of stuff I’ve saved into Raindrop.io which I …

Aug 31, 2023: A rare Betteridge’s Law-breaking headline. Yes. Yes he was. (Because of the nature of the content, Snopes has a pass) www.snopes.com/fact-chec…

Aug 31, 2023: This is great: a bunch of primary sources about the early Macintosh. Much reading! web.stanford.edu/dept/SUL/…

Aug 30, 2023: I see Captain Dickhead is at it again www.cnbc.com/2023/08/3…

Aug 27, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 27th August 2023 Being on my own is weird. Many of the things that I tend to do when Kim is at home turn out to be less attractive when I’m on my own for a longer …

Aug 21, 2023: It is always worth remembering that Steve Jobs could be a nasty piece of work when he wanted to be. twitter.com/TechEmail…

Aug 20, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 20th August 2023 This has been a week of joining. First, I joined the Society of Authors. Although I’m not a published fiction writer, the body of work I have from a …

Aug 20, 2023: Sad to hear about the death of John Warnock, who was a truly great computer scientist. His early contributions to computer graphics included …

Aug 16, 2023: This weather is almost exactly the kind that makes me want to go for a long snooze, all day.

Aug 14, 2023: Unraveling the Digital Markets Act I absolutely loved this post on Unraveling the Digital Markets Act: by the team from iA, who also make one of my favourite pieces of software.

Aug 14, 2023: This book sounds right up my street shkspr.mobi/blog/2023…

Aug 14, 2023: Printer makers are evil, part 3422 Judge denies HP's request to dismiss printer lockdown suiit • The Register: HP all-in-one printer owners, upset that their devices wouldn't scan or …

Aug 14, 2023: Latenote, "Sunday 12th August 2023" (but really Monday) This week a classic "I don't have to work" project: sorting out my music library. My music collection has been all over the place for a while. I have …

Aug 14, 2023: The Centauri Device Finished reading: The Centauri Device by M. John Harrison 📚 I first read this when I was about ten years old and I’ve loved Harrison’s work ever …

Aug 14, 2023: On Cnet deleting its archive CNet Deletes Thousands of Old Articles in an Attempt to Game Google Search – Pixel Envy: Google says this whole strategy is bullshit. A bunch of SEO …

Aug 12, 2023: Downloading all of the music I have bought from iTunes and I am left with some deeply disturbing questions. Such as “when did I buy ‘the …

Aug 12, 2023: Am I the only Mac user who really doesn’t like Magsafe? It constantly gets small particles of grit in it, which stop it making a proper …

Aug 9, 2023: Goddammit people don’t make me buy Baldur’s Gate 3

Aug 7, 2023: Suspect charged in hate-motivated stabbing in Canada university gender issues class Suspect charged in hate-motivated stabbing in Canada university gender issues class | Canada | The Guardian: A suspect has been charged in the …

Aug 6, 2023: Opinionated record shops w/e 2023-08-06 (Phil Gyford’s website): My only specific memory of shopping in Revolver was going in to buy a ticket to see The Wedding Present play …

Aug 6, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 6th August 2023 I bought a watch. A normal, not-in-any-way-smart watch, for less than £30. That feels like better value than a smart watch which I use mainly to tell …

Aug 1, 2023: Billionaire investor threatens to pull out of UK amid global outcry at new oil rush Billionaire investor threatens to pull out of UK amid global outcry at new oil rush: “I am a major investor here,” Forrest told Bloomberg News. “If I …

Aug 1, 2023: Gnome windowing becoming more like Apple's Stage Manager? The Gnome foundation, which makes arguably the most popular desktop environment for Linux, is experimenting with new windowing models. While …

Aug 1, 2023: Why do cryptrobros always have such a lack of imagination about what they spend the money they fraudulently obtain on? Take Richard Heart: In …

Aug 1, 2023: If ever anyone wants to buy me a fancy birthday present, this will do. kareprints.com/products/…

Aug 1, 2023: Glenn Greenwald is, and always has been, a know-nothing blowhard who overstates everything he comes into contact with. He’s not a radical – he …

Aug 1, 2023: Apple and repair I largely agree with Nick Heer’s take on Apple’s policies on repair – and the criticisms thereof. I don’t think Apple goes out of …

Aug 1, 2023: In today’s episode of “Brexit meets reality”… www.theguardian.com/politics/…

Jul 31, 2023: I am very pleased to find that The Stinky Meat Project, one of the greatest sites of all time, is still online. www.stinkymeat.net

Jul 31, 2023: Looks like Amazon video has reached the stage of enshittification where, having enticed businesses on to their platform, they start treating them like …

Jul 31, 2023: Things you might be interested in - 31/7/23 Cory has a new book coming out which builds on his work on "enshittification". You can pre-order it as DRM-free audiobook (and no it's not on …

Jul 31, 2023: Hmm, can anyone think of the 1001 ways this can go wrong? www.axios.com/2023/07/3…

Jul 31, 2023: This is a really good summary of why iCloud Drive is really good, until it’s not, at which point you had better start praying to whatever …

Jul 31, 2023: Latenote, Monday 31st July 2023 This week, I mostly gave myself a week off which meant I hit level 60 on my character in the new Diablo 4 season. That’s understandable, but I need to …

Jul 29, 2023: Hot. Dog.

Jul 26, 2023: I’m thinking of moving my blog from Wordpress on to something else, and Micro.blog ticks a lot of boxes: incorporates ActivityPub and RSS; can …

Jul 26, 2023: God Alexia Putellas is good. Really good close control and vision.

Jul 26, 2023: There is a player for Costa Rica called Pricila Chinchilla which may be the greatest name in football history.

Jul 25, 2023: The Sky Glass advert is basically “here’s all the features Apple has in Apple TV but we will charge you £17 a month plus a Sky …

Jul 23, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 23rd July At long last, I have some news. After six years, I’m leaving Bauer and moving got to pastures new – or at least to allow myself some time to do some …

Jul 16, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 16th July 2023 It's been a couple of weeks since I last wrote and a few things have happened: I spent a week up in Arvon's Lumb Bank writing house doing a wonderful …

Jul 14, 2023: Apple and Disney are happy to fund Nazis Far right influencers are first to get paid by Musk's Twitter: The first beneficiaries appear to be high-profile far-right influencers who tweeted …

Jul 6, 2023: Some quick thoughts on Threads This is very obviously v0.9 Some fairly fundamental things are missing. Support for ActivityPub, which would allow you to follow Threads users from …

Jul 2, 2023: Weeknote, 2nd July 2023 Having teased you all with some big news that I thought I was going to be able to talk about this week… I can’t… so you will have to wait. Maybe next …

Jul 2, 2023: It’s genuinely shocking how Musk has managed to completely destroy his reputation as a competent business person with the Twitter acquisition. I …

Jul 1, 2023: Honestly Musk would have been better off just making Twitter 100% subscription from the day he bought it. At least that would have been a strategy.

Jul 1, 2023: Fox on the left, potential fox snack on the right

Jul 1, 2023: Well that was a pretty frustrating performance from England. Lots of chances – Alessia Russo should have had a hat trick – but no luck at all.

Jun 26, 2023: The new piece in the Turner Contemporary looked really rather nice at the weekend.

Jun 26, 2023: Currently reading: Yes! No! But Wait…! by Tim Lott 📚

Jun 26, 2023: Today I learned that Dave Winer has created another outliner, and now I feel like it’s 2000 again and I’m using Radio UserLand to publish …

Jun 26, 2023: Tired.

Jun 26, 2023: Latenote, Monday 26th June 2023 Oh gosh I've missed two weeknotes in a row. In fairness to me, there has been a lot going on -- much of which I can't talk about yet (but should be …

Jun 21, 2023: Meta and Mastodon – What's really on people's minds? There has been a lot of chatter about the decision of some instances on Mastodon to pre-emptively block Meta's purported new ActivityPub-compatible …

Jun 4, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 4th June 2023 I’ve been feeling somewhat melancholy this week. I suspect the cause of that is mostly physical: I have also been feeling quite run down, not to the …

Jun 3, 2023: The time of seclusion and loss I think it’s only now, with the benefit of two years of processing, that I’m really able to think and write about covid and the lockdowns of March …

May 28, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 28th May 2023 Bank holiday! Another one! Yay! On Friday we went over to Margate to see The Chimera Function, a performance lecture by artist and researched Lo Lo No …

May 21, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 21st May 2023 There’s been a lot of London this week. I’m doing a stint of training sessions for various teams across the business – eight sessions this week, …

May 14, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 14th May 2023 This week was mostly about training at work. Not me doing training: me training other people, and developing supporting materials, and so on. It’s …

May 8, 2023: Weeknote, Monday 8th May I hate being ill, so I have hated this week. After having a tickly throat on Tuesday, Wednesday morning I woke up with a full-blown very sore throat …

May 1, 2023: Mastodon, BlueSky, and Highlander Syndrome I am total agreement with Jamie Zawinski here. There is no way I will trust anything that Jack Dorsey has anything to do with. He’s either incredibly …

Apr 30, 2023: Weeknote, 30th April 2023 I missed out on my week note last week because I was incredibly tired, and when I’m too tired to write you know it’s really something. I was trying to …

Apr 16, 2023: Weeknote, 16th April 2023 Bit of an abbreviated week note as we have not long got back from seeing my sister up in Suffolk. The last time we were up there, about a month ago, I …

Apr 10, 2023: Just why do journalists love Twitter so much? Om Malik highlighted a survey by Muckrake which shows a bigger proportion of journalists expecting to spend more time on Twitter in the next year than …

Apr 9, 2023: Weeknote, 9th April 2023 Everyone I know has been desperate to get to the release of the bank holiday weekend, four days when you don't have to think about work. Or at least a …

Apr 2, 2023: Weeknote, 2nd April 2023 I bought a new Mac. There was a bonus from work and it was exactly the amount that a new M2 MacBook Air cost, which I took as a sign from the fates …

Mar 25, 2023: AI, like Jon Snow, knows nothing This is a great illustration of how AIs don’t “know” anything – they generate an answer one word at a time based on a huge corpus of text, predicting …

Mar 19, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 19th March 2023 Where exactly is the year going? This is week twelve, which means we are 20% of the way through 2023. I've been talking about 2024 as if it's …

Mar 12, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday, 12 Mar 2023 Is it just me or are the weeks at the moment a weird mix of being both extraordinarily long and incredibly short? It’s like time is bending in on …

Mar 5, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday, 05 Mar 2023 This will be a bit of an abbreviated weeknote because I have a lot to work on today. In particular, I want to get some more writing done because I …

Feb 26, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 26th February 2023 Looking through some old documents, I rediscovered Cory's notes on a talk that Danny gave at Notcon in 2004 on todo.txt (I might even have been there, …

Feb 19, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 19 February 2023 It's been a week of what I would call "faffing": poking around at the decaying corpses of ideas and projects and deciding whether they are, in fact, …

Feb 12, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 12th February Quiet week. I went along to give blood on Wednesday, only to be turned down because my iron levels were too low. Nothing, apparently, to worry about …

Feb 5, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday, 05 Feb 2023 Sometimes weeks are quite fractured and this was one of those. Bitty. Lots of little things happening which get in the way of doing an actual project. …

Jan 29, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday, 29 Jan 2023 This week has mostly been a cavalcade of getting things sorted in my little office. I finally decided that it was time to get a new chair. The one I …

Jan 15, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 15 January 2023 This was quite a busy week for work, with many meetings and even a day in London at the new offices (the first time I have visited, and very nice). It …

Jan 8, 2023: Weeknote, Sunday 8th January 2023 This was the first week back at work since the middle of December, so it was a bit of a shock to the system. Good to see everyone I work with, though. …

Jan 4, 2023: Currently reading: Less is More: How Degrowth Will Save the World by Jason Hickel 📚

Jan 4, 2023: I’m late to the party with “Our Flag Means Death” but it’s really good.

Jan 1, 2023: Yearnote, 2022 When the first day of a year falls on a Sunday, I suspect it's a good idea to look back on the previous year. A yearnote, if you will. I could look …

Dec 25, 2022: Going down the Twitter memory hole M.G Siegler on Mastodon: Yes, yes, the network is under immense strain as people flee the Elon strain infecting Twitter. But come on, there are folks …

Dec 25, 2022: Weeknote, Sunday 25th December 2022 I feel like in the past week I’ve travelled the country — and that’s mainly because I almost have. Last Saturday I travelled back from Devon to Kent, …

Dec 11, 2022: Weeknote, Sunday 11th December 2022 This week has been almost my last time at work this year. I’m off to the middle of nowhere for a five day writing retreat tomorrow, returning on …

Dec 4, 2022: Weeknote, Sunday 4th December 2022 Thursday saw the arrival of my Kindle Scribe, which I pre-ordered on the day it was announced. I've long wanted a bigger Kindle because the smaller …

Nov 29, 2022: Musk could make his own phone. But no, he won't. Daring Fireball: Should Be Easy, Indeed: The hard part is that what he’s really talking about is making his own phone with his own app store. (Android …

Nov 27, 2022: Weeknote, 27th November 2022 My notebook, like my week, is blank. This is not a good sign: when there's nothing scrawled there other than work notes, it indicates my life is …

Nov 13, 2022: Weeknote, 13th November 2022 This week has mostly revolved around the trapped nerve in my shoulder, which came on last Sunday evening. It took me almost completely out of action …

Nov 1, 2022: Thinking again about Stage Manager on iPad The big reason I was eagerly awaiting Stage Manager wasn’t using it on the iPad’s screen: it was the promise of proper second-screen support. I have …

Oct 30, 2022: Weeknote, 30th October 2022 I had a week off work. I intended to get a lot of writing done, but I slept a lot and generally lazed around. The best-laid plans, etc. I did get some …

Oct 27, 2022: The iPad's confusing lineup John Gruber on the iPad's current lineup: A lot of people are now complaining that the iPad lineup is “confusing”. I disagree. There are specific …

Oct 26, 2022: How to run Scrivener on Linux Scrivener happily running on Ubuntu, like a boss Scrivener is easily the best application around for long-form writing. Yes, you can do it in Word or …

Oct 23, 2022: Weeknote, 23 October 2022 This has been a pretty busy week at work because I HAVE A WEEK OFF THIS WEEK. I've promised myself that I'll spend a major chunk of it writing, as …

Oct 22, 2022: Keyboards! Apple being shit! Ducks! Or, as you might call it, links for today Oh good. An attack on machine learning algorithms that secretly gives language models a point of view. No idea how that might be abused. Chrome's …

Oct 21, 2022: Downgrading screens, misogynists losing money, and some Apple stuff I recently downgraded my screen - my ThinkPad is a 1920x1200 display - so I think John Gruber has got this a little wrong. There is much more to a …

Oct 20, 2022: Some stuff that's interesting (not featuring Liz Truss) Cory's written a great post on how the FTC uses dormant powers and obscure provisions in existing bills to enact key policies like the right to …

Oct 19, 2022: The Das Keyboard Professional 4 for Mac If you want to start a fight, ask people who are serious about keyboards what their favourite model is and watch them “debate” it. The debate will …

Oct 18, 2022: The new iPads A lot of people are drawing attention to the fact Apple released the new iPad and iPad Pro with a video and a press release rather than an event. I …

Oct 16, 2022: Some stuff which caught my eyes this week Oof. Apparently, Windows 11 is installed on just 3% of existing PCs, which is less than Windows 7. That is truly pitiful, but not surprising: there …

Oct 16, 2022: Weeknote, Sunday 16th October 2022 I spent a lot of this week being ill, with the really noxious head cold that Kim had been poorly with finally getting me. Bad head colds are one step …

Oct 9, 2022: Weeknote, Sunday 9th October 2022 OK PEOPLE I got so excited doing some other writing I nearly forgot to write this. I'm slightly tired so I'm not going to write much. Writing First …

Oct 7, 2022: TFI Friday notes: No one loves the Metaverse and podcasts I wish I could find No one loves Meta's Metaverse. Including the people working on it. I still haven't found a compelling reason for the metaverse to exist until we can …

Oct 6, 2022: Musk! Twitter! And why Google is a bit cheeky with its RCS claims There's some new Google stuff out, but I am just not excited about it. The Pixel Tablet looks interesting, especially because of the dock, which sort …

Oct 4, 2022: Does my alien have a penis and other interesting things for today Only a so-called "gender critical" could turn the sex of a cartoon intended to get kids reading into a debate about whether an alien has a penis. This …

Oct 2, 2022: Weeknote, 2nd October 2022 It seemed like a good idea at the time. Go down to Brighton. Kim doing a drawing group with some Proper Art Friends(TM) while I have a mooch around, …

Sep 25, 2022: Weeknote, 25th September 2022 Today was a bit of a double art extravaganza, as we went down to Folkestone to see Sara Trillo talk about a project she is currently working on about …

Sep 25, 2022: On the fine art of not finishing I learned, over time, not to be a finisher. I would start grand projects, read the first 20 pages of a hundred books and write the beginnings of a …

Sep 18, 2022: Weeknote, 18th September 2022 This has been a week of tech-futzing and annoyances. I converted my ThinkPad back to running Windows because I was desperate to use Aeon Timeline for …

Sep 6, 2022: On Michael Moorcock I once wrote a letter to Michael Moorcock. I have no idea how I found some kind of address for him -- possibly via the Hawkwind fan club I was a …

Sep 5, 2022: Leaving Ulysses? I wrote a little about this in my weeknote but I thought it was worth expanding a little on why I'm looking at Obsidian as a potential replacement for …

Sep 4, 2022: Google isn't bored of Android John Gruber, writing aboutCounterpoint Research's note that iPhone has overtake Android in US usage share: I also continue to think Google is bored …

Sep 4, 2022: Weeknote, Sunday 4th September 2022 I spent yesterday at Interesting 2022, organised by the redoubtable Russell (Not T) Davies. Of course, the talks were all great, but it was also nice …

Aug 19, 2022: Please won't someone stop the bullshit about RCS? I am so tired of how tech sites preach the gospel of RCS as the "solution" to interoperability between messaging on Android and iOS, based on nothing …

Aug 6, 2022: Miscellany, 6th August Web3 provides both anonymity and accountability, they said. It has its own built-in protections against bad actors, they said. Oops. It's usually …

Aug 3, 2022: Miscellany, August 3rd 2022 Apple is delaying the launch of iPadOS 16 until October, a month after the launch of iOS 16. If you have used the beta this might not surprise you: …

Aug 2, 2022: A collection of miscellany - 2nd August 2022 You know how websites want you to use their app instead? There's a good reason for that: apps can often collect more data about you, and are more …

Jul 29, 2022: Stuff I’ve been reading today: 29th May 2022 edition Google has delayed its third party cookie ban till 2024. Of course, all this is doing is just giving browser makers even more reason to work …

Jul 27, 2022: What I’ve been reading today: Firefox, Spotify sucks, spoken word recording and combat drones The latest version of Firefox includes better support for ProMotion displays, for those lucky lucky people who have a new 14- or 16-in MacBook Pro. …

Jul 27, 2022: Some people really do want their Instagram back Taylor Lorenz has written a piece on why you don’t want the old Instagram back and I couldn’t disagree more with it. No really, a lot of people do …

Jul 24, 2022: Weeknote Sunday 24th July “The hottest day of my life so far” is an event which should cluster in your childhood. I suspect that for the next few years we will see quite a …

Jul 3, 2022: Weeknote, Sunday 3 July 2022 Some weeks fly by and leave you feeling that nothing has been done. Unfortunately, this is one of those weeks. While I'm sure that if I looked back …

Jun 26, 2022: Weeknote, Sunday 26th June 2022 This has not been much of a week. I missed last week's week note because I was sick: I had been coughing for a few days and generally felt tired and …

Jun 12, 2022: Weeknote, Sunday 12th June 2022 One of the many useful things about writing a week note is it give you a regular reminder that life is as much about doing as thinking about doing. …

Jun 11, 2022: What is an "editorial line"? Journalism isn't the most transparent of trades. And a trade it is -- despite the best efforts of all involved in my working education, I'll never …

Jun 5, 2022: Weeknote, Sunday 5th June 2022 This might be abbreviated as we have just returned from spending a long weekend camping with some lovely friends. Memo to self: take more pillows. And …

May 29, 2022: Weeknote, Sunday 29th May Three days in the office this week! THREE WHOLE DAYS. Commuting is such an odd thing: spending an hour on a train to get to a place where you do the …

May 23, 2022: Apple's "repairwashing" Cory Doctorow on Apple’s cement overshoes: "In fact, nearly every part of Apple’s official repair process was worse than the iFixit equivalent. The …

May 22, 2022: Weeknote, Sunday 22nd May I spent some time restructuring my setup in Ulysses for writing. It had spiralled completely out of control, with countless filters, folders, …

May 15, 2022: Weeknote, Sunday 15th May 2022 Yesterday we went to London (a trip into the big city!) for the Art Car Boot Fair, held in Kings Cross. There was some decent work there, and it was …

May 12, 2022: Just why did a company owned by a former UKIP leader pay Andrew Bridgen £500? Here's an interesting one. According to the register of members' interests, on 17th November 2020, prominent Tory MP Andrew Bridgen received £500 for …

May 8, 2022: The New Victoriana In 1997 I wrote a piece for the long lost and much missed Rewired about a cover story from Wired. It was one of the first pieces I wrote which …

May 8, 2022: Dipping my toes into Linux (again) I'm no stranger to Linux. I went through a phase in the noughties of running it, partly inspired by the moves from Mark Pilgrim and Cory Doctorow, and …

May 8, 2022: Weeknote, Sunday 8th May 2022 With the demise of the ivy on the back fence came the discovery there wasn't much in the way of a back fence left. The ivy has grown over it; it's …

May 8, 2022: On the prospect of Keir Starmer resigning The pressure from Conservatives on Durham Police to investigate Keir Starmer - and their jubilation when Durham agreed - perfectly illustrate why the …

May 1, 2022: Weeknote, Sunday 1st May 2022 A wedding! Friday evening saw the lovely betrothal of an old friend and his darling in Kew Gardens (which has to be one of the loveliest venues to get …

Apr 24, 2022: Weeknote, 24th April 2022 A brief note this week: we have only just got back from Oxford so there’s not much time to write. We were in Oxford in part to see Jesse Darling: No …

Apr 17, 2022: Weeknote, Sunday 17th April A sunny bank holiday feels like such a pleasure after the winter. Our ancestors knew a thing or two about how to break from the bleakness of the cold. …

Apr 10, 2022: #Weeknote- 10th April 2022 It took me a few days but I feel like I’m finally over the bought of Covid which I wrote about last week. I still have a cough, but it’s getting …

Apr 3, 2022: Weeknote: 3rd April 2022 It's a week since I tested positive for Covid which means it's been a week when not much has happened other than a large amount of lying in bed and …

Apr 3, 2022: What will it take to change people’s minds on Brexit? [twitter.com/garside_g...](https://twitter.com/garside_geoff/status/1510552252028698628?s=20) I do wonder what the level of poverty and misery is …

Apr 3, 2022: “We survived” [twitter.com/mac46100/...](https://twitter.com/mac46100/status/1509954814045790216) You see a lot of this: “we survived”. It’s called “survivorship …

Apr 2, 2022: Time lies https://twitter.com/EU_NO_MORE/status/1509952800981192706?s=20&t=DWMMVosYaa5-TWdWKgqCtg (Thanks to Lee Woodard for the title!) This kind of …

Mar 16, 2022: Paul Thurrott is very unhappy Paul Thurrott is really unhappy with the current direction of Windows (subscriber only link, and I think he has a lot of good points: "Naturally, this …

Mar 13, 2022: An interesting little app for quick capturing on the iPhone - either text, audio or scanned text quickcapture.xyz

Mar 13, 2022: Weeknote w/e 13th March 2022 This week I have mostly been working – which is not, of course unusual. We did manage a trip out to Sissinghurst yesterday to see our friend Jen, who …

Dec 21, 2021: Flotsam I wrote this piece 17 years ago for fun as part of a series about the life I was living at the time. Some of the elements of it had completely slipped …

May 23, 2021: Weeknote, w/e 23 May 2021 Greetings everyone, it’s been a while hasn’t it? There’s been quite a bit going on. This week our dear old cat George finally passed on to the great …

May 8, 2021: Thinking about the iPad Pro Want to see the best example of why the iPad isn’t really a multi-tasking professional machine yet? Try opening up Apple TV while you’re connected to …

Apr 5, 2021: Yesterday blue skies.

Apr 4, 2021: Weeknote: Sunday 4th April Bank Holiday weekends are traditionally the time when everyone piles into a car and heads for the coast, or has a big party, or has a barbecue with …

Mar 21, 2021: Weeknote: Sunday 21st March Hello again. It's been a while, hasn't it? I wish that I could tell you that I have somehow had a lot on, but in fact, the opposite is true: I've had …

Mar 8, 2021: Some thoughts on the Surface Duo Despite Microsoft pricing the device to fail in the UK I've somehow ended up buying a Surface Duo. Yes, the cost here is ridiculous – £1300 at a time …

Mar 7, 2021: John Gruber on Jason Snell on iOS Markdown Editors Gruber: “I have no idea why there are now apps that use Markdown as their back end storage format but only show styled text without the Markdown …

Feb 14, 2021: That’s quite some sky

Feb 5, 2021: I don’t think I can disagree more with this. If you asked 100 people what freedom means to them, you’d also get 100 different answers, …

Jan 31, 2021: Weeknote: w/c 31st January 2021 I always have a temptation with these notes to begin them with “this week, I have mostly been eating elderberries” which will make absolutely no sense …

Jan 24, 2021: I think I like this version best.

Jan 24, 2021: W/e 24 January 2021 I realised a few days ago that, apart from taking out the bins and refilling bird feeders, I hadn’t left the house for at least a week. Possibly …

Jan 14, 2021: Apple: “Here is our new flagship phone. It costs £1099” Samsung: “We can beat that! Ours costs £1149!” Guys… …

Jan 4, 2021: Yep.

Jan 2, 2021: www.wsj.com > Sen. Ted Cruz and 10 other Republicans say their call for an audit of the 2020 presidential election results ‘would dramatically …

Jan 2, 2021: 2021 iOS Predictions: New iPad Pros, less drama - Macworld. There is one thing more than any other that I would love to see in the next version of …

Jan 2, 2021: George’s ability to find the warmest spot in the house is really quite spectacular.

Jan 1, 2021: 23 books read in a year isn’t a bad effort, especially given the fact that remarkably few of them fell into the category of trash science fiction. …

Jan 1, 2021: Chaffinches are funny little birds - like something drawn by a three year old, all triangular body and spindle legs. They like to hunker down too, …

Dec 28, 2020: An average afternoon view

Dec 28, 2020: Decided on a whim to make a quick Swedish-style cake. Turned out pretty well.

Dec 28, 2020: Cat beard

Dec 27, 2020: Weeknote: Sunday 27th December This is the last week note I’ll write this year. So, how did 2020 feel to me? I’m struck by the similarities to space travel. We have endured …

Dec 26, 2020: This bag is sitting, waiting, for when I can travel again.

Dec 13, 2020: An M1 Mac vs the Surface Pro X: How do ARM devices compare? I suspect that the Venn diagram of people who own both an M1 Mac and a Surface Pro X is small. I fall into that section in the middle, so I thought it …

Dec 6, 2020: Weeknote Sunday 6th December Sometimes weeks drift by with only one or two things to write about, and because those things often involve super-commercially-confidential work-stuff …

Nov 29, 2020: And so to bed.

Nov 29, 2020: After having tried hey.com when it first came out, and decided it wasn’t for me, I’ve decided to give it another go. Everything is forwarding, but if …

Nov 29, 2020: Adam I almost didn’t answer the message. When Chris popped up asking if he could call, I was just pondering going to bed and wondered if it wasn’t …

Nov 22, 2020: Weeknote: Sunday 22nd November Writing this weeknote started out as a kind of training wheels for getting back into blogging. Having not written regularly for years I needed some …

Nov 18, 2020: I bought a Mac mini I lasted a day without preordering a new Mac running Apple’s M1 processor. That’s an improvement, right? Better than I would have done a few years …

Nov 15, 2020: Weeknote: 15th November 2020 I’ve been doing a lot of thinking over the course of the last week, some of which manifested itself as a post about a letter to my 23-year-old self …

Nov 14, 2020: A letter to my 23-year-old self Dear Ian, Congratulations on leaving Hatfield and getting a pretty good degree! I’d like to say that you worked hard for it, and you certainly put the …

Nov 13, 2020: Writing with the Freewrite For anyone that has spent the last 20 years or so typing on ever less satisfying keyboards, writing with the Astrohaus Freewrite is a strange …

Nov 1, 2020: Weeknotes: Sunday 1st November 2020 It’s hard to write anything meaningful at the moment without referring to COVID-19, and the prospect of another national lockdown makes it a subject …

Oct 25, 2020: Weeknote, Sunday 25th October 2020 I’ve been watching episodes of The Computer Chronicles quite a lot lately (they’re all available on a YouTube channel). It’s quite a blast from the …

Oct 18, 2020: Weeknotes, Sunday 18th October Tuesday saw us head again to the Curzon to see Kajillionaire, which is a lovely film that I’d recommend to everyone. We’ve been seeing a lot of …

Oct 11, 2020: Weeknote: Sunday 11th October On Tuesday we ventured out to the cinema (again) to see Sofia Coppola’s On The Rocks. Our local Curzon is showing many small movies (plus Tenet) at …

Sep 20, 2020: Weeknotes- Sunday 20th September 2020 This week was the deadline for the latest piece of coursework in the masters that I'm working on (senior leadership, which is fun). That meant a …

Sep 6, 2020: Weeknotes: Sunday 6th September Abbreviated this week, basically because I want to do some more reading today. But I have some links for you. Things I’ve been reading Online Privacy …

Aug 30, 2020: Weeknotes: Sunday 30th August 2020 There are a hundred little ways which the pandemic has changed our lives, often without us noticing. For example: despite being at home, work now …

Aug 24, 2020: Weeknotes, Doh edition Of course, a couple of weeks go I should have said that I was on holiday so wouldn't be posting much for a couple of weeks. I should have said that, …

Aug 16, 2020: Weeknotes: Sunday 16th August 2020 I missed last week’s note thanks to a huge bout of tiredness which left me pretty exhausted and sleepy all Sunday. Sorry about that. Still a bit …

Aug 2, 2020: Weeknote: Sunday 2nd August 2020 I try not to grumble too much when I’m writing these notes. However, 36 degree heat isn’t really the kind of thing that I enjoy, and it’s not the kind …

Jul 26, 2020: Weeknotes: Sunday July 26th 2020 I started writing a post this week about the two major trends in computing devices at the moment: pervasive computing (voice activated wherever you …

Jul 19, 2020: Weeknote: Sunday 19 July 2020 I’ve been on holiday this week. Of course that means I spent the first few days being anxious about work, something that’s a pattern I’ve had …

Jul 17, 2020: Ambitions When I left school in 1983 my ambitions boiled down to owning a van and being in a band. The two things were not unconnected: I was a terrible …

Jul 12, 2020: Weeknotes- Sunday 12 July 2020 I have a week on holiday! Because I am an idiot this is the first time off that I’ve had this year, not counting being sick with COVID (and that …

Jul 5, 2020: Weeknote: Sunday 5th July 2020 We’re starting to emerge from lockdown (too early, maybe) but the world still feels very weird. Boris Johnson is still the most useless prime minister …

Jun 28, 2020: Weeknote 27 June 2020: WWDC, social media, and a whole lot of linking I think you basically have to not be looking at the state of the country to not be anxious about the state of the country. I keep trying to remind …

Jun 21, 2020: Weeknote, June 21st: a big ol’ week of very little In technology it’s the calm before the storm: Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC to most, dub-dub inside Apple) is kicking of tomorrow in …

Jun 14, 2020: Weeknote: Sunday 14th June 2020 One of the things they don’t tell you about COVID: you’ll still be feeling it weeks later. It’s now 15 weeks since I felt ill, and my symptoms back …

Jun 7, 2020: Weeknotes, Sunday 7th June Some notes on anger I’ve found myself getting astonishingly angry over the course of the week. There’s a lot to be angry about, but anger never sits …

May 31, 2020: 31 May 2020 Weeknote Habits, as I’ve learned over the past few months, are a good thing. They’re also something I resisted like the plague in the past owing to a misplaced …

May 31, 2020: Tot I hadn’t heard of Tot before I read MacStories’ article about its new share extension in iOS, but when I did I was intrigued. And when I used the Mac …

Mar 22, 2020: COVID 19 is tailor made for our culture I should start with this: I’m not an expert. You should listen to those that are. COVID is an almost perfect virus. It rarely kills its host. Unlike …

Feb 22, 2020: Scamware, malware, viruses. Who cares? John Gruber: Computer viruses are called viruses because like biological viruses, they spread by themselves. What Malwarebytes is talking about are …

Feb 17, 2020: Thinner, lighter, faster John Gruber, on the "thinner, lighter faster" Galaxy Book S compared to the MacBook Air: Well, there’s the small notion of, you know, the operating …

Jan 5, 2020: ChromeOS I was an early user of ChromeOS. Not as early as David Ruddock, who has written a post on how Google’s flagship desktop operating system has stalled, …

Jan 2, 2020: Goals January 2nd, or “the death of goals day”. You spend the first day of the year thinking about all the things you want to achieve and by this day you’ve …

Jan 1, 2020: Happiness How often do you think about what makes you happy? Not “how often are you happy?” but how often do you reflect on the things which make you happy and …

Dec 24, 2019: So I got a Surface Pro X Earlier this year I bought myself a shiny new Mac. This was the first Mac I’d bought since 2015, when I bought the 12in MacBook, a machine which …

Aug 17, 2019: The Pixel Slate and why I still really love it The Pixel Slate has had a rough ride. When it was initially revealed, there was a level of excitement around it which built a big bubble of hype. When …

May 12, 2019: My week with the Pixel 3 XL Never let a bunch of people decide anything that you have to do via a Twitter poll. In my case, very definitely don’t let them condemn you to a …

Apr 28, 2019: The Pixel 3 XL experiment Here's a lesson for you: never, ever ask your Twitter followers whether or not you should use a particular kind of hardware or software. Ever more so, …

Mar 5, 2019: Learning to love silence I’ve always been someone who has background noise around them. Growing up, the TV was always on, and my dad spent his time singing around the house – …

Mar 4, 2019: You've got to know when to fold 'em Lots to agree with in Owen Williams piece on “Foldable phones: right tech, wrong place?”, starting with this: If I consider it for a while, the …

Mar 3, 2019: Becoming a creator OK, this sounds trite. But… The difference between you and the creators you follow is simply they are creating while you are consuming. Source: …

Apr 3, 2018: Remembering Project Marklar Nick Wingfield mentioned something which took me back a long way: Ok, reading this report about Apple contemplating dumping Intel chips for its own …

Apr 2, 2018: Rebuilding Back in 2002 (or thereabouts), I started writing up my thoughts on technology at a site that I dubbed "Technovia". About fifteen years later, after …

Feb 13, 2015: On David Carr and 20 years of journalism Originally published: 13th February, 2015 When I started my career as a journalist in 1995, I realised pretty quickly that despite my skills as a …

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