markjgsmith

2021/06/26 #

cat << EOF > Saturday 26th June, 2021 (Issue #32)

This week’s newsletter is out! (2021-06-26)

In this week’s edition:

Unicorns in the UK, Crypto all the entertainments, Windows 11, Cookie blocking delayed, Amazon gets into podcast hosting, Funding open source projects in the modern world

Issue details:

Another awesome issue of the newsletter. #

Today’s links:

2021/06/25 #

Today’s links:

  • Microsoft announces Windows 11, with a new design, Start menu, and more - It’s been a long time since I was a Windows user, that was when Windows 10 was in the early days, clearly a major version bump doesn’t happen very often in Windows land, so it’s big news, and reading the feature list it looks like a lot of attention has been paid to integrations and I’m getting a sort of wholesome feeling about this release, interested to see how the rollout goeswww.theverge.com #

  • Google delays Chrome's cookie-blocking privacy plan by nearly 2 yearswww.cnet.com #

2021/06/20 #

Today’s links:

  • “Fantasy Hollywood” - Crypto and Community-Owned Characters - This all sounds interesting, bringing governance concepts developed in open source code communities to other types of building activities, and I don’t doubt that there’s really many people that are earnest in their endeavours, but my overall feeling towards “communities” is rapidly approaching negative infinity, and so these governance models look more and more just like ways for people to cement their power over others, and it pains me to say it because I’ve always been an optimist, but my experience is that when the rubber meets the road, these co-ordination methods just get used to crush people even more efficientlyfuture.a16z.com #

2021/06/19 #

cat << EOF > Saturday 19th June, 2021 (Issue #31)

This week’s newsletter is out! (2021-06-19)

In this week’s edition:

TBL www NFT, Facebook VR, NodeJS next gen http, NodeJS streams, AdTech in VR, Rust in Linux Kernel, trippy high dimensional maths, WWDC, and javascript working group nerdiness

Issue details:

Another awesome issue of the newsletter. #

Today’s links:

  • Changelog Podcast - Funds for open source - I’m literally right in the middle of my own intolerable funding issues, so I found it difficult to concentrate during this episode, but it’s an important topic and it was a good conversation, power permitting I’ll be able to listen to the episode again soonchangelog.com #

  • The UK Crowns 100th Tech Unicorn - It’s all about “Deep Tech” at the minute, awesome to see the UK first in Europe to reach this milestonewww.pymnts.com #

2021/06/18 #

Today’s links:

  • Is Facebook cornering the VR market? - “Facebook will have literally reinvented itself for a new paradigm shift in computing by the time regulation gets around to addressing it in its current state”www.platformer.news #

  • Introducing Undici@4 - Has been in development fir a while now, aims to be the next generation of the NodeJS http librarynodejs.medium.com #

  • Google backs Linux project to make Android, Chrome OS harder to hack - It’s a project to re-write parts if the kernel in Rust, could have a big impact not only in security but also on the culture which has until recently been dominated by the C programming languagewww.cnet.com #

  • Lex Fridman Podcast Ep #190 - Jordan Ellenberg - Mathematics of High-Dimensional Shapes and Geometries - I was pretty into mathematics at school, and especially geometry, and I’ve found that recently I’ve been super interested in anything related to parallel dimensions, higher order dimensions etc, whether it’s grounded in science but also of the more esoteric kind, anyway there’s some interesting problem solving techniques discussed in this episode, it’s totally trippy in places, and it’s also tangentially related to programming and AIlexfridman.com #

  • Another Podcast Podcast - Paying attention to Apple again - Benedict and Toni discuss all about what Apple is up to and what went down at WWDCanother-podcast.simplecast.com #

  • TC39 Podcast - Interview with Tab Atkins-Bittner spec hacker for Google on the Chrome team - Not all podcasts need to be super well produced, and I like the lowfi production on these TC39 podcasts because you can easily concentrate on the in-depth javascript discussions, in this episode topics include similarities in how the different committees approach problem solving, writing specs, grid and flexbox, web components and the general componentisation of web development, shadow DOM, scoped styles, CSS modules, pattern matching and container queriespodcasts.google.com #

2021/06/09 #

Today’s links:

  • Websites begin to work again after major breakage - Lots of websites go offline including BBC, NYTimes, the UK government website gov.uk, Financial Times, the Guardian, PayPal, Shopify, HBO Max, Vimeo - Fastly had issues with it’s content delivery network (CDN) which all the sites use to deliver their servicewww.bbc.com #

2021/06/08 #

Today’s links:

  • Apple unveils iOS 15 with new FaceTime features and more - The photos, wallet, weather and maps features look to be the most interesting to me9to5mac.com #

  • Apple announces iPadOS 15 with homescreen and multitasking improvements - Looking forward to seeing these iPad multi-tasking improvements, I’m wondering how feasible it might eventually use one of these devices as an ultra-portable development devicewww.theverge.com #

2021/06/06 #

Today’s links:

  • Chrome 92 - Web Apps as File Handlers, New JavaScript Features, and More - The files functionality could open up a lot of pretty cool app possibilitiesblog.chromium.org #

2021/06/05 #

cat << EOF > Saturday 5th June, 2021 (Issue #29)

This week’s newsletter is out! (2021-06-05)

In this week’s edition:

Apple vs Adtech, Esports, Apple podcast subscriptions, Twitter Blue, Trump quits blogging, Stack Overflow acquired

Issue details:

Another awesome issue of the newsletter. #

Today’s links:

  • In Response to Oversight Board, Trump Suspended for Two Years; Will Only Be Reinstated if Conditions Permit - Linking to this because it’s relevant to some of last week’s links, but haven’t had time to read more than the title and first few paragraphs as I’m fully focussed on project work - I note that it’s written by ex-UK politician Nick Clegg, now VP of Global Affairs at Facebookabout.fb.com #

2021/06/04 #

Today’s links:

  • Introducing Twitter Blue - Twitter’s first-ever subscription offering - It’s aimed at Twitter power users, and adds several special features to enhance their experienceblog.twitter.com #

  • Trump shuts down his personal website - Big news I suppose, it would seem that having gotten used to millions of daily reactions on Twitter, that the 150000 that he was getting from his personal website wasn’t enough, I guess if you are someone like Trump you just have to be mainstream, and personal websites are never going to be like that, it’s a different sort of readership, I still wish he ran a personal website though, maybe he could have an alter-ego website, wildly different from DJTwww.platformer.news #

  • Stack Overflow sold to tech investor Prosus for $1.8 billion - Big news for developers, nope I hadn’t heard of “Tech Giant” Prosus eitherarstechnica.com #

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