A weekly list of interesting things I found on the internet, posted on Sundays. Sometimes themed, often not.

1️⃣ You might have noticed another blogging community event, Blaugust, kicking off. I’ve written three posts for it so far (this will be the fourth), so…so far so good? I’ve you’ve been in a rut like me, this might help get the writing juices flowing again. [🔗 Belghast // aggronaut.com]

2️⃣ Regarding X’s reversal on the gun emoji, Stephen Hackett says it best. [🔗 Stephen Hacket // 512pixels.net]

3️⃣ I’ve tried Arc Browser in the past and bounced off, but Numeric Citizen’s post might have convinced me to give it another go — if only to try its new UI conventions. [🔗 JF Martin // numericcitizen.me]

4️⃣ I thought this Friend thing was a joke, but it’s not. No thanks, not for me. [🔗 Alex Heath // theverge.com]

5️⃣ For devices that won’t get Apple Intelligence, iOS 18 has seemed like a lightweight release, but after seeing all these little improvements, I’m pretty psyched for it. (I usually watch these round-ups on 1.5x.) [▶️ 9to5Mac // youtube.com]

6️⃣ Like many others, I find listening to lofi music helps me to get in the zone more quickly and focus on the task at hand, namely writing. The thing is, I don’t want hours of those tracks influencing my Apple Music suggestions and I don’t care to guess and check that the Listening History toggle is actually working. I tried out lofi.cafe, but even as a web app on the home screen, it can’t keep music playback going like other native apps. So now I’m trying Lo-Fi Clouds Radio, and I’m tentatively quite happy with it. It’s free, supports Split View and Slide Over, and the music is doing the trick. [🔗 Lo-Fi Cloud Radio // apps.apple.com]

7️⃣ If you see my rock climbing photos and videos and are interested in getting a better look at some of the routes I’m scaling, here’s a YouTube video from a different climber who climbed Quadrophenia, the route I did just yesterday. This Chris Granata guy has a number of other Adirondack climbing videos. [▶️ Chris Granata // youtube.com]

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.

This is post #4/31 for Blaugust 2024.

7 Things Blaugust

I know this old news by this point, but I hate leaving things unfinished. Therefore, over two months after the fact, I’m back grading the predictions I made prior to Apple’s ‘Let Loose’ event, in wish they debuted the thinnest Apple product ever, got crushed by their own ad, and expanded (rather than simplified) the Apple Pencil lineup. Among other things.

Let’s get grading.

1️⃣ Apple Pencil Pro — 👍

While it didn’t come with all the features I had hoped for, I got the name, haptic feedback, squeeze button, and magnetic charging all right!

2️⃣ OLED Screen for iPad — 👍

It was probably the surest bet, but still I was blown away by the specs of the Tandem OLED display. Can’t wait to see it come to more products.

3️⃣ M3 Chip Inside — 👎

I said it was a coin flip, and I guessed wrong. Apple leapfrogged the M3 chip and went straight to M4 with the new iPad Pro. In hindsight, there was too much smoke for there not to be fire with them debuting the M4 at this event. But still, the M3 only lasted seven months before its successor appeared.

4️⃣ Every iPad gets an update — 👎

So close, and yet so far. The base iPad didn’t get an update, per se, they just dropped the 9th-gen altogether so the 10th-gen could take the entry-level spot. And the Mini got no update whatsoever. I’m hoping out (slight) hope that it could get a more major update by the end of the year, maybe with that gorgeous Tandem OLED display? (A man can dream, alright?)

5️⃣ New “Pro” Keyboard Accessory — 👍

You know what? I’m going to claim this one as a win. Although “Magic Keyboard Pro” would have been a way better name for what they introduced, “Magic Keyboard for iPad Pro” is the official name for the newest keyboard accessory and it does include “Pro” in there. USB-C data pass through was really the only thing I missed in this prediction.

6️⃣ Mac Virtual Display — 👎

Nope. Basically no new functionality in the software for these new iPads, except for what you can do with the new Apple Pencil Pro. And after The Talk Show Live at WWDC this year, I’m no longer holding out hope for a Mac Mode on iPad. (Although creating a MacPad is ever more intriguing.)

7️⃣ Minimum storage space on the base-level iPad gets bumped up — 👎

Nope. Still stuck at 64GB or 256GB.

8️⃣ Goodbye Home Button — 👍

Yup! No more Home Button iPads for sale from Apple. And the 10th-gen iPad now holds down the fort at an entry price of $349, well below the $400 price tag I had expected.

9️⃣ Event video will be no longer than 45-minutes — 👍

Got it. This one lasted a little over 38 minutes.

🔟 “AI” will be said at least 15 times — 👎

According to a transcript (fittingly generated by an AI analysis of the event’s YouTube video), they only mentioned AI by name 8 times. So about half as many as I expected.

Final Result: 5/10 predictions correct. That’s about par for the course for me. But they’re fun to make, so I’ll keep at it.

Bonus Grading Of My WWDC Wish List

A Siri that doesn’t suck. — 👍

It’s hard to say for sure because I haven’t tested it myself, but I’m optimistically grading this one as a win because it seems like they’ve hanging their hat on Apple Intelligence providing “a new era for Siri.” And its new animation is hella gorgeous.

This is post #3/31 for Blaugust 2024.

WWDC Blaugust

First things first, a massive congratulations are in order for Marco Arment, developer of Overcast, for shipping the huge rewrite to his podcast app. It’s pretty cool that he was able to get it out on the 10th anniversary of app’s debut. Hitting those kinds of milestones isn’t important to everyone, but I understand why it was important to him. Marco has been working on this update for about 18 months and, as he noted in its announcement blog post, it sets Overcast on a new, modern foundation for faster iteration and feature development.

I’ve been using Overcast for all of its 10-year existence. With it, I’ve listened to thousands of podcast episodes and saved 1,142 hours (over 47 days!) of listening to silences in those episodes with its industry-leading ‘Smart Speed’ feature. I’ve learned, laughed, and loved shows and their hosts. It is quite possibly the app I use most.

Throughout those 10 years, I’ve dabbled with other podcast apps. I tried Castro and its unique queuing feature. I’ve tried the Apple Podcasts with its weird instance that I would continually want to listen to individual episodes of random shows rather than stick with the ones I’ve subscribed to. I tried Pocket Casts. I tried one called Airshow where its design looked amazing and had great ideas around chapters. I tried an unnamed Testflight beta of a podcast app. But I always, always came back to Overcast. It’s been fast, reliable, had the important features I cared about, and has always worked the way I think podcast apps should work (kind of like an RSS reading client, but for podcasts).

Overcast has been through major redesigns before, and although they can be grating at first as you grapple with your muscle memory for completing common tasks, they have all eventually felt right and become the new norm until the next redesign comes around.

The funny thing about this 10th anniversary release is that it’s not a major redesign of the app. The biggest changes are all under the hood, and the fact that Marco could get it to look and behave so similarly to the last version is quite a testament to his skill because, as I understand it, almost nothing of the old UI code remains in the apps. Sure, there are some notable changes to the UI (more slide up sheets for the Now Playing screen, controls, and show notes; horizontally scrolling playlist icons, a more colorful Settings screen), but overall its the Overcast you know and love. And yes, there are some missing features and bugs — because of course there are going to be some snafus in a ground-up renovation of a decade-old app. But I’m thankful that Marco only changed one thing — the backend — rather than also trying to rethink the entire UI of the app at the same time. It really is a new foundation. Now he can start redecorating and making new additions.

If you’re into hearing about the “why” behind the Overcast renovation, I highly encourage you to listen to Marco discuss it in detail on a recent episode of the Accidental Tech Podcast. I could feel the despair he described as he looked down the barrel of rewriting the entire app from scratch, a task that seemed insurmountable at the outset, but that he has now successfully completed. He’s not shy about admitting that the app has fallen behind in the last few years, but that he’s now enthused about getting it caught up with new features — something that he held off on in the old version because it would have only dug the old codebase deeper into technical debt knowing that this rewrite was imminent. He’s been developing Overcast for 10 years, and I’m willing to give him a grace period to get the app back to the forefront.

Now that I’ve prattled on for over 500 words about how much I respect this rewrite — even if its not exactly the chock-full-of-new-features update that we might have wanted — I’d love to share some short lists of the things that I love about the update and what I’d like to see improved. But first, if you’re like me and have been a happy Overcast user and willing to extend some grace to Marco as he finishes the second act of this rewrite, I encourage you to head to Overcast’s App Store page and give it a rating and review. Marco shared in a follow up about the update on ATP that his recent ratings have taken a nosedive as people displeased with the update have swarmed to express that displeasure. I’m certainly not unhappy with the update — like I said, it’s just a refinement of the previous design — and I know it’ll help both the app and Marco’s mental health to also hear from satisfied users.

Got that rating done? Great! Let’s get to the lists.

Likes

• The app is indeed fast. It’s always been the fastest app to see new podcast episodes, but now the UI feels extra zippy too.
• The horizontal playlist row. I have a lot of playlists, but only really use the first few regularly. I’m glad to have them take up less vertical space on screen.
• Smart Playlist management is way better. Priority ranking now has more options, and selecting included podcasts is much easier with a more compact view.
• The chapters list can now show longer chapter titles. They used to get cut off.
• Swiping gestures make the app feel more fluid and modern. I can make imprecise gestures to dismiss screens for example.
• The simplified list of ‘Current’ or ‘All’ shows in the main podcasts list. The “Inactive” tab was unnecessary.
• The ‘Undo Seek’ option. I’m so glad this works even when you’ve made an unplanned seek from the lock screen.

Dislikes

• Show notes take an extra second to load. This is the one thing that I’ve found to be slower about the app. It’s not a show-stopper, but when I switch the show notes view and see a blank screen for a sec, it really throws me off. I wonder if it’s fetching the notes upon my first request to view them, but it really seems like that data should be already waiting for me. (I’ve not heard anyone else mention this, so maybe it’s a me problem.)
• Losing the skip forward/back buttons on the minimized ‘Now Playing’ bar. I used those buttons quite a bit, and now I have to jump to Control Center or bring up the Now Playing screen to skip forward or back. When I just want to quickly re-hear the last thing spoken, I don’t want the extra step.
• The Sleep Timer is harder to use. It’s not hard to get to, but I use it every day and liked having it more accessible on the Now Playing screen. Marco has mentioned that it being buried further is a common complaint, and I expect it will make a more prominent return.
• The elimination of streaming means shows sometimes take longer to start. I understand and respect Marco’s decision to removing the streaming feature, but it does mean I’m waiting for shows to download more often than I was before. And since I don’t want my infrequently-listened-to shows to take up a bunch of space on my device, I had a lot of those set to stream. Better control over pre-downloading certain shows or playlists would make this problem mostly go away.
• Can’t skip or seek while looking that the chapters view. I like how you can seen progress through specific chapters, but without play controls visible, I can no longer easily seek within a chapter. (Showing chapter segments within the main scrub bar like Apple Podcasts does in the iOS 18 beta would solve this.)

Wish List

• More context menu actions. Long-pressing on a show or episodes feels like it should bring up some options, but it doesn’t.
• Quick actions from the app icon. I don’t understand why every app doesn’t offer quick actions when you long-press on its icon on the Home Screen. I want to quickly start playing from the most recently played list, start playing a designated playlist, jump into the search view ready to type, and maybe start or bookmark the currently playing episode or something. Or maybe start a new clip share from the current episode.
• More user customization overall. This is an app trend that I think Marco is missing. Let users customize which icons appear at the bottom of the Now Playing screen. I’d personally add the Sleep Timer and Share button, but I’m sure others might want the Star button or a way to quickly jump to the Podcast’s main page.
• A listened-to history view. I’ve pined for this for years. Sometimes I fall asleep listening to shows and wake up hours later with no idea of which shows I missed while I was asleep. That never feels good. Or I want to go find a link or share something from a podcast I just finished. Hopefully I can track it down via search or lots of scrolling, hunting, and pecking through the UI. A (7-day? 30-day? infinite?) history of every show I’ve listened to would be so helpful.
• Fun Spotify Wrapped-like stats. I listen to a lot of podcasts. I like seeing and sharing stats. Need I say more?

Even though it may look like I have many of gripes and wishes for future versions of Overcast, I’ll reiterate that I’m very happy with the app as it is. Marco pulled off a successful rewrite, and I’m still listening to many hours of podcasts every day with Overcast. Hopefully he’ll see these lists and make some of the improvements, but none of them are stopping me from enjoying the app. And I’ve very excited to see what comes next with the refreshed foundation ready for rapid development. Congrats again, Marco, and here’s to 10 more years!

This is post #2/31 for Blaugust 2024.

Apps Blaugust

There’s a bar here in town called the Waterhole that is cash-only. When we first moved here, I thought that policy was an inconvenience. I don’t tend to carry cash anymore and wondered why they didn’t “get with the times” and accept credit cards. Each Thursday night, I needed to remember to scrounge up some cash or hit the ATM before heading to see that week’s live band.

It’s not the “nicest” bar in town. They don’t serve food. You’d probably get a quizzical look if you ordered a specialty cocktail. You can get a secondhand high from all the weed smoked out on the patio. The staircase and hallways are narrow and there’s next to no seating. But their claim to fame is the killer live bands they bring in, and especially their weekly summer concert series, Party on the Patio. It’s an institution that brings people of all ages and all walks of life into town to let loose, catch up with friends, and dance. It’s a true watering hole. People love it.

It’s a husband and wife team, Kiki and Eric, who run the place. I can imagine if and when someone else eventually takes it over that there would be some changes. Maybe more chairs, or a food menu. Probably credit card terminals.

But I’ve come to see that decision, and many others, not as an oversight, but as an intentional choice with real benefits. Namely that it’s speedy and simple. There are no computers that could glitch or need updates and maintenance. No reliance on an internet connection. No one has to wait for a customer to juggle a wallet full of different cards when one gets declined. There are no open tabs for the bartenders to keep track of, or cards left behind. Everything is in service of quick service, so folks can get back to the main event: the music.

I’m all for the advancement of technology, and you know I love computers. But there are still places where the experience is better without them. It keeps things simple, if less convenient on the surface. And if new owners did come in with modernizations to the Waterhole, I would mourn the loss of what I now consider some of its charm. And even though it makes me feel a thousand years old to say it, I would be among those stubbornly professing that Kiki and Eric did it best.

This is post #1/31 for Blaugust 2024.

Blaugust

A weekly list of interesting things I found on the internet, posted on Sundays Wednesday this week. Sometimes themed, often not.

1️⃣ Parker Ortolani shared two music apps that you can still get today that showcase previous iOS designs in case you liked the old Music apps better. [🔗 @parkerortolani // threads.net]

2️⃣ Niléane is doing the thankless work of showing how Threads is failing marginalized communities. It sucks and Threads should do better. [🔗 Niléane // macstories.net]

3️⃣ Manton Reece shared a measured opinion on where he draws the line on mixing politics with business. It largely mirrors the way I feel about such things. (Sticker Mule crossed the line.) [🔗 Manton Reece // manton.org]

4️⃣ We’ve gone from an iPod nano with a strap to make it a watch to an Apple Watch sans strap to make it an iPod. Isn’t nature beautiful? [🔗 Allison Johnson // theverge.com]

5️⃣ I’d rather get DRM-free EPUBs for purchased books, but these new price drop alerts for Apple Books are pretty nice. [🔗 Ryan Christoffel // 9to5mac.com]

6️⃣ This Beeline cycling app looks super cool. Can’t wait to give it a try! [🔗 Ben Lovejoy // 9to5mac.com]

7️⃣ “Cate’s Brother” by Maisie Peters came out a couple of years ago, but I only just discovered it. It’s a real banger and my song of the summer. [🔗 Maisie Peters // song.link]

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.

7 Things

I’ve not been keeping up very well on noting here when there are new penpal entries, so I’m fixing that now! I’ve had the pleasure of writing back and forth with Justin Wong and Steve Ledlow over the past few months.

Justin and I wrapped up our extended month talking about summer plans and new things happening in our lives:

I landed a written job interview for technical writing. That’s been stressing me a bit, just because there’s a bit of pressure and there’s so many questions. I always overthink and overedit my writing. I’m overthinking this email!

Read our entire conversation →

And Steve, of Tangible Life, and I started talking about how life changes when school’s out when you have kids, vacation memories, and love languages:

My wife and I align on many things, but one of my favorite things has to be our feeling on almost every form of “holiday” other than birthdays.  They’re not really a big deal to us.  We don’t exchange gifts.  We don’t make Valentine’s, or Mother’s Day/Father’s Day or anniversaries a big deal.  Our anniversary just passed at the end of June and I was in St. Louis for one day for work.  We didn’t even remember that it was that day until someone reached out because it was a “memory” in their social media.  We just celebrate life every day, and attempt to celebrate one another the same.  It’s refreshing in a way that I can’t describe.  No obligation.  No expectations.  It only works because we both feel this way, otherwise it would be a complete fail.

Read our entire conversation →

I’ll probably be taking the rest of the summer off from PenPals once Steve and I wrap up our conversation, but if you’re interested in chatting with me later this year, please do let me know!

PenPals

Jeff Perry, writing for Clicked:

The attempted assassination of Donald Trump this weekend triggered a predictable firestorm online. As someone who’s spent over half my life in the broadcasting industry, I know firsthand how overwhelming these news cycles can be. From being a bystander online wanting to know what is happening, to being a news reporter trying to get the correct information as fast as possible, it is incredibly stressful during these times. But this time, something felt different for me. Scrolling through my feeds, I realized this wasn’t just another news event — it was a chance to rethink how we consume breaking news.

Jeff goes on to describe how he set an alarm for later in the day to catch up on what happened, rather than wade through everything spilling onto social media.

It made me realize that I treated this event differently too, but without conscious thought. I found out something was going on a couple of hours late (from Apple TV of all places), and almost opened Threads to “check the news”. Then I realized that I had no interest in heading down the algorithm mine shaft to seek out nuggets of truth and relevance there.

Instead, I opened Apple News, which had a helpful “latest” section on the shooting. I quickly caught up from reputable sources, and then closed the app. Later, when I checked again, I was pleased to see that the same section was still at the forefront and while there were a few new updates, the old ones were right where I left them. I felt no need to scroll and scroll.

I think I, too, will be sticking to this slower, more deliberate approach in the future. And it’d be helpful to have a similar experience available in other news and social apps.

Linked

A weekly list of interesting things I found on the internet, posted on Sundays (but maybe Mondays). Sometimes themed, often not.

1️⃣ These crowdsourced captions for the Eddy Cue/Sam Altman photo op are quite humorous. 🤭 [🔗 @gruber // mastodon.social]

2️⃣ Microsoft has done a great job making their Surface products more repairable. I’m impressed by the QR code to their repair guide and markings inside the device etched there specifically to aid in repairs. [🔗 Shahram Mokhtari // ifixit.com]

3️⃣ I’m with Tyler Stalman in thinking this new Tom Hanks movie would be ideal for watching as Immersive Video on the Vision Pro. [🔗 @stalman // threads.net]

4️⃣ Jason’s short post is a good reminder that the internet is simply a reflection of our greater humanity. Not inherently good, nor bad. It just is. But I choose to return to find the nuggets that make me feel good. [🔗 Jason Becker // json.blog]

5️⃣ I’m with Matt here in feeling some frustration when folks say that Apple is introducing “actually useful” features with Apple Intelligence. Yes, ChatGPT (and the like) are command line-like in that you type out your request, but millions of people are finding use in that text box. And while a command line requires specific commands to be useful, chatbots are way more accessible as they let you talk like a person to it and still get useful things back. Apple Intelligence will be awesome for the personal context, but I think it’s foolish to say that it’s the first useful AI. [🔗 Matt Birchler // birchtree.me]

6️⃣ Similarly, I bristle when people say “there’s less good music than there used to be”. Maybe the music you like isn’t being produced as much, but “good” and “bad” music is entirely in the ear of the beholder. Nick Heer describes very well how our access to music is so bountiful these days. And reminded me that album releases used to be on Tuesdays, which I’d completely forgotten! [🔗 Nick Heer // pxlnv.com]

7️⃣ Congrats to the Inside Out 2 team on such a successful film (over $1 billion at the box office). I saw it last night and can confirm that it’s something special. A perfect sequel? No. But I felt seen in watching it, and I’ll be thinking about it for years, I’m sure. [🔗 Pamela McClintock // hollywoodreporter.com]

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.

7 Things

Jumping into Clockwise, “the tech podcast that uses half an hourglass for timekeeping”, with my own answers and opinions that no one asked for.

Mikah Sargent: Assuming that you use a voice-based virtual assistant, what are the one or two features that you know you can rely on?

Despite having a site called “HeyDingus”, I don’t actually invoke Siri with its wake phrase all that often.

But keeping with the trend here, when I do use Siri, I’m also a big timer boy, particularly with our kitchen HomePod while cooking. My second most common use case is probably starting workouts on my watch. The list of options in the Workout app is extensive, so rather than find the app, scroll through to ‘Outdoor Run’ and then adjust its parameters for a distance or timed run, it’s so much faster to say “Hey Siri, start a 3-mile outdoor run”. CarPlay is the other place where Siri gets uses, but usually that’s just through the voice prompts it gives to respond to texts while I’m driving.

As a side note, my wife uses Siri quite often for adjusting smart lights in our house, while I tend to use the physical buttons I’ve set up, or Control Center, to turn things on and off. I had bet it would have been the opposite.

Lisa Schmeiser: If you had unilateral power to impose legislation regarding internet activity, what edict are we all now living under?

I’m surprised no one else brought this up, but my edict would be to bring about strict data privacy laws regarding the collection and sale of personal data online. With a large part of the TikTok ban being related to what kind of data can be harvested by that app and potentially be used for nefarious purposes, I think the general public would get behind such a law. It’s not just TikTok though, data brokering gives terrible incentives to apps and websites of all kinds to hoover up as much as they can about their users so that they can make a buck selling it to the highest bidder. Let’s get some protections going.

Dan Moren: Will Apple’s new Passwords app in their newest platforms change how you store, fill and manage, and use passwords?

Unfortunately, I don’t think so. In fact, I’ve been testing iCloud Passwords for most of the last year and, I have to say, it doesn’t work as smoothly as 1Password has for me in the past. In addition to filling passwords into log in fields across apps and the web, it turns out I look up a bunch of data that I’ve stored in 1Password, and doing that in iCloud Passwords has been a pain. Having a separate app is a major improvement (you can use it split-view now!), but it doesn’t yet cover all the use cases I have.

If I were starting from scratch without any habits formed around storing credentials, I think the Passwords app would be sufficient — and I’ll certainly recommend it to most folks — but I think I’m headed back to 1Password until Passwords gets a little more full-featured.

mb bischoff: How comfortable are you telling an LLM your most intimate thoughts, and will that change with Apple Intelligence when more on-device models are used?

See above for the data privacy laws that I’d like to see enacted, I’m not very comfortable putting any sort of personal or intimate stuff into an LLM chatbot text field. I do use them, but usually for coding help, assistance with rewording specific sentences, or Q&A. I’ve not yet uploaded my own documents or data (besides the occasional photo to get help with alt text, but I’m sharing those photos to the web anyway).

But if I want to use Apple Intelligence, that will necessarily change because it basically is only used for personal context situations. For it to be of any use, I’ll need to be okay with it churning through all the data on my device.

It all comes down to trust. Very few, if any, of the companies with LLM products have earned my trust when it comes to user privacy. But Apple has, and I know that they’ve gone to extraordinary lengths to make sure that they can’t end up with all that intimate knowledge about me on their servers. On-device (and Private Cloud Compute) help me rest easy in that regard.

Bonus Topic: Do you enjoy rollercoasters?

When I was young, I hated them. Then a switch flipped and I loved them. Now, though, I’m not as keen about them again. There are a number of theme park rides that I’d like to try, mostly because I’m interested in their “story” while riding, but I no longer seek out the biggest, fastest, loopiest rides anymore.

Overtime Topic: How many email accounts do you actively maintain?

Thankfully, just two*. My work one, which is though Microsoft 365, and my personal iCloud address. That had an asterisk because I do have a number of Custom Email Domains set up with iCloud, and they work great. I also created a family alias address that sends emails to both my wife and I that we use for shared streaming services or anything else that we should both get updates for. Luckily, my email app of choice, Spark, plays nicely with both those custom domains and aliases. I occasionally have to jump into Apple Mail when something doesn’t render right, but most of the time it’s just Spark and those “two” accounts that hold my email life together.

Crashing Clockwise

And now for something new! I’ve been on something of a… let’s call it a “summer break” from blogging, so Robert offered to pick up the slack for 7 Things this week. I don’t really do guest posts here on HeyDingus, but I love linking out to other sites. And since Robert has his own website, I encouraged him to post something there and that I’d quote and link to it for issue #146. He was game, so let’s see what Robert’s found in his internet spelunking for us.

Hijacking “7 Things This Week”

Jarrod over at HeyDingus has been a little busy lately. I’ve missed his “7 Things This week” segment lately. So, I’m doing what any good best friend would do, and I’ve asked to guest post. So here we are, as my first true post on USB, I’m giving it a whirl. For those who aren’t familiar,”7 Things” is a weekly collection of 7 things Jarrod finds interesting. Sometimes themed, sometimes not. Here’s what I found interesting in the past week:

1. I hate that this is a necessary thing in our society, but as an IT coordinator I am glad tools for school safety are within reach of even the smallest schools. The K-12 District I serve has been featured as a case study by Motorola. This project is ongoing and ever evolving! [🔗 Motorola Solutions Blog]

2. Ever think about your last meal? Meghan Trainor talks last meals with Josh on a segment of my favorite channel: [🔗 Mythical Kitchen // youtube.com]

3. Talking Tech and AI with Tim Cook. No summary needed. [🔗 Marques Brownlee // youtube.com]

4. I’m not much of a gaming guy, but it sure was neat to see some of my favorite old Mac systems running Minecraft in this video. [🔗 Action Retro // youtube.com]

5. This one will hit a small niche in this audience, but I love the community that has been built around the K12 Tech Talk podcast that has evolved into a forum for Technology Professionals working in K-12 Education to network and problem-solve together. [🔗 K12TechPro]

6. Just a shameless plug for the “10 Best Days of Summer” and an organization for which I volunteer - if you’re in Michigan July 11-20 come check it out! [🔗 Ionia Free Fair]

7. What will AI mean for HomePod? This article covers a lot of what I was thinking about it… [🔗 9to5Mac]

Thanks Robert!

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.

7 Things