Republicans are just being weird. This is the kind of solid messaging you get when the generation shifts.

A quick review of London food: everything I have tried to eat has made me think, “this is designed to be eaten after a late night of drinking” or “I would really enjoy this hungover”.

Deadpool and Wolverine is great, and made by a company (or at least people) that understand movies can be fun and made by people who have fun. The MCU I’d want is basically Iron Man, The Marvels, Guardians of the Galaxy, and Deadpool.

I feel like CGP Grey, furiously staring at an AC thermostat that will not work as my expensive hotel room remains uncomfortably, if not unreasonably, warm.

I miss MTV of the 90s. I miss what MTV News would have done this week.

One of the worst things about traveling iPad only is not having MarsEdit to write blog posts while traveling.

The most challenging aspect of my relationship to Elsa is her refusal to use Apple Maps. Traveling is basically just the two of us refusing to send links to each other in the preferred place.

I don’t understand who this mythical voter is who the GOP establishment thinks exists that votes for democrats and is mad that the VP is now running instead of the person at the top of the ticket in a primary. This feels like a completely manufactured issue.

This is supposed issue with Meta in the EU is sounding even more desperate. The EC doesn’t strike me as much more informed on technology or much more competent than the ridiculously incompetent congress and judiciary we have in the US.

When and where did people learn the names of flowers? I certainly didn’t learn how to identify them (or trees) the way some people talk about never having learned geography.

Last vacation I went into in need of a break and I felt awesome walking away. This time I don’t really need a break, and there’s a coding problem I just won’t solve before I go and it’s annoying the hell out of me. I’m sure my therapist would have a word for all this.

The Anderton video on the Slash Magnatone was shockingly GAS inducing.

I had no idea I live 30 mins from the PRS factory.

Holy shit.

Joe Biden joined the raise in 2020 to beat Trump. He succeeded. Since then, his record of accomplishment as president with the narrowest of Senate majorities has been strong. He was far more progressive than the Obama administration.

I wish he had decided not to run a year ago, sticking to the oft-repeated notion that he was playing the role of custodian. However, his effectiveness in office and the failure for other clear leaders to emerge in the Democratic Party made his decision to run in 2024 understandable. He had earned the right to tell us when he was no longer up for the job. And even though he was diminished from four years earlier, when I cast my vote on May 14th for President Biden to be the nominee, it was a vote for him. Even at that time, he remained seemingly capable, and he had earned my trust and faith.

I am not sure if now is the right time to drop out strategically. But I know that President Biden wants to be president and I know how seriously he takes the thread that Donald Trump poses to the future of our country. President Biden is leaving the race because in spite of the turmoil and chaos that will be created over the next several weeks, he believes this is the best way to defeat Trump and elect another American President who will make us proud and do right by the country.

I can make my peace with that. I don’t see this as a disgrace, but a triumph. I don’t see the time he’s taken to make that decision as selfish or intransigent, but as considered given the gravity of what will be unleashed.

President Biden has dedicated himself to serving this country, and his final four years of service have been crucial.

Now it’s up to us.

Note: I wrote this within 20 minutes of learning the news, without having read further analysis. These are my feelings captured in the moment, though I don’t think they’ll change, new facts will surely emerge.

I’ve donated what I can afford to Harris. Time to show we’re united.

Let’s go.

I like Rick Beato fine, even if sometimes he’s an old man yelling at clouds. But let’s be clear, he was totally correct that Third Eye Blind is one of the best and best sounding albums of the 90s. And the fact that he pulled Motorcycle Drive By as the best track means we’re on the same wavelength.

Anyone know why it seems like Shopify doesn’t support Apple Pay anymore? I have seen many sites drop it while adding “Shop Pay”, while maintaining Google, Amazon, etc.

I definitely lol’d.

“This wouldn’t have happened on Linux” I say smugly, as I copy and paste a command from a 2008 forum post, three hours into trying to get my fucking WiFi working on Arch.

From @theresnotime@fox.nexus

We saw this with ESSER and we see it now. Laws are passed and structured with the intent of slow, deliberate expenditure over years and then we hear government doesn’t work because it takes time. We could structure laws to spend faster, but we don’t.

I’m going to London for the first time in a week for a week and have virtually 0 plans and no idea what to do.

Everything I read about Silicon Valley’s support of Trump comes down to this:

These are people who believe in spending massive amounts of public money to enrich themselves while they make shitty tunnels under Las Vegas or drop off scooters on city sidewalks or chase self-driving cars, so firmly believing that these are total solutions ready to solve all problems right now, in complete ignorance of any existing systems or mechanism or solutions that exist.

These are the folks who reinvent busses or trains, but do so in a way that will make them rich, and therefore, they’re better. Except in practice, each time we follow their lead we end up with something worse than what the rest of the world gets through competent government. These are the folks who think the solutions are $600 home test devices for COVID and not wearing a mask. These are the folks who will block real solutions while they waste money failing over and over to solve big problems and then walk away without a consequence. These are the folks who think the only thing we have to learn from each other or other countries is what cannot yet be exploited for profit by a Stanford drop out building something 1/8th as good for 10x the price.

These are the people who think the best things that have happened over the last fifteen years have come out of Silicon Valley, even though virtually all of those things are not profitable and have come with major downsides.

I work in tech. I think a lot of cool stuff is being built and a lot of good work is being done. But tech is a mature industry, and most of what is interesting these days has to do with bringing the things we learned from 2000-2015 about how to use software into places that have not yet modernized. We’re at the tail end of what’s interesting and good and novel. Software technology has very little left to change in a major way. And the entire ethos of a16z and the like has utterly failed to produce breakthroughs in computer hardware, biological sciences, energy, environment or any other major sector. The last decade of innovation has been entirely about reducing friction in commerce. That’s it. And it’s not that profitable and will end up with a very small number of winners.

The major successes in tech are largely SaaS companies selling tooling to hopeful SaaS companies. It’s a spiral-jerk that ends in an easier buying experience online or shitty advertising.

The problems we face in the US, and the problems faced by folks throughout the world, will not be solved on Sandhill Road. And the thing is, they all know this. Support for a monstrous fascist like Trump is the warning sign. It’s just like how companies don’t move to Texas to be great, but instead to squeeze margin out of cost cutting everywhere you can when you no longer capable of growth or innovation. The Trump-Vance ticket has the support of Silicon Valley because their goal is to have government give up. Elon Musk pushed the hyperloop to stop California high speed rail. And in that space, Silicon Valley can try and convince us to drive self-driving electric cars underground. When that doesn’t work, they walk away, and the problem remains unsolved. In the meantime, we’ve wasted billions and they’ve made millions off of carry fees. When the government isn’t even trying, it creates space for charlatans to step in.

Think of all the problems Silicon Valley won’t solve, but can look great telling LPs that they’re part of the solution. Doesn’t it feel better to be part of the solution and make a profit instead of paying taxes? Never mind nothing will be solved.

I probably should have let that last post sit and edit the writing to be clearer, but I gotta work and I’m too mad right now to spend time on it.

Apparently someone linked to one of my blog posts on LinkedIn. That feels weird.

I have so few stats on my blog, so here are some interesting ones:

I have 4601 posts on my blog.

I have written 2067 replies on Micro.bog.

I have received 51 webmentions ¹

Since May first, I’ve had about 1,000 unique visitors. I have about 327 Mastodon followers. I would guess (because it’s not shared) that I have about 50 folks following me on Micro.blog. I crosspost to Bluesky and Threads as well, but would guess even fewer people follow there. My gut is the vast majority of my short posts are read natively in social apps, and that long posts get the click/hit.

My gut looking at the stats is I have about 50 active users. A day with a new long post might get 30ish hits. A popular post might get about 100. I rarely write something that is read more than 200 times.

Not bad for just, tossing out my thoughts whenever without a theme, rhyme, or reason.