7 Things This Week [#137]
A weekly list of interesting things I found on the internet, posted on Sundays. Sometimes themed, often not.
1️⃣ Blogroll.social is a new site from Dave Winer with a neat way to display a blogroll: sorted by more recently updated. Blogrolls are cool again! [🔗 blogroll.social]
2️⃣ I don’t record a lot of videos of myself, but if I did I’d be very tempted to get this auto-tracking dock that Belkin made to work with the iPhone’ DockKit. Stephen Robles gives a great overview in this video, and it’s pretty charming to see the little robot arm swing the phone around to keep faces in frame. 🤖 [🔗 Stephen Robles // youtube.com]
3️⃣ Playing chess via brain implant. The future is wild. [🔗 @pronounced_kyle // twitter.com]
4️⃣ Old-school lighters had so much more personality and functionality. I want them badly. [🔗 @histoireduneflamme // tiktok.com] (Via Todd Vaziri)
5️⃣ I guarantee you’re not ready for this site. 🤯 [🔗 henryheffernan.com] (Via Keenan)
6️⃣ Credit where it’s due, Humane seems to have taken criticism of their over-serious demeanor to heart. This latest demo video is far more casual and fun. Not as fun as the Rabbit R1, and still without a lot of personality, but a step in the right direction. There’s a lot to digest here, but my impression is that this interface may be better served by glasses and/or watch hardware. It’s very early days, though, and I’m intrigued to see where this technology goes. [🔗 humane // youtube.com]
7️⃣ LinkTalk is a fascinating idea for a very different sort of social network. [🔗 Jatan Mehta // journal.jatan.space]
52 Albums Project
Kind of Blue by Miles Davis (1959) — #12/52
It’s not very original to select one of the quintessential jazz albums as one that’s influential or important specifically to me. And yet. When I was a wee seventh grader, still learning my way around the trumpet and with dreams of joining the Ionia Middle School Jazz Band, Miles Davis is to whom I turned to get a feel for swing and blues. I don’t think I even knew at the time that he was the jazz trumpet guy. I just searched iTunes for jazz trumpet, Miles Davis popped up, I clicked “Buy”, and started listening on repeat.
I would later transcribe and play “So What” as a class assignment, so it has an exceedingly high play count as I would play along, scrubbing back and forth trying to nail the notes and style. Miles Davis’ music opened the door to learning about getting behind the beat and how one could infuse emotion and personality into every note.
I don’t listen to as much jazz these days, but I do find that it makes for excellent music to have on to get my creative juices flowing. I can’t listen to lyrics when I’m reading, writing, or focusing on something — but a little soft jazz gets things flowing.
So, yes, I’m going with Kind of Blue as one of my go-to jazz albums. An unoriginal, but absolutely essential choice.
Follow along on the 52 Albums Project page where I’m making some playlists for you.
Thanks for reading 7 Things. If you enjoyed these links or have something neat to share, please let me know. And remember that you can get more links to internet nuggets that I’m finding every day by following me @jarrod on the social web.