From Monospace to Duospace: In Search of the perfect writing font

From Monospace to Duospace: In Search of the perfect writing font:

Designers have pointed out that, with all the structural benefits that may or may not come from using a monospace font when writing, there are typographical compromises in typewriter fonts that are mere mechanical constraints that can and should be overcome. Due to the way mechanical typewriters worked, using the same horizontal space for each letter was inevitable at the time. As beneficial as this regular rhythm is for writing, do we really need to squeeze every letter into the same square? Can we not at least make some exceptions?

[Yes, please. I’ve been using this for quite some time, but never pointed to their article. Allez!]

Bike Outliner: Outline Writing tool, lists, notes app for Mac

Bike Outliner: Outline Writing tool, lists, notes app for Mac:

I think macOS needs more “bicycles for the mind”.

Bike is small enough to fully understand. Once understood it’s flexible enough use for many purposes.

Bike is small, but designed for real work. It’s fast. It can handle big outlines that break other outliners. Bike’s also fast at the basics–opening files, scrolling views, and resizing windows. Bike won’t slow your Mac down.

Bike makes your writing open and accessible. Outlines are stored in text files using standard file formats. Bike is also scriptable. Automate and extend Bike with scripts.

[Nice.]

It’s not an experience

It’s not an experience:

Alto.com is a wonderful pharmacy that offers same day delivery. I have nothing but great things to say about them.

But they’re following a pattern I’m seeing far too often these days. They’re trying to track everything, and asking people to attribute "experience" to things that are mere, routine happenings.

They ask me to rate my "experience". Thing is, I didn’t have an experience. The delivery person just left the package by the mailbox and I grabbed it when I got home. And what does it mean to even rate a delivery like this? It showed up, it was correct… Is that a 5-star experience? Would it only be worth 3 stars if the package was lying on the ground instead of propped up against the wall? There isn’t enough there there to even establish a value.

If you’re going to ask anything, a more apt question might be "Did the correct prescription show up on time?" Then I can answer yes or no. But rate the experience? And every time I get a prescription, it’s the same question about the experience.

I know what they’re getting at, and I’m probably belaboring the point, but I’m seeing this everywhere and I can’t help but think it’s generating data that’s incompatible with the actual situation. Being asked to rate minutia with a 10-point scale, and ascribe depth of an experience to something that’s effectively flat and one dimensional, is overshooting the goal.

[I don’t think Jason is belaboring the point. I started writing about this from a slightly different perspective — namely, that all these companies want to have a “relationship” with me — whatever that word means when you’re not talking about individuals. What I usually want is a transaction. You sell something or a service, I pay. I don’t mind a customer service check, but it needs to be thoughtfully considered and implemented.]

Source: Jason Fried

Did Apple really make the ANC in AirPods Max worse? Yes, but…

Did Apple really make the ANC in AirPods Max worse? Yes, but…:

The technical report demonstrates the latest 4E71 firmware for AirPods Max indeed reduces the ANC and it’s not just in peoples’ heads. At the time of this writing, Apple hasn’t yet addressed RTings’ findings. There’s no class action lawsuit, though some believe it could happen. There is, however, an ongoing lawsuit between Apple and Jawbone Innovations claiming that Apple infringed on its noise cancellation patents, as discovered by Reddit user u/facingcondor.

If Apple thinks it’s a real issue, it could do a recall, or more likely, fix the ANC reduction problem in a future firmware update.

[Yuck.]

Jony Ive on Life After Apple

Jony Ive on Life After Apple – WSJ:

One surprising thing about Ive’s approach is that conversation, rather than sketches, is how he often begins a project. Thinking—and then speaking about that thinking—is the raw material he works with. “Language is so powerful,” Ive says. “If [I say] I’m going to design a chair, think how dangerous that is. Because you’ve just said chair, you’ve just said no to a thousand ideas.

“This is where it gets exciting,” he says. “You have an idea—which is unproven and isn’t resolved, since a resolved idea is a product—and the only tangible thing about the idea are the problems. When someone says it’s not possible, and all you are being shown is why it’s not possible, you have to think and behave in a different way. [You have to say], from a place of courage, I believe it is possible. 

“I love making things that are profoundly useful,” he adds. “I’m a very practical craftsperson.”

[I apologize for the paywall… but this particular bit registers so tightly with me. Thinking and discussing are so important to my design of anything. And not just the “saying no” part by using certain words and making choices. But the malleable, mutable nature of ideas as words is profound.]

Record-breaking chip can transmit entire internet’s traffic per second

Record-breaking chip can transmit entire internet’s traffic per second:

The speed record for data transmission using a single light source and optical chip has been shattered once again. Engineers have transmitted data at a blistering rate of 1.84 petabits per second (Pbit/s), almost twice the global internet traffic per second.

It’s hard to overstate just how fast 1.84 Pbit/s really is. Your home internet is probably getting a few hundred megabits per second, or if you’re really lucky, you might be on a 1-gigabit or even 10-gigabit connection – but 1 petabit is a million gigabits. It’s more than 20 times faster than ESnet6, the upcoming upgrade to the scientific network used by the likes of NASA.

[Cool. (Also, meh. My son’s gaming probably uses more bandwidth than that… 🤷🏼‍♂️ 🎈)]

Elon Musk says he can’t cover Ukraine Starlink costs after diplomat insult – The Washington Post

Elon Musk says he can’t cover Ukraine Starlink costs after diplomat insult – The Washington Post:

While SpaceX at points has portrayed Starlink service in Ukraine as an entirely charitable venture, it has not, in fact, covered the entire cost. The Post reported in April that the U.S. government had quietly paid millions to SpaceX for equipment and transportation costs.

[Not as kind as they would lead you to believe.]

Production Notes: making an iPhone Video in the Field – David Smith, Independent iOS Developer

Production Notes: making an iPhone Video in the Field – David Smith, Independent iOS Developer:

What I have found is that it is essential that the audio be recorded directly into the iPhone. While external recorders can be later synced up in Final Cut, this process is super cumbersome and means that you can’t easily check your footage in the field. It is also essential to have some kind of wind/weather screen on your microphone, otherwise you will constantly be ending up with unusable shots where all you hear is wind noise.

[On it. Kinda. Sorta.]