Posts in "link"
Any post where the link was the point of the post
I’m not sure I need Surf.
I already use and love the app Tapestry to pull my Bluesky, Mastodon, Pixelfed, Tumblr, and Threads feeds into one place. I also have micro.blog for publishing my stuff to one canonical place and sending it out to all those social networks (POSSE: Publish on your Own Site, Syndicate Elsewhere).
If you don’t have something like micro.blog, I can see the benefit of the reverse approach (PESOS: Publish Elsewhere, Syndicate to your Own Site). It means you can publish on the various platforms and Surf will pull it into a destination that you can share with new audiences. Likewise, if you don’t use Tapestry, I can see the benefit of using Surf to aggregate your feeds.
The publisher case is less clear to me, though.
The Surf beta has launched with outlets like 404 Media and The Verge on board. For them, it could make sense as an audience consolidation tool. But if readers stay inside Surf browsing snippets, will it drive traffic back to their sites where the ads/subscriptions are? Publishers have been burned by that trade before on Facebook, on Twitter, and on Flipboard itself. I am not clear how this new approach will be any different.
“… there is no damnation greater than spending our allotted days in the catatonia of comfort and certainty, our inner lives automated by habit and halogen lit by convenience.”
Another Star Trek prediction coming true thanks to research at Microsoft… Star Trek’s Isolinear Optical Chips: memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Isol… Microsoft’s Project Silica: www.microsoft.com/en-us/res…
I did not know Tagesschau had a version of their news in simple German. This is fantastic! www.tagesschau.de/tagesscha…
Possibly the most sycophantic article from a podcast news site ever written about corporate interests in podcasting!
TLDR: Apple is introducing video to its Podcasts app, but only if you host with one of four large provider/ad networks: podnews.net/article/v…
From (apparently highly-regarded) Podnews' article:
“Whether it’s truly “open” or not, it follows the ethos of podcasting - that creators should be responsible for distribution and for monetisation."
The word “responsible” is doing serious concealment work here. If Apple had opened this to all podcast providers, it would follow the ethos of podcasting. Instead they’ve launched with four big players, which increases (or even incentivises) lock-in in an industry that is meant to put creators in the driving seat. Podcasting started with RSS precisely so creators controlled distribution. Restricting access to a handful of corporate partners inverts that original promise.
Much of the industry is drifting toward the legacy media model with big corporations extracting value from creators and listeners. Podnews.net seems happy to be along for the ride.
I hope Apple moves quickly to open its API to all podcast providers, especially independent networks like Myke Hurley and Stephen Hackett’s Relay.
More from the Apple fans at Podnews:
“The Apple team are deep thinkers and want the best for the industry. This is a good move for the entire industry; and whatever we might think of the “per-impression” charge, it does mean that Apple also wants this to be a success."
That is a remarkably generous take. Apple wants what is best for Apple. If supporting an industry in specific ways lets Apple monetize it, they’ll do that. If Apple wanted what was best for the industry, they would have built an open solution, not a proprietary one; or at least a solution open to all, not just four big players.
But maybe I’m behind the times on modern podcasting. I don’t even really think that video should be considered a podcast… I’ll go back to shouting at clouds.
Looking forward to hearing what the Upgrade boys think of this: www.relay.fm/upgrade
I think UKIP's proposed logo is much more like an iron cross variant than a cross pattée variant
I think UKIP’s proposed logo is much more like an iron cross variant than a cross pattée variant. And that’s fine: let ‘The New Right’ be honest about who they are through their logo.
A decent party would take the feedback and redesign the cross to avoid this terrible association. The fact that they choose instead the call the criticism ‘Christophobia’ tells you everything you need to know about their populist, authoritarian ambitions.
“When I showed up with a camera, nobody was surprised, because they knew I was a photographer,” she said. “They knew so much about me and they were just charmed to meet me, finally.” Bill had been showing them pictures of his kids for decades.
Very excited for this! Order placed 😊 - This is the new Clicks Communicator… and BlackBerry fans, we need to talk! | CrackBerry
Tech, Design, and Leadership - perfect news story for me!
It’s interesting when three domains of my interest coincide. Last week (or was it the week before?) it was the tech/leadership/design news that (now former) Apple Human Interface Design chief, Alan Dye, was leaving Apple for Meta. I drafted this post when the news was announced, but I forgot to post it… so here it is.
My first thought was not about Dye’s competence as a designer (those more competent to judge than I suggest it was limited), but rather the strange move from the perspective of Leadership.
One of the things you learn if you want to succeed as a leader is how to adapt your leadership to the organisation in which you’re leading. Or to leave and find an organisation more aligned with your values and principles. If Dye has done the latter, it is remarkable that he spent so long at Apple. While both Apple and Meta are corporate behemoths, they do seem fundamentally different when it comes to the expression of specific values. If Meta is Dye’s ‘value home’, then Apple certainly cannot have been. If Apple is Dye’s ‘value home’, then Meta is going to be hard for him. Time will tell, I suppose.
For more on the story (if you somehow missed it), John Gruber has a nice write-up on how this news was received at Apple: daringfireball.net/2025/12/b…
The Paper Pro Move from reMarkable looks like a really interesting format, but I don’t think it’s for me. Great exploration of the device from My Deep Guide, highlighting both the good and the bad, which helped me come to my conclusion: www.youtube.com/watch
I have a custom timeline in Tapestry (https://usetapestry.com/) that is an oasis of photography, insight, stories, and kindness. It’s a wonderful place to immerse myself. I still take a deep breath and wade into the unfiltered stream daily, but the oasis reminds me how joyous social media can be.
I signed up with Kagi (https://kagi.com/) for paid personalised search. I’m having to retrain my muscle memory that the links are the top of the page ARE actually Kagi’s genuine top hits, not some paid-for links. I realise I’m so used to skipping down the page on Google to find the proper results.