I wrote this in January but waited to see if I'd resolve it somehow. Since it looks like I'll miss the deadline, better to share it and move on.

This is what Apple's kiss of death looks like:

Hello Rosano,

We've sent you a new message about your app, sonogrid, app Apple ID: 1409129549.

For details, visit the App Review page in App Store Connect.

Best regards,
App Review

Swift, bureaucratic, saying nothing.

According to their policies, it's been over three years since the last time I updated my apps, and there aren't "enough" downloads for them to keep it on the store, so Apple will remove all of them unless I update within ninety days.

To update means:

1. apply half a decade of iOS and App Store "innovations" just to exist or remain compliant, but
2. even then there's no guarantee it would be approved, and
3. even if it does, it only buys me three years

Naive to think I could just pay their $99 USD annual membership fee to keep projects up there.

It doesn't matter if you spent seven to ten years working on something in the Apple platform and it's meaningful to your niche: either you keep up with policies (stay updated, scale with them) or you'll get taken out in a fashion maximally automated to communicate how cheap and replaceable you are to the ecosystem.

I might look into alternative app stores like AltStore, but it's sort of like starting from scratch while my primary motivation was to let people who already paid have easy access on their other devices. I'm also kind of tired and lazy to deal with this genre of problems to be honest: with orders of magnitude less effort, I could ship something on the web today and make progress that the rest of the world and I can keep forever.

Maybe I'll find a way through it another day, but this definitely confirms most of my hesitations about the App Store in the first place and makes me glad the web exists: I can just do things there.

So once again, I'll say "get them while you can"; they'll be gone around April 27, 2026.

After bringing home lyrics and Vibrations, I've moved over 150 music recommendations from Tumblr to my journal.

I'm proud of having found these, written notes, and put them together in a way that's public and shareable. Even better that it's now in a more durable form and offers relatively distraction-free browsing across various music platforms.

They were originally part of my Ephemerata newsletter (2021–2022) and eventually published in a Tumblr blog, but this was either hard to browse as a collection or somehow detached from the rest of my universe. Now that I have a place for everything, it's nicely organized and even has an RSS feed.

Important lesson here that when links break, it's super helpful to have context saved somewhere and not rely on the platform to keep it around for you. For example, this video is currently no longer online, and I haven't tried to replace it yet, but I easily can because of the context that was written as part of my post.

Also nice to see detailed 'via' links crediting people in my community or named publications as the source for certain items.

This is how I would like to share things online: less on social media, more in places I control – at home.

If you're seeking eclectic sounds, you'll find plenty here.

I've reorganized my homepage a bit.

1. Much less scrolling is needed now.
2. Larger lists have been broken into smaller lists which are easier to orient.
3. Mixing writing into each section makes way more sense. (I learn more and more: don't sort by type).
4. It's deliberately a bit rough so that I can fix things later.

I had more grandiose ideas, but this will do for the moment. Feels good to improve so much without a big 'redesign'.

The last update in 2021 was quite dramatic for me, going from pure icons to text; slowly considering more the reader over 'aesthetic'.

This is part of some things I'm doing for the 20th anniversary of my domain. More to come this year.

I thought it would be fun to share a special public email address to feed hungry bots:

sayhi@rosano.ca

Anything sent there gets instantly reported as spam. To do this in Fastmail, you first make an alias, then a rule:

It only took a few clicks to create. Maybe if enough people did this, email spammers might flag themselves out of existence?

I imagine it might be better to:

• put it in source code or somewhere no human would look for contact information
• use your own domain, as plus addressing like +hello reveals your main address
• sound plausible (like dictionary words) and not random letters/numbers

Try to get creative so that it's hard to pattern match. Here's another one:

eatme@rosano.ca

I've been interested to understand my family history for some years now. I already put some effort into talking with relatives, taking notes from our conversations, finding old documents, and consolidating information from different places.

There are many platforms or apps that can visually represent your tree. Using my family as an example (with anonymized names), below are some visualizations in the form of:

1. an ancestor 'fan chart', starting with the subject and going back, omitting siblings

2. a descendant 'sun chart', radiating outward from a single 'root ancestor'

3. the traditional 'tree', representing more comprehensively

4. 3D force-directed graph

All of these look nice and are fun to explore but become harder to read as data accumulates. None of them help me orient to where people fit in the larger picture. So I made my own with the following characteristics:

1. radial layout to maximize space and group by generation;

2. lines to connect siblings, spouses, and children;

3. colour to roughly track lineage based on last names;

This finally gives me a sense of who my second and third cousins are, which I wasn't able to grasp before.

I also learned that surnames aren't the ultimate indicator of 'where one comes from'. Even though I commonly think of my last name as representing family origins, it really just emphasizes those who passed on their name; feels cool to realize that as one person I actually come from people with thirteen unique last names!

Another interesting set of trivia has to do with the Mormon Church. I never paid much attention to them, but through this work I've learned that they contribute heavily to family tree technologies and to ordinary people learning about their own family histories:

• they invented the GEDCOM file format in 1984, which all these apps use to import and export genealogical data
• they probably run a 'FamilySearch Center' near you to provide research help and free access to paid platforms
• their FamilySearch wiki has about 150,000 articles to help you find vital records for family research in most countries
• they've helped archive and digitize birth, death, and other records from all over the world (accessible through their FamilySearch platform or local centers)

There's more I'd like to do with this, but for now I'm happy just to have my own tree and share it with family.

For anyone who's curious, here are some full-size PDFs where you can see details:

• mine
• the royal family
• presidents washington, lincoln, kennedy
• amelia earhart
• thomas edison
• alexander graham bell
• albert einstein

resources

If you're interested to explore deeper, I've compiled links from my research to save you some searching.

build family trees

• Genea (open-source, privacy-oriented)
• Family Chart (open-source, privacy-oriented)
• Visual Family Tree: Windows, macOS, Linux (open-source, privacy-oriented)
• obsidian-charted-roots: organize your tree inside Obsidian

visualize family trees

• Topola Genealogy Viewer (open-source, privacy-oriented)
• Family Tree Map: "Map the birthplaces of people in your family tree." (open-source, privacy-oriented)
• blood lines: 3D force-directed graph (open-source, privacy-oriented)
• tmcw/gedcom/live: 2D force-directed graph (open-source, privacy-oriented)
• Exploring Family Trees: tree layout on a timeline
• arbre: visualize GEDCOM data

self-hosted genealogy tools

• Gramps Web: collaborate with your family in a private space
• Betty: generate an encyclopedia-like website from Gramps or GEDCOM data
• Open Pedigree: draw genomic pedigrees
• Genealogy
• terrywbrady/TNG_Docker

hosted genealogy tools

• build family trees: Family Echo, Kintree, FamilyBushes
• make genograms: Genogram Creator, GenoFlow
• make pedigree charts: pedigreejs (open-source, privacy-oriented)

inspiration

My iOS apps are on the App Store again; if you ever wanted to have sonogrid or the others, now might be a good time to get a copy.

AudioScrub

slow down music, change keys, loop.

essential tool for transcribers, improvisers, music students.

also available with a subset of those features as a PLAY Edition that remote controls Apple's Music app.

sonogrid

"drum machine on steroids".

make simple loops that overlap in complex ways, explore visually and playfully, send midi out if you to connect with other systems.

Quick Record

audio recorder with iCloud sync that can start on launch; select audio quality, add tags.

Ticker

fun scrolly metronome that shows classical music markings.

Carrot Price

"now you know which one is cheaper".

unit cost calculator with my beatboxing sounds.

I wrote in going fully web about my reasons to take them down and, although I continue to feel similarly, was recently convinced by Heddi to consider restoring them there.

Here's what motivated me:

1. People who previously paid for them could not get a copy for new or other devices. I thought this would be possible even when not officially on the store, but it turns out to be more complicated than that. After contacting those who had issues about this years ago, many quickly replied back with very visible gratitude to have access to AudioScrub again; seems it still fits their needs better than whatever else is available.

yes!!!!! Thank you🎉🎉🎉 Still the best one out there

Thanks so much for communicating this to me. I’ll pass the word on to friends and colleagues who I know will benefit greatly from these 2 apps.
I myself use these apps daily, as it helps the learning music process greatly!

That’s amazing, congratulations! And thank you for letting me know, I really appreciate it.

I will definitely try it today on my iPad. I love your app.

Hello, so great to see your music app again!

i have already bought it !! Thank you very much. A nice Christmas present.

2. I worked hard on these and remain quite proud of them; not sure if it accomplishes much to nuke my history in the way that I did. Even though they were built for another era, everything still works great and I've never stopped using them.

3. It's been quite a puzzle to create income from pure web apps with my ideal structure of no personal data stored or collected, no login or signup to start, ideally open-source. While I figure out how to make that sustainable, it's helpful to have some other income streams.

No plans to update these for the moment, but I think it's a good step to keep it available.

I made a small web app called memo to quickly jot down points, framing it as "a notepad you can't edit".

Similar to a piece of paper, you just note things down without editing or 'managing' much.

There are no buttons for each item: you can only add new things, and then copy or delete everything.

The interface supports routines I describe in work, then don't: capture points to deal with them later without distracting from whatever's happening at the moment.

Coming from other note taking apps like Simplenote, Apple Notes, or even Hyperdraft, it's nice to not manage conflict: "did I edit that already on another device?", "I synced but the changes aren't here yet", "I'd rather not think about that, let me make a new one and then copy/paste between later". Here, there's no need to trust in special sync — "just add and it will come together".

I find that 'not editing' also means 'not judging', thus allowing things to flow out as easily as possible—it can easily be cleaned up later; this is useful in brainstorming, writing long-form, and other modes.

So it's a little box to type in that's always ready when opening the app, and it syncronizes points to other devices, and none of the data is held hostage by me because you can bring your own storage. Great, but that's it?

Well, it's a 'real' app that I use everyday, but I think it's also a useful example of interoperability with other tools.

If you want to edit or delete individual items, you can connect the same data to this simple list app; the changes will sync back to memo.

If you like checking things off as 'done', use this todo app; they will show up completed (crossed out) in memo.

Some people want to keep everything forever, like a physical journal. Maybe someone could make another app that presents a nice 'archive'.

This is very primitive but it feels cool that separate apps work together pretty seamlessly. It's all possible because: 1) they each let you bring your own storage, and 2) they all share a similar format.

I think it would be nice if this was normal with apps and technology. The web is full of people making fun little tools but they're not connected to data in other places; I tend to imagine that by simply tweaking them to read and write data this way, we get some very cool new possibilities, and even give older projects new potential without much change.

Having different tools to deal with the same data is useful as an 'app user', but I love it as an 'app developer' because interop simplifies my life: I don't need to build all the features in my app — other apps can fill the gap, and together, we share one growing base of people who mix them in their workflows.

Try memo or the interop demo and let me know what comes to mind.

For my thirty-seventh year, I wanted to write a shorter annual reflection, so here are some important layers since last year, followed by something I'm currently sitting with that feels profound to me.

1. affirming experiences, celebrating myself, from scrolling to strolling.

2. love and relationship with my partner as we spent time in Germany, Dubai, India, Kenya, and Portugal.

3. food, cooking, eating, tasting; untold amounts of dosa, chaat, shredded cheese, fried sandwiches and crispy things; many days started with masala chai; happy to discover uji power

4. childhood, family, reconnecting

5. bureaucracy, admin, visas, stress

I'm immensely grateful to have found a sense of place again with my projects. My questions from last year have answers, and something is emerging, not sure what.

I find myself deeply in the zone.

Most days, all I want to do is get back to it.

It's abundantly satisfying even if I'm the only person I know that might consider it relevant.

Focus, reps, optimistic vortex, strong signal, ripple effects.

Just keep going, keep building.

I understand my technology toolset at a level higher than I've ever known; I no longer fear the docs, and it gives me greater control over my materials.

Looking ahead, I just want to put my head down and make progress. Let's see next year where it takes us.

All yearly reflections: 33, 34, 35, 36, 37.

Since 2020 I've developed a frequent day routine of 'work' followed by 'non-work', which looks like this:

• work intensely until a certain time, often lunch, then 'digress' for the rest of the day;
• "no messaging or social media before lunch"
• "no computing after lunch"
• log points that occur to me during the day
• the next day, spend a short moment going through previous day's points, then start the cycle again.

Of course, many days can't be shaped like this, but I enjoy when it's possible and often really look forward to this kind of plan. I could do it every day, and somehow the repetition doesn't get boring; life also conveniently interrupts with variation.

I think it came about because until 2019 I was regularly spending unlimited hours a day coding apps on iOS or the web, and, naturally, it started to cost my mind and body. So I started to seek ways to limit my computer time.

It's also a riff on my productivity trinity and 'writing without magic': allow time to work in your favour, enjoy the fruits of resting your mind from intense focus, and diversify ways of being.

My morning mind is sacred to me as it hasn't yet been bombarded by external distractions, so I often use it to make progress on important things and try to keep the world at bay until I'm ready; I usually feel at my highest capacity, very focused, and productive. I give my first self to whatever I feel called to do.

During the 'digress' part, I read, do nothing, take walks, listen to music or podcasts, call friends, focus on body things, hang out, run errands, correspond, cook, touch plants, etc… Ideas, improvements, and iterations come quite naturally because I'm not occupied with 'work'; it's like shower thoughts, but for the whole afternoon and evening. The goal is to ensure there's a process or modality happening different to "sitting and doing stuff on my screen".

I just note down whatever occurs to me, things like "fix typo", "contact them", "wash dishes", "lookup word", "clean shoes", "buy vegetables", "share cat video"; it's all captured quickly and without polish, just enough that my future self will understand. Then I get back to my digressions.

The next morning, whenever I'm ready to start, I skip notifications, social networks, emails, or any external communication that I can do later—"don't look at anything"—and start with what I captured the previous day. I dump it all somewhere, and try process everything without taking too long. Just grouping the mess of points into "what goes with what?" is helpful and a simple starting point if I lack clarity that day.

I try to distribute everything into other places where I collect related points, but similar to just capturing quickly, I don't stop to put it in the 'correct' part of those buckets: I just drop it at one end or the other and move on immediately; I will eventually sort it anyway whenever I end up doing something about a specific collection of points.

If there's something time-sensitive there, briefly scan for it and bump it to the top. Otherwise, go through linearly.

If there's something 'nice to have, but not practical right now', I throw it in my rabbithole list, where I can be revisit without pressure to 'get it done' or take any decisions.

It normally takes me under five to ten minutes to process everything. I mostly don't get too involved in any of the points and just function like a dispatch center putting things in a useful place as efficiently as possible. If something worthwhile takes a minute to complete, I might just do it instead of moving it, but generally I like making deliberate time to focus on specific things and letting the rest accumulate so that time works for me.

The goal is to maximize space for deep work on what feels meaningful and motivating.

Sometimes I even defer this review until after lunch so that my morning brain has more time to party.

It's very satisfying for me to record little thoughts today and trust that they will be seen at the right moment; to have space to be present, yet not miss details that could be useful later. I often don't feel overwhelmed because there's a simple process for dealing with whatever comes up, and it helps me get a sense for what's potent.

A larger aspiration here is to switch modes at healthy intervals: do focused work but avoid several hours or more of the same body posture, instead trying to alternate and stagger contrasting activities; ideally, I even look forward to break because it's a chance to let the previous thing ferment.

Lately I've found that it also gives me direction with bad things happening in the world, as the more I learn about what's broken, the more I want to simply move the needle and do something useful: this framework helps me focus on those things.

I hope that sharing my concept might give you some ideas but also act as a prompt to consider which ways of working would help you flourish. May we all have clearer paths forward.

My new memo app is a "notepad you can't edit" specifically built for this work/digress cycle.

High off the fumes from bringing Vibrations home, I made a "room" for all the lyrics I've accumulated over the years from capoeira classes, deep listening albums, and learning languages, motivated because there were too many mixed into my notes and other stuff to find anything when I needed it.

informal to structured, automatically

Each song lives in a collection, which is a text file representing my personal tie to where it came from: maybe the year or place or group or album.

The lyrics in a collection are just separated by one # character, which represents a Markdown heading. New heading, new song; no need to "make one file per thing" and manage it.

…

quem ama mesmo prefere o ofício de amar.

# Joyce: Mistérios

você chegou feito um silêncio

…

With just this one semantic unit to divide the information, each song can get it's own page automatically. But I can still easily move things around if I change my mind. This fulfills my principle of "presenting things consistently regardless of how I organize the files".

Adding a topic to collections lets me combine collections from a certain context (such as my Brazilian popular music). As it shows recent items first, I have a list roughly in order of discovery without any 'blog post' system; time is somewhat relevant but it doesn't need to be super precise.

I had tried to do this with my non-chronological garden, but it was too much effort to manage pages and ended up crowding other stuff without being easier to find. Reverse chronological order is much more relevant here to me than other ways I've tried, as I often want to revisit newer things first; the order is a helpful reminder of where I got it from and orients me to other details I may have forgotten.

cool benefits

About 150 individual song notes were purged from my Simplenote and condensed into 21 collections. I no longer need to carry them around in my notes, and they're also 'liberated' as public data that anyone can benefit from as text or through my site's web interface.

Collections are presented without pagination so I can just scroll, with sticky headings for orientation, using the browser to search when needed: this way I can easily save one page offline with the Reading List in Safari and have lyrics with me even without internet access.

The page for any song has links to search the title via YouTube, or translate text via DeepL, or a 'Source' link so that anyone can edit things on GitHub.

There are bidirectional links between lyric and Vibrations pages, connecting published songs from my personal history to the lyrics.

other reflections

I'm generally not using my blog brain when I deal with music and don't always know very specifically what I'm looking for when it comes to songs I may want to reconnect with. It's nice to browse through what I've gathered as easily as physical albums or photo collections—an example of how technology can support more 'fuzzy' approaches.

I have another less public collection somewhere with compilations of more lyrics than I will ever use in my lifetime, but those are more like a large 'dataset' and not personally meaningful. The songs I've encountered along my way have more significance to me, and it's nice to express that through files, markdown, and some rough technical transformation.

My endeavour in writing this is not really to focus on the technology but an attempt to share why I do things a certain way, which can be applicable to other things.

Hugo gives me the rush of making apps, but applied to organizing information—something that disproportionately seems to satisfy me.

I would close with a quote from Heddi that describes what it's like for me to have a personal website or corner of the Internet where I can do niche things like this without some company's blessing:

"Having a platform profile is like living in a single-room apartment, whereas having your own site is a castle with unlimited rooms."

I'm motivated to start a newsletter again, after being out of it for some years, and mix the approaches I've tried so far.

Currently feels fun to try quarterly (Occasion-al) updates about things I've experienced, published, or encountered; it's inspired by a private one from Nathan Hewitt, as his seems to be about connection and a kind of life and online digest.

From publishing Ephemerata, I learned that I enjoyed the sharing, ritual, and weirdness—as did other people—but weekly is too much for me, and maybe monthly too.

My posture has shifted from "I should take as little space as possible because I'm probably not worth your time" to "I'd like to connect regularly with people who like what I'm doing, want more, and expect the unexpected".

Would also be nice to have one newsletter for a change and not several. Perhaps the nature of a secular church is that it serves many interests unevenly at different times, but remains worthwhile for all.

If you'd like to try this with me, see the most recent edition or just jump in and subscribe.

Sometime in the last months, I seem to have overcome my long-standing fear of reading another project's documentation in order to understand how it works and solve whatever coding block I'm facing at the moment.

In the past, I would resort to flailing around on search engines or Stack Overflow, hoping that someone would have a simple solution for me to copy and integrate so I could continue on with my "real" work.

"There's probably an elegant answer that someone has already tried to figure out, and I just need to craft the right search query to find it."

I'm often good at finding those, but equally often I tend to do things that nobody would do, and therefore it would stop me. "Why do I have to read all that just to accomplish this little side goal in my project?"

I assumed that because I had no idea where to start, and because documentation is often poorly organized, and because I couldn't search quickly for the answer, I therefore would have to read every single page from beginning to end and hope that it wouldn't be for nothing.

But I've learned from spending time with the excellent, readable, up-to-date, and maintained documentation for Hugo that I can just open a bunch of tabs with potentially relevant sections, skim or read deeply as necessary, and I will often find my answer.

Might not be so easy with projects where the information landscape is more chaotic or cryptic; command-line "man" pages, for example, were maybe good in their era, but still a challenge for me as my expectations are from the current century. But now that my capacity has increased, I might still try anyway.

This seems time-consuming initially, but sifting through those pages frequently is now actually the point for me; that's the skill/rep/practice. It's quite functional to let the docs wash over you multiple times while approaching them with different questions, intentions, or reading speeds:

1. It gives you a sense of the layout of where things are.
2. You're likely to stumble upon things along the way that weren't part of your search but are interesting and might be useful for future possibilities.
3. Over time, you can familiarize yourself with many subconcepts and how they fit into the larger structure.

All this builds strength, confidence, resilience, capacity, and understanding, which pays dividends the more you exercise it.

I used to throw my hands up and say it's a design problem if a beginner doesn't know where to start or can't find the answer quickly. Even if that's true (although I'm not sure whether I believe it now), it's been very rewarding to deal with it anyway.

I feel powerful, as if I can tackle anything. I can get answers by simply reading. I can just look at the code.

I'm no longer afraid to try and understand.

My fear may have also been because it's a challenge for me to focus while reading in general, but that too has gotten better with practice.

It surprises me how this applies to open source code and making sense of it. The first time I saw someone do this was in 2018, sitting beside Émile and watching him casually open the source of Ruby on Rails to understand and then describe to me how some ORM method worked; I never thought to do that in the almost 10–15 years of programming language experience prior, and it still took me some years afterward to try it myself and get over my fear in the process.

Code is also a kind of documentation of how something works, usually messy, but it's also possible to skim through or read deeply to make sense over time—and your capacity increases the more you do it.

So I'm no longer afraid, and it makes "open source" mean something new and powerful to me that, although probably obvious to many people, I perhaps only understood intellectually but never experienced.

Most of my open source contributions have been fixing documentation while trying to understand another project and discovering a 'bug' in the text. That's also worth celebrating, but I'm happy to now feel capable enough to do this with code too; somehow it's possible for me because I started reading the docs.

With my current understanding of the value in documenting things well, I've started doing more in my READMEs, CHANGELOGs, and even higher level in a blog; I do this even if the project is "just for myself" at the moment, because I want to work my empathy muscles and be useful to anyone who may ever try to understand what's going on.

Writing things down is powerful and means that someone else can skip the work you did, so I want to improve documentation wherever I see it.

If I had taken this approach from the start, I'd be levitating right now, so I wish someone had shown me 20 years ago. Maybe it could have happened if someone had guided me or told me I was capable of it. Could I do that for you? Perhaps you can take the chance to practice on something small, and maybe soon enough you too shall levitate.

If you enjoyed that, I also wrote about 'figuring it out much later' with respect to iOS programming and playing the guitar.

I'm starting a process to collect my online publishing across various platforms into one 'home'.

Music was the easiest to setup because it doesn't involve dealing with existing systems of mine.

You can see what it's like at rosano.ca/vibrations.

Vibrations

It's hard to have an overview on YouTube as they only order things by date upload, and also separate some videos into 'Shorts'.

By contrast:

1. I now have everything on one page,
2. videos are ordered based on my actual chronology,
3. and some even show the recording date.

It's crazy to perceive the psychological impact of no platform, no ads, and no random obfuscation of my work: I can browse and experience in peace.

metadata details

One thing I find cool is how I can derive the local time and place of any post with my travel data.

Every page also has a "Source" link to view the original file (like the one for this post). A reader can easily correct something, or add tags if it makes sense.

And the there are direct social media links saved from crossposting with n8n or manually.

One last detail is that I've mixed these with log entries to see them in a richer time context; see 2024 for an example of how this mixes together.

vibes

My inner librarian really gets excited by this sort of thing. I love information density, organizing things a certain way, and the potential to fill in more details as time goes on; I would like this site to become a very precise opinion about how that should be.

Might be worth mentioning that this is powered by Hugo, which seems to always have an elegant place for things to rest; I described some of the features I used on their forum.

It feels cool to see so many parts of fragmented systems coming together. With search engines becoming increasingly hostile toward finding things, these approaches remind me of older internetting ways: links that don't break, having multiple ways to discover things, openly accessible without ads, and maybe owning more of your data.

I'm starting to train capoeira again with some new groups and thought to reflect on how many different places I've done this.

My accountant brain enjoys a good spreadsheet, so it naturally manifested in this list:

I'm not sure how to make sense of time versus experience.

My first class was on December 13, 2021, which amounts to about 4 years ago at time of writing, but regular training in groups and solo during that time probably amounts to about a year and a half.

But also some training is more impactful than others, so what is the best measure of experience here?

I think about two quotes.

One is "Do you have ten years of experience? or ten of the same year?" which I heard from Jess Martin.

It can certainly be valuable to have a broader perspective from diversity of experiences, but, also…

when it comes to the body, maybe there's more potency to practice Bruce Lee's single kick 10,000 times.

I'm far from good at this, and as with other aspects of my life, my skills would be deeper if I stuck around and solidified a kind of 'base'.

I do like how this shows an aspect of how I travel to connect with people rather than tourist attractions, more-so than my list of cities; Mestre Mago told me it shares the idea that capoeira lets you feel familiar in unfamiliar places.

I definitely value meeting so many great people, and feel grateful for being welcomed into so many places to be part of the movement, music, and camaraderie.

Someday I'll have a nice game I can share. For now here's me practicing and singing on my own.

If you're interested to learn more or try capoeira, there's probably a group near you even though it's invisible to most people. Here are some games I like:

My video about scrolling meme platforms talks about how random unrelated bits and pieces can leave you confused.

Here I wanted to talk about the scrolling aspect, as I have my own interpretation of this and am trying to become more aware as I do it.

If 'memes' are the content, 'scrolling' is the permission you give to be subjected to one unrelated thing after another without much choice.

'Scrolling' is constantly changing the channel: useful to have an end point, not sure it's conducive as a default mode of operation.

It can also happen while walking down a street full of commercial things designed to get your attention: 'huh, look at this shiny object', 'ooh, that place has a sale', 'yum, this seems tasty'.

It doesn't even have to be about shops: I notice my attention on pigeons gathering, car drivers getting into arguments, judgements about people's clothing…

I say I'm 'scrolling' when I don't realize my attention is bouncing between these things, when the channel changes are the main event.

There's nothing wrong with having attention on any of those things, but I'm noticing a similarity between how I scroll online and how I jump between things in the real world.

In the same way I would prefer to choose where my attention goes online, I would like to have that kind of choice offline: to choose to be absorbed by random things walking down a street, or not.

More and more, I prefer to observe where my attention goes, and at least to be aware when random things appear to be the main event.

From watching the screen to watching myself watch the screen.

Scrolling to strolling.

My birthday reflection this year is a kind of online update since I've been more offline the last while. I'm currently not so clear-minded, somewhat fatigued, with less to say even though a lot happened. But I'm here, and happy to share this.

waves of loss

My father's passing shuffled around many things beyond what I could have expected, and I'm still trying to make sense of this new life. I learned that when a loved one passes away, your old life dies with them and things never 'get back to normal' at some point. Life and death somehow feels a needle apart, which has shifted my priorities, and so I find myself with even less attention to the unnecessary, travelling lighter. At the same time, feeling fortunate to be alive and make the most of it with who or what nourishes me.

movement

I gave myself the gift of training capoeira some weeks in London with a group and master I've been following the past two years. Life-changing by my standards, but not sure how to describe it other than new sensations of what is possible and a vibe that I'll probably carry with me everywhere. Well, at the least it makes me want to dance.

my own food

Although I'm grateful for what seems like years where food just happened around me, it's so satisfying to cook again. Preparing meals while travelling has always been a challenge and I've gotten more practice this year than ever. One thing I'm grateful for is my friend Nairouz demystifying stir-fry to me, as I've enjoyed making it a few times now.

more questions than answers

The past year seems to have been characterized by much uncertainty about the future and what makes sense for me to do.

I passed many periods overwhelmed by my perception of bad things happening in the world, and although I have my own ways to cope, I would invite anyone reading this to share with me: what helps you? I often come back to doing what feels meaningful, even if it's not sufficient. Seems hard to estimate what the world will be like in even five years.

With respect to the technology threads I've been cultivating in previous years, I'm not sure where to place myself considering how the landscape is changing. Conversations and music feel more obvious, as their significance will likely not change in the future. It's interesting to consider what technical things will remain constant… I don't know, but I want to feel like I'm working with a strong sense of purpose.

Perhaps, as someone recently said to me: everything we do matters.

All yearly reflections: 33, 34, 35, 36.

I grew up cooking not much more than toast. What a privilege to just have food around when I was hungry, but a missed opportunity to help my mother in the kitchen and develop vital skills. As a result, I basically avoided cooking for myself until living alone in my 20s.

In 2014 I became fed up feeling powerless, so I tried 'learning to cook' with my project Cooked August. Technically, I followed almost a hundred recipes in that month (trying for three a day), but didn't end up feeling confident in my abilities.

My friend Judy, who is a great cook and owns a restaurant, suggested I simply stock up on things I like and taste as many ingredients as possible: "Take a carrot and just bite it". This helped me realize I was preparing dishes but never really tasting the food, only to get a sense for the result while sitting down to eat; I wonder now whether years of mostly being served meals at home and at restaurants left me with a concept of 'food is what shows up'.

After returning from my first long solo travel of about 6 months in 2018, I was a bit drained and only had energy to make sandwiches and salads, but I took Judy's advice and experimented with various fresh vegetables in there, combining and tasting them in different permutations. Doing this for a while helped me start developing a relationship with ingredients that I can't describe, but feels like knowing more about what I like.

Feeling more confident, I branched out into oatmeal as it was something I liked to cook and eat every morning. Syrup, fruits, and sweet were getting a bit boring so I started to experiment with savoury flavours, vegetables, spices, and cheese; I first got turned onto this from Leanne Brown's Good and Cheap where she had an oats recipe suggesting to 'throw a fried egg on top'. Through this process I arrived at my signature Poor Man's Risotto, which most people have never had but seem to love. My greatest accolade was making it in Colombia for half a dozen friends of my friend who hosted me, among which was a Peruvian chef who asked for seconds and vowed to steal it! Another fond memory was cooking it for my friend from Berlin and her son; a year later I reached out to share some travel photos and her son asked 'is that the chef'?

I'm still working on my skills and would like to actually learn 'the rules' but I feel good about my progress so far and that other people can enjoy my food.

If you have a website, what are your earliest meaningful links that still work? I have almost no broken links at least since 2012 because I usually add a redirect whenever something changes.

Redirects help links in a healthy web resolve, avoid rot, and last a long time, but they also increase agency by letting own your data (own your URLs).

own your links

When I link to a platform I don't control, I try to at least use a URL that I do control. I have found this useful in recent years when switching my newsletter provider (/list), Mastodon instance (/mastodon), or crowdfunding platform (/fund)–I didn't have to change any links when that happened.

I'm considering even my Twitter account (/twitter in case the site goes bankrupt, and GitHub repositories (/hyperdraft-source) or YouTube videos (/strolling-0172-video) in case I start self-hosting; neither has happened yet, but if it occurs, I can easily update the destination once and point it somewhere else retroactively.

self-hosting a link manager

My links tend to be readable, but I like Derek Sivers' idea of making them short and speakable. I use YOURLS one-click self-hosted via Cloudron to manage my redirects which makes it easy to have both short and speakable if necessary; the links technically are something like go.rosano.ca/whatever, but because I own the data, I can make it further accessible under my root domain, as rosano.ca/whatever is often shortest, simplest, and most memorable. I also do the same contraction with blog permalinks so that utopia.rosano.ca/interoperable-visions/ can be accessed at rosano.ca/interoperable-visions; I stick with Ghost's simple permalinks design of /post-title-as-a-slug and find it more readable and predictable.

self-hosting legacy redirection

For legacy domains and permalinks, I made a simple single-file Node.js Express app (git push self-hosted via CapRover). There are about two dozen domains pointing to the same app to handle:

1. removing www.
2. correcting old and mispelled domains
3. redirecting archived projects to a single page
4. masking a domain that functions as a landing page
5. redirecting PeerTube links to YouTube
6. redirecting gibberish slugs to friendly slugs
7. redirecting to the Wayback Machine as a last resort, (but I may have done this one incorrectly, as it might cause some recursive issues).

This is hopefully a graceful degradation that takes care to guide existing links somewhere useful. It also supports HTTPS so if you write https://[OLD_DOMAIN] it works, which is not the case when you 'forward' URLs via registrars like Hover who only support writing http://[OLD_DOMAIN].

static versus dynamic

I love the simplicity of static sites and how they're basically free to keep alive forever, but all of my redirect pipework makes me feel forever tied to dynamic systems. It's possible to redirect via meta refresh on a static page but I find it ugly to write and manage with HTML; I'm also not sure if all search engines understand them, although Google claims to yet still recommends server-side redirects:

This tag, commonly called meta-refresh, sends the user to a new URL after a certain amount of time, and is sometimes used as a simple form of redirection. However, it is not supported by all browsers and can be confusing to the user. We recommend using a server-side 301 redirect instead.

conclusion

Maybe it's the librarian in me that finds it fun to have my stuff organized and moving along smoothly. I like the sense of ownership that comes with being able to direct links where I want, and the care to avoid throwing visitors into the weeds by making sure they land somewhere useful, always and forever.

If you want to keep reading, learn about the difference between fragile data and durable data, dream some interoperable visions with me, or marvel at how the person who wrote this needed six tries to learn iPhone programming.

A mini campaign idea came to me fully-formed and felt simple, fun, interesting, and worthwhile, leaving me curious and playful to see what happens without any expectations.

tiny vision, tiny goal

This began with seeing a friend joyfully post about their eSIM getting activated, which got me intrigued to learn about the initiative and try it myself; to use an effortless medium like Instagram Stories to communicate that 'you did something and that others can too' was powerful in retrospect.

A few days later I had a visual identity concept (stemming from my belief that the icon is the promise) and all the needed parts for a tiny campaign I could produce and run over a weekend easily, quick, and cheap: how far could this get? and with what kind of results? Of course, food would actually be more necessary and urgent as people there are on the brink of famine, but I chose to focus on what could be helpful without getting blocked by borders; I also have credibility with technical things and certain skills that can be fittingly deployed with respect to this kind of idea. My wish was to share a simple action people can do to instill hope and comradery in the midst of a dire situation.

structure and steps

I timeboxed with a limit to keep it approachable, so it took probably a few hours of effort in total, and because the idea was more or less fully-formed, I just needed to execute on the fly, without too much pre-planning. Always begin by brain dumping everything, to give new refinements and ideas a place to go: let time work for you.

unusual visuals

My concept was to link the sense organs with a smartphone to communicate that Internet becomes our 'eyes and ears', and make it a bit weird by showing more hands than I actually have. I took two photos of myself (~5 minutes), imported them into Photopea to superimpose one on the other via layer masking (~5 minutes); removed the background (~2 minutes, but almost automatic), and duplicated the result on a portrait-sized canvas to create some quirky repetition (~10 minutes).

do something and document the steps

I got an eSIM to understand the experience, made a note of the steps and anything noteworthy that wasn't in the project instructions, and simplified everything into a small unintimidating guide (~15 minutes) with three concise sections: introduce the original project, list different options for purchasing, and the important step of donating the QR code, prefacing the whole thing by giving an idea of how long it takes.

It takes less time than boiling water for tea 🍵 or heating a slice of pizza 🍕 to donate internet access for Gaza.

Hyperdraft let me just edit text to quickly create an online home for this: no setup, no nonsense, just write.

share on Stories

After importing my earlier photo composition into Instagram, I was able to put some text on top and link to the guide.

It took a bit of fiddling and re-writing to find nice wording (~30 minutes) even though I already drafted possibilities in my initial brain dump, then I finally posted it to Stories on different platforms (~5 minutes). I also made another version for public social media (~10 minutes).

The important part here is to set and communicate a small, achievable goal ("5 people") so that it doesn't take much to accomplish something meaningful.

ask friends who would likely join

This took the longest: I direct-messaged about 106 people in my network who were posting about the situation there (about 20 were able and willing to participate, and 15 eventually did) and corresponded with those who were on board to help them, send encouragement, and share progress (~2 hours spread over the weekend); I extracted templates from my personal messages to save time, spell correctly, and include important details, then refined them through experience and usage; this means copypasta but I always respond personally to any replies.

Some people wanted to participate but felt not able because of financial constraints and I found them sponsors so they can still engage with the initiative. Some already heard about the initiative and had done this before, so I just encouraged them to share the guide with anyone who could use it. The point of reaching out is less about their donations and more about making contact: the feeling of knowing that one of your friends is doing this can often be worth the effort.

I mostly stuck to Instagram but found Beeper and FluffyChat helpful for both multi-platform messaging and not feeling distracted with timeline posts.

celebrate progress

When someone completed the steps, I told them how many other people had done the same and gave a sense for the total impact.

I tracked progress in a spreadsheet and at the bottom of the guide itself.

Everyone who did this felt happy and excited at the end, so I encouraged them to share that they did this in their own story: this enabled more people to get exposed to the idea and feel comfortable, potentially starting a recursive process and channeling that energy into future progress.

lessons and reflections

1. I probably shouldn't have worded this as 'donating eSIMs' as many people might have no clue what that means: if you're not tech-oriented, you might wonder "is that something lying around at home?" or "do you buy one from a convenience store and bring it to the post office?". I eventually rephrased to 'donating Internet' and tried to communicate how it can be done online and even from your phone.
2. I probably should have mentioned 'Gaza' as many may have understood 'donating eSIMs' as a general request for some random cause rather than related to the current situation there. I eventually rephrased to 'donating Internet in Gaza'.
3. As a tech person, I thought 'total gigabytes' was an interesting metric to track progress, but of course not everyone speaks that language. I eventually tried to estimate what the data could be used for and converted it to more meaningful numbers:

That means: 24 hours of livestreams or videocalls (1.5gb per hour), 18,000 photos (2mb per photo), 288 hours of audio calls (2.5mb per minute), text messaging for 30 days (rough validity).

All of that involved random edits to the guide and spreadsheet (~1 hour).

1. It was necessary to reach out, as likely nobody would have taken action via the ephemeral story alone; I imagine asking directly helps move an abstract idea to one where people might consider acting and see themselves involved. I received feedback several times when someone said they were aware of the idea before, but eventually did it because they saw that I did it, which tells me the importance of modeling the action before or while you ask; in a way, this whole campaign happened because I saw a friend friend post his eSIM activation in a story.
2. I wish I had operated with less urgency, as it unnecessarily drained me. I tried to disconnect regularly, but was often magnetized back to my phone simultaneously from excitement (at progress) and doom (desire to help the situation over there); as I described in watching catastrophe, the time to change course was a decade or two ago and there's something misplaced about urgency 'now'.

conclusion

Inspired by someone's action, I had an idea to transform my own contribution into a call for other people to follow my example. I asked for five people and over a dozen stepped up (on a weekend) to contribute, without any in person interactions (completely digital); I feel that's a success, and only in the least because of the material result: the feeling of 'doing together' and any resulting conversations from this will probably have future effects that we'll understand later.

It was a bit exhausting to do this, but I really enjoyed it; I engaged in the kinds of things that fit my curiosities, maybe other people would take a different approach to fit theirs. How much impact can one have with a few hours work? Maybe it would take you longer to do similar tasks, but there are other possibilities easily afforded by your skills—do you have a sense for what they are? What's the value of feeling that we can accomplish things within our own circles, rather than waiting for larger institutions to help? I like to believe sometimes that it doesn't matter where we go as long as we do it together.

If anyone else wants to donate or sponsor please reach out and I'll happily help you 🙏🏽☀️❤️

go deeper

I can't take much credit for many ideas here, as this was a chance to put into practice what I learned from The roads to funding your community network projects.... and the Get Together book and podcast; I'd recommend those for anyone interested in this sort of thing.

If you want more, there's hopefully some comfort in when bad things happen in the world, tips for dialogue in "Why Are We Yelling?" by Buster Benson, and more collective visions in secular churches for continuity.

After the experiences that prompted my encryption rant, I have started to notice other moments when my digital stuff seems precarious, fleeting, as if slipping out of my hands; I hope to describe this a little and then consider some solutions.

fragile data

Encrypted messaging apps (like Signal and WhatsApp) can be volatile: you can easily lose access to your conversations; messages can fail to sync or deliver; your data might be secure with encryption, yet still trapped in an app.

Beeper and Texts help bring your messaging app data in one place, but export is not yet possible, even with open-source Element and the half dozen Matrix clients I've tried.

Platforms (like Discord, Slack, Telegram, or Facebook) don't let you own your messages: their systems can go offline and temporarily obstruct access; one of your contacts can delete their account and disappear your correspondence; smaller ones get acquired or shut down; you can only hope to get your data out or somewhere useful; your 'permalinks' (which you didn't own or control) break (remember that cool URLs don't change).

Microblogging platforms make it hard to own your posts: Twitter oscillates in states of chaos; Mastodon (or ActivityPub) ties them to whichever server you published from; Bluesky claims to let you move your data, but somehow it's not directly tangible.

Self-hosting gives you more control, but you still might end up losing stuff to 'export'. Discourse will give you SQL that has 'everything', which you need technical expertise to 'do something'; Datasette can be helpful to browse what you have and maybe convert to more accessible formats. Ghost claims creators get "access to 100% of their data", and WordPress claims you can "Own your data, all of it", but both their exports only include what they consider important; to actually get 'everything', you need to have systems administrator expertise to export SQL and download your images or attachments, then more expertise once you have all that and want to 'do something'. Consider export harmful unless proven otherwise.

I've been enthusiastic about personal data stores, but can admit it doesn't feel like it's in my hands.

Let's summarize 'fragile data' as:

• volatile access
• limited or no export
• data tied to a provider
• unusable formats (needing technical expertise)
• hard to see or manipulate data directly

durable data

I want to stop my stuff slipping out of reach as platforms change, depending on companies to stay around and hold it for me, or losing it to 'security', 'encryption', and 'export'. I want to have all my correspondence, publishing, and data, forever, defragmented from various networks and apps. I want to search my archive. I want to avoid being tied to a risky provider or format.

So far, the options that feel durable to me are email, files, Delta Chat, and git: they all continue to work, are supported by older systems and diverse new ones, and enable interesting possibilities via interop; the closest to 'future-proof' that I'm aware of.

email

Email will likely be around for at least as long as it has been around and remains ubiquitous and accessible to more people than any other data storage system. You can take your messages with you, switch providers, interact with everything in a variety of apps and clients.

Too bad many associate it with 'transactional B.S. from startups', 'marketing offers', 'newsletters one can't unsubscribe to', '10,000+ unread and no way to process'. Comprehensive solutions to information overload would be beyond the scope of what I'm writing (off the cuff, I can think of technical, philosophical, social, and political ones), but even if your main account isn't usable, it's easy and basically free to create a quiet new one to play with possibilities.

Email is a nice way to store data associated with a specific moment in time without considering how to structure files or tag items. Sometimes when I research an answer that I likely won't need anymore, I send myself an email instead of putting it in my notes. I would love to have a rich summary of activity on various platforms periodically archived there to maintain my history. Gmail used to harmonize chats and email by archiving and automatically grouping messages by conversation.

Email means copies. Using platforms with their own messaging system relies on the site to be online and hold your messages, while it's also possible for them to go offline (temporarily or permanently), erase data of someone who deletes their account, and sell or get acquired (sending your data who knows where). I used to delete emails with 'messages' sent on these platforms, but now I keep them as I don't trust the platform to do it for me.

Email is the original 'all your stuff in one place that you control', and as long it's designed to protect and respect your attention, it can serve an important function in supporting more durable data.

files

I don't like managing files and consider them a holdover from an older time, preferring interoperable apps (ideally as pluralistic lenses on data), yet they remain a useful response to ephemeral software. Files let you choose how to use them, and can be moved between different devices or storage providers.

I don't like hand-editing CSV, reading JSON or XML or HTML, but I'll be able to 'do something' with them probably forever. Plaintext is the way to my heart, and also one of the most interoperable types out there.

There are so many common formats and it's not easy to get an ecosystem to agree on which ones to use. Despite their limitations, having the data stored this way liberates it from any app. Your data could be available in these formats through export or integrations, but ultimately the app developer chooses whether to make that available; some solutions could be to ask people nicely, pressure companies publicly, or take it ourselves.

Delta Chat

(Disclosure: I've done paid work in the past to help with this project. I write my own opinions here to describe how it relates to durable data.)

Delta Chat uses your existing email account as a messaging app, and lets you do many things you'd want to do with apps like Signal and WhatsApp.

Unlike other messaging apps: you can move your messages between providers as easily as email; if the app goes away or stops working, you'll still have access to your messages (even if encrypted); it can help defragment your social graph across various platforms; it supports webxdc as an emerging way to do 'app things', including collaboration; it requires no permission, no company, and "no coins" to participate.

As documented in encryption rant, it's easy to transfer devices and never leaves me with the feeling that my messages will disappear. And because the data is stored in my email account, it's not dependent on any app, including Delta Chat itself.

It's basically as durable as email, with extra features and benefits: one approach to 'email without crap'.

git and GitHub

GitHub still leans technical but is becoming increasingly accessible.

It turns git into version control you can see and lets you edit directly on the site without installing apps.

There are virtually infinite integrations and automations available.

Backup, replication, and copies are built into the underlying technology.

Git enables credible exit from GitHub so you can take your files with you.

It's also collaborative and doesn't rely on a specific app's format of version control.

Connecting GitHub as the storage backend for apps would be a powerful way to enable backup and sync to multiple devices.

building for ownership

There's a reason why Zero Data defines data ownership specifically to mean 'having access without export or permission'. In the sea of shiny features advertised by apps, startups, and projects, it can be confusing to understand whether you actually have or own your stuff in the end.

'Encryption' helps avoid unauthorized access, but your data could easily disappear.

Many efforts that use the 'local-first' label focus on 'working offline', 'sync', and 'collaboration via CRDTs' without consideration for the seventh ideal of data ownership (perhaps leaving some company holding the data); in this way, plenty of Apple software could be misunderstood as 'local-first' while locking data into their ecosystem; DXOS is the closest I've seen to doing local-first right.

Ideally, data ownership is not a coincidental byproduct of someone's goodwill, but rather baked into how the system works. It should go beyond a technical concept to make people feel safe and able to trust the space as they might in a long-term relationship.

👋 Heads up: if you're more interested in solutions, read durable data.

This sort of 'complain-y' post fleshes out my encryption thread to highlight how data becoming inaccessible might feel to someone less tech-oriented than I am and who isn't going to document their experience; if you're a technology wrangler, read the rest of this while putting yourself in the shoes of someone whose relationship with owning data might be "new phone, please send your number".

encrypted bricks

In the end of 2023 I experienced the co-incidental deprecation of multiple messaging apps simultaneously. WhatsApp, Signal, and Beeper either suddenly stopped working or warned about 'going away soon'.

As a technologist, I can vaguely guess it's tied to something like 'availability of better encryption primitives or standards on newer versions of the operating system', but to a non-tech person it might be strange how WhatsApp says "you can use their web version instead, without upgrading your computer, but the native version that was working yesterday 'needs to' stop working today because of 'security'".

This could nicely tie into imagined stories of planned obsolescence and 'Apple pushing people to always get new stuff' even if that might not be what's really happening here; without technical knowledge, how would you tell the difference?

Also weird how many of these run in Electron (Chrome) as web apps with some kind of server component, but they don't work in a normal web browser.

volatile updates

It's fine that Beeper is no longer compatible with my older version of macOS, but not fine that the underlying self-update framework (Squirrel) forces an upgrade to a version that doesn't run on my machine: when is that ever desirable?

The threat of these workflow disruptions means one needs to keep backup copies of apps or lock them from being changed to prevent unintended updates.

locking Element on macOS to prevent it from incompatible upgrades

moving devices

Transferring both WhatsApp and Signal messages to a new phone, there's a scary thought (and real possibility) that all my messages could suddenly disappear because of 'security'. Since the app's transfer interface doesn't assure me of the correct path, I need to find the eight- to thirteen-step guide via a search engine and precisely follow it in order to understand and not mess up.

WhatsApp's transfer process simply didn't appear for me, but I was able to just re-register my number on the new phone (restored from iOS full backup) and unlock my data; phew, glad I didn't trust the documented process and relied on luck or a third party like Apple instead.

Signal's QR-code-based local network transfer is more straight-forward, but repeatedly failed at 99%, which although probably contains all my data, will not let me manage the last inch, thus leaving me locked out. After changing Wi-Fi networks, with a crash for success, it seemed to make it over safely.

Now, even though my messages are there at the moment, there's a lingering worry that my path was not acceptable for 'security' and so it might all get randomly taken away from me some day; this comes from seeing how message history is often not available on new linked devices. It doesn't matter whether my imagined story about possibly losing data is real. Does the experience make you feel safe? Does it reassure you that you have your data? Or does it threaten that you could become signed out and lose everything 'for your own protection'?

Delta Chat has the simplest device transfer and even an equivalent of 'changing your number'; the messages are also encrypted, yet I never worry about losing them.

clean by accident

If you can't afford larger storage capacity, you might find yourself managing space on your device. While cleanup up earlier in the year, I accidentally deleted Signal because my screen stalled — throw away your old, slower devices as they quickly become obsolete, right? — and my finger tapped and swiped perfectly because of muscle memory. My years of chat history were just gone. I have some messages on another linked device, but no possibility to export or transfer or merge because their desktop version is only 'linked' and not 'special', awaiting the next unfortunate accident; it sends the message that 'security' lacks agency.

decentralized if you know how

Is the solution is an open standard like Matrix? It's not so easy. Their "join" explainer is not as intuitive as other decentralized projects like Mastodon, PeerTube, or Lemmy. I don't believe a non-programmer would be able to do this without help, but assuming they sort through and understand the options of picking both a server and client, they will get stuck on errors like "Unable to decrypt message", "Verification failed", and the scary thought of losing messages if you log out.

Well, it was tricky to figure out how to trigger the Matrix verification process, but I managed to revive access to my Beeper messages with FluffyChat (which really might be "The cutest messenger in the Matrix network"), and it's nice to have access to my data in a variety of web apps that will probably remain backwards compatible forever. Still, "I managed to get it working" is a hard sell for normal people.

export impossible

I still have yet to see a built-in way to export all my messages at once with Signal, WhatsApp, or any popular Matrix client. It's possible to get a copy of some Signal Desktop messages with tools like sigtop and sqlcipher if you're comfortable typing into a terminal (I'm not). iMazing lets you export messages and attachments from WhatsApp. Not being part of official app interfaces just feels like platform capture to me: data in, but not out.

secure, complex, fragile

Why does all this 'security' have to feel so fragile? What does it mean when 'robustly-secured data' can accidentally vanish at a moment's notice, or that I can back up my entire phone for peace of mind, except for 'secure things'? Should it be normal to expect people to simply upgrade their operating system to the latest version when it's known to likely cause a slew of random issues?

How are ordinary people supposed to feel good about this? There may be workarounds, and maybe I'm even just taking the wrong approach in everything I've documented here, but if someone like me can't figure it out, it's bad: for people outside the tech world with little time or capacity to deal with these kinds of issues, the seeming possibility of them occurring is scary and unsafe, even if not real; for software developers to treat these circumstances as mere 'policy' is not very empathetic.

It's important to give space and patience to technology under development as people make it work, but there's no feigning moral superiority in using 'alternative tech' until it includes a real foundation to stand on for people without this domain expertise. Fleeting personal data is like alternative tech's equivalent of platform enshitification and doesn't fill me with confidence to trust these systems or recommend my non-tech friends to do so.

end rant

I hope to see more apps with comprehensive export or supporting personal data stores. And why not maximize compatibility where possible? If I can message all these platforms via Matrix bridges in a web browser, there's no reason to force an upgrade or brick my app.

Digital security should go beyond a technical concept: what if it made people feel safe, trusting the space as they might in a long-term relationship?

Are these stories of data becoming inaccessible just mine? If you have your own, be welcome to share. Maybe if the problems are documented, they're more likely to be fixed.

If you liked that, you might want to read durable data for some solutions, or interoperable visions in pointing at the wrong thing, or about different levels of agency.

When I stayed at Kanthaus in 2022, I noticed their box of small "butt towels" cut from old clothes in the bathroom; these machine-washable replacements save a lot of toilet paper and I always wanted to make my own.

We had some old sheets and shirts beyond use or donation lying around, and instead of throwing it out, my girlfriend cut them up into two sizes: smaller ones as a toilet paper substitute, and larger for cleaning up kitchen counters or as tissue paper; a simple, cost-effective, and beautiful way to reduce our usage of disposable cleaning paper.

Cut sheets lose threads around the edges in the dryer, so I hang dry them now, or since our apartment is dry it's possible to just leave them in a stack anyway; cotton shirts don't have this issue.

That's just one idea from this resourceful co-living collective. Here are some others:

Human suffering on an immense scale has been an inseparable part of how we got here. It's not new, but still impacts us so strongly that seeing people in pain or learning about possible future issues can numb us into paralysis ("there's nothing I can do", "let me think about something else") or provoke us into finding solutions ("what can I do?", "how do I make a difference?").

I went through a short period considering myself an activist when I was helping organize events and student initiatives to raise awareness about various issues: this was a time when I shared news and political outrage on social media, using whatever platform I had to publicly call out hypocrisy in anger, often shouting into the void; saying it this way is not meant to demean anyone who does similar-seeming things, but a way to acknowledge my own misalignment of intentions as I operated under confusion without realizing—I thought that's what my response needed to be.

With a greater understanding of how power works and propagates itself, I now focus on things that bring me satisfaction. Dealing with root causes rather than symptoms is harder because it's invisible and not a job for one person, or even a group of people: it really requires humanity overall to be more cooperative. So every time I feel the real and consequential urgency of moral injury, and find myself thrown into deciphering a problem larger than myself while I brush my teeth anxiously or lie in bed unable to sleep, I try to remember that my individualized frenzy is misplaced: it's not just me that will solve this—it's the whole planet working together. How can this be accomplished? Is it even possible? Or a good idea? I don't have all the answers but trust in figuring that out collectively, and rather than joining a group or starting one, I've chosen to create bridges between them.

Part of bringing people together involves being inclusive and seeing diverse forms of contribution as useful and necessary: what's needed isn't always visible, vocal, and popular forms of 'activism', or what is considered as such either by 'activists' or the people who claim to disdain them. Everything is politics. I like how this analogy of the spear describes a spectrum of contributions coming together:

• Direct action is the tiniest tip of a spear's blade: sharp and vital for making a mark, but not powerful on its own.
• The metal part between tip and handle represents organizing around that, showing up, and substantiating the above with food, calls, gatherings, emotional support, bail, paperwork, etc…: everything here enables the tip to have some kind of impact and is often considered activism, but the result is very acute (and seen as fringe) without further support from a larger populace.
• Supporters of a movement inhabit the much longer portion of a spear's handle, and represents a diversity of perspectives, some of which may not feel satisfactory to the metal and tip; it doesn't get as much attention as the other parts even though it's what creates leverage and forward movement for deep impact. At the very end of the handle you might find people who show up to take a selfie and leave: this is considered 'merely performative' by some but is also important for bringing ideas out of the fringe and into normal discussion, shifting thought.

To find my own place within this sphere, I avoid doing things that make me feel replaceable, where the result would be comparable if someone else was in my place, and prefer activities where the outcome drastically changes because I'm there. This leads me to spend most of my time on personal projects, which often provokes a comparison about whether I'm doing 'enough' or 'my part' in times of crisis, probably because it's not how most people get to spend their days. Yet, every time I question myself, the deliberations lead me circling back to the same place: my projects will likely not save a life or end that bad problem over there, but without hesitation I feel and understand my actions to be completely holistic.

How do conversations on Strolling help? After a period of global political unrest and binary views on how things should be, I observed divisions everywhere, and saw myself as part of the problem that divided communities into red and blue. Dissatisfied that greater powers continue to flourish and profit as we squabble over our teams and rip apart the world's social fabric with our own hands, I recognized that dialogue is critical to overcoming conflict and disagreement, and have I've tried to repair what I can by learning to disagree productively, fostering discussion, being a bridge, reconnecting, calling in, reaching out. Strolling tries to honour dialogue and what is possible through merely conversing, and perhaps also expose people to ideas they wouldn't come across anywhere else or be open to; I've been in a bubble so far recording mostly with people who share adjacent perspectives, but on occasions where I disagree, I practice being conducive instead of reactionary.

How do apps help? Technology underpins everything today, and its companies with massive resources would rather profit from transforming us into consumers of their addictive platform fodder than help us cultivate greater agency. I don't believe technology will or can solve all our problems, but if we want a different future, it must involve changing our technology. I participate here because I have specific skills and feel it's under-addressed, as: 1. most of the world does not have the space to develop technical expertise to infiltrate the castles of confusion erected by programmers; and 2. most of those who do have expertise see it as a job or fun hobby without attempting to change why it works the way it does; without criticism towards either, I believe this is the reality and it's not sufficient. My involvement has always tried to help close this gap by documenting for beginners, or decentering the English language in app development (maximum localization), or incorporating non-techie friends into the world of alternative technology. I've also written about agency, separation of data from apps, interoperability, and antipatterns, often with accessible language and minimal jargon, to help more people realize what could be possible.

How does music on Vibrations help? It's my formation and one place where I might hold a deeper credibility. I publish music mostly for myself as a way to recover from the narrow-minded upbringings of my training, and send a message about how different the concept of music could be. People seem to enjoy what I share, and that has taught me to care less about being considered 'professional' (a former pain point) and more about doing meaningful things. I consider music one of the deepest, most underrated forms of social change, and it's completely invisible to most people; I might write later about how [[music is not what's on your streaming platform]]. Daryl Davis talks about reflexes as a musician to 'create harmony' as he reformed over 200 KKK members, and although he mentions it in passing as if light spiritual humour, I think music manifests a capacity to create synergy, and on a practical level help coordinate multiple things in parallel.

In summary: I have some skills, see where it could make a difference, and try to enjoy the process; this may lead to discomfort or financial instability if it's not seen as useful by the institutions of society, but I've learned to harden myself against comparisons and counterproductive thoughts as long as I believe in what I'm doing. The range of 'music, technology, and conversations' might seem disparate and perhaps selfish, but I see it all as complementary and emancipatory: there's no question to me that it's holistic, which fills me with confidence to go forward 100% even as the dumpster fire burns higher.

I'm also proud to have received feedback that my presence had an unlocking and enabling effect on some people, without trying to persuade them to do things the way I do; I believe changing something about your life merely by feeling inspired is actually quite powerful and was my catalyst for many initiatives and habits.

When you think 'nothing I do matters' consider this: in all those stories of time travel, you step out of your time machine into a moment of the past, maybe feeling uneasy about touching anything or making even the slightest change to your surrounding environment, out of fear that any difference would create a cascading effect with unforeseeable consequences as time progresses with the result of your actions; now bring yourself back to the present and realize that the same power is held by each of us, right now. So… What would you like to do today?

Thanks to Heddi for encouraging me to put in words here something that I've often said to myself and others, but never considered writing.

Writing interoperable visions got me thinking about how cool it would be to use a GitHub repository as the storage for Zero Data or local-first apps as many people have an account there, even some less technical people. Using their repository contents API it should be possible to connect it as a backend for web apps and store the data in a repository. Has this been done already?

GitHub has useful affordances for browsing files, understanding directory structure, editing text, collaborating, version control, and a whole wack of integrations hooking into every corner of the internet. A repo can be synced to your local device where you can also do all the things your device can, then push it back to the cloud.

Might be interesting to think of it like a Dropbox shared folder, but globally public and editable, or another way to get Datomic's "version control for your database".

Of course, you may not want the data created by your app to be public, so you might use a private repository instead of a public one. Choosing a public repository where it doesn't breach privacy could be a new way to encourage 'open data', as one can literally see, fork, and hack all of it with no extra steps,

The many affordances accessible point-and-click via GitHub's web interface ensures there are at least two apps that can edit the same data, which is great for interop, but factoring all the ways to edit GitHub repos via integrations and on your local device, it becomes closer to infinite: could it be one of the most interoperable formats out there? What would it say about sovereignty if similar flexibility via an API was replicated by Codeberg, or self-hostable options like GitLab, Gitea, or Gogs?

The remoteStorage.js library already supports Dropbox and Google Drive as an optional storage backend, with Solid on the way. Why not add GitHub? A polyglot library with five low-friction storage options would give developers more potential for their apps, and the people using them more ways into owning their data.

I capture notes frequently and prefer to avoid looking at apps, notifications, or any distractions along the way: here's the shortest path to typing into some kind of note-taking app.

It's possible to customize the lock screen as of iOS 16, and we can use this to launch an app directly from there.

First create a script in Scriptable (for some reason this is not yet possible with Apple Shortcuts)—here's an example to open Shazam:

let widget = new ListWidget()

let icon = widget.addImage((SFSymbol.named('wand.and.stars').image))
icon.tintColor = Color.white()
  
Script.setWidget(widget)
Script.complete()

Safari.open('shazam://')

Replace shazam:// with the 'URL scheme' for your app, for example: Apple Notes is mobilenotes://, Voice Memos is voicememos://, and Twitter is twitter://. There are lists at github.com/bhagyas, github.com/FifiTheBulldog, techregister.co.uk, medium.com/@contact.jmeyers, and davidblue.wtf. You can probably guess what it is for your app or search for YOUR_APP_NAME url scheme.

You can also replace wand.and.stars with any icon from Apple's SF Symbols icon set built into iOS: hotpot.ai has an online list where you can tap the 'SF Symbols' button and click on an icon to copy it's code.

Once that's done:

1. open the Settings app and select Wallpaper (iOS users can click this shortcut);
2. tap Customize on your lock screen, then Add widget, then Scriptable, then tap the smaller or larger format,
3. once you the new widget appears, tap Select Script, change 'When Interacting' from Open App to Run Script, and change 'Script' from Choose to your the one you created earlier,
4. finally, tap the close button on all the boxes (probably about 2–3 of them), then tap Done to save everything.

There are quite a few other possibilities in all that but this will be enough to open stuff from the lock screen without having to look at anything in your phone. Unfortunately not yet possible with web apps added to the home screen (see Link Capturing).

This might pair well with disabling notifications via the 'Do Not Disturb' Focus.

If you use Simplenote like me, you can also open a specific note by getting the full URL:

1. create a new note;
2. type a bracket [ and then the first few letters of another note;
3. select from the autocomplete list and tap it to insert note link.

For example, if it shows [alfa bravo charlie](simplenote://note/7df07707b0744184b68224983c1b8c79), then the full URL is simplenote://note/7df07707b0744184b68224983c1b8c79 and you can substitute shazam:// for that in the original script to open a specific note.

👋 Heads up: if you're looking for the longer, more technical version, read interoperable visions.

Would it make sense to point Google Docs at your Twitter likes? Or Google Maps at your contact list? Or a flashcards app at your music collection? Some combinations are more complementary than others, but regardless, this flexibility would enable us to play with and combine data from various apps in meaningful ways without needing to wait for the developer or platform to build it first: we can just mash things up and see what happens.

For example, by pointing a note-taking app at your bookmarks, you might use fancier text-editing features (rather than a simple text field) to add notes to your saved links, perhaps more comfortably draft a personal message or blog post about that link. Pointing at other things (like contacts, recipes, correspondence, etc.) might mean editing them as if they were only 'plain editable text', and maybe having a new way to read and search them. Consider also pointing a maps app at your contacts (maybe to see where your friends are?), or recipes (maybe to see where foods or ingredients come from or can be found?), or photos (maybe to see where you've made some memories?).

This flexibility sort of exists already with apps that open 'files', but pointing at 'collections of items' in the way previously described often requires specific integrations (as Find my shows your friends or Photos presents places from geotagged images). Would be nice to see this in every app, so that we always have multiple options to handle our digital stuff, as opposed to data being locked into specific apps and platforms.

I could imagine it useful to have a kind of 'data picker' without dealing too much with 'files', where even on a mobile device you can say 'open this from there' with just a few taps; maybe like the iOS Share sheet shows "what you can do with the shared content", but in reverse, to show "what content you can use with the current app".

Imagine a text editor that can deal with the gamut of:

• text files, whether on your computer, Dropbox, Google Drive, iCloud, GitHub, etc…
• documents from Apple Notes or Simplenote
• documents from Google Docs or Microsoft Word, editable as simple text
• blog posts from Ghost or Wordpress
• contacts, calendars, or correspondence as text by 'pointing at the wrong thing'

What's the value of one app supporting a mix of these? Two apps? A whole ecosystem of apps? In the way we 'edit stuff as text' here regardless of where it is, what how else can apps 'edit stuff as X'?

This could be a dynamic ecosystem where people are building and using software in unpredictable permutations, where progress happens faster than the speed of plugins, or perhaps even without the developer or platform specifying it. I'd certainly love to see this brighter future with more possibilities for our human agency. What about you? I would love to hear what you think about this especially if you consider yourself a 'less technical' person: be welcome to comment or message me anywhere.

I might have been politically asleep until about twenty-seven years old; moving to Montreal changed that, and even left me feeling like an activist for a few years.

The world became more polarized since then, and I observed divisions everywhere, including in my own social circles and family. I was part of that problem: being puristic instead of patient; cancelling, blocking, or unfollowing instead of cultivating curiosity; calling out instead of calling in. Realizing that, I decided to shift towards building social bridges, repairing my social fabric, and cultivating connection. I somehow simultaneously discovered Beau of the Fifth Column and felt fascinated to witness people from a wide political spectrum pay attention to his coverage of USA politics in such a divided country: he's such a masterful teacher that I often find myself bowing down to proclaim "teach me!".

I'm still interested in this question as I think it relates to all societal problems: we cannot advance without learning to talk to one another; we need to include people we disagree with; it's healthy to have conversations outside our bubbles. Reading Why Are We Yelling? re-invigorated this important thread in my life.

The book re-affirms that even if spaces I previously considered harmful might still come with risks, it's possible to keep doors open without superficiality, to dialogue without danger, and to appreciate the potential in learning from anyone; I called it a fire mindset when adversity feeds you somehow.

Everyone has something to offer. Everyone is going through something we're not aware of. Everyone carries experience that others don't. It all applies to you too. We're more productive together and can unlock a wealth of possibility around us if the doors remain open. It serves our broken system to be divided and squabbling.

One of the deepest things I realized in this book is that these reflexes of fostering dialogue are not only for 'outside my bubble', but also inside of it, as being closed to 'the other' becomes an issue both ways.

beware reason

[Reason habituates us to asking black-and-white questions like "what is real?" and "what actually happened?" when actually there's no need to go there, to the point that some people feel a sense of duty to correct others who believe in something considered unacceptable.]

[When resolving conflict, the voice of power uses force, the voice of reason uses systems, and the voice of avoidance uses inaction. The voice of possibility tries to make conflict productive instead, by facilitating learning, curiosity, understanding.]

[The voice of reason makes sense of things by connecting to all the other things that give authority and power to its wielder.]

openness

[The voice of possibility doesn't need to immediately decide whether something is true, and can accept contradictory arguments simultaneously.]

[Consider helping the opposition build their strongest arguments and enlist them to build up yours. Iron sharpens iron, and each of you is best suited to find flaws in the others' approach.]

[Strengthening an argument doesn't make it more threatening.]

A traditional essay makes a single case and puts all its weight behind it. A problem brief collects the best proposals [and criticisms] that attempt to answer the open question. That means it might have two or five or a hundred different proposals, each with supporting evidence and proposed actions, each a result of a collaboration between supporters and opponents.

[1. What is the difference between hearing and endorsing a dangerous idea? 2. Should we hear them or not, and why? 3. Is it possible to discuss them productively?]

[We're easily blind to the loopholes in our own desires.]

[Leader seek to have strong judgment and good instincts. They incorporate diverse perspectives and work to disconfirm their beliefs.]

creating space

[Arguments are an indication of something important, not necessarily bad. It's normal for them to come back like weeds. Not dealing with them to 'avoid rocking the boat' can create anxiousness underlying everything.]

[People don't need to answer, or do so truthfully.]

[Systemic issues stick when their disagreements are stuck in unproductive states or off limits of discussion.]

[Appreciate disagreements; notice and address anxiety.]

conducive discussion

[Try to determine whether it's about being true, meaningful, or useful.]

[Depersonalize points of view so that people feel free to try out other ones. Plot them on a quadrant of agreement against potential to change.]

[Propose to 'disagree and commit' when nobody will have the ideal information anyway, especially if reversible. Try to recognize misalignment and correct quickly.]

[Focus on end-games instead of arguing specific points.]

anti-patterns

['Nutpicking' is to select the most extreme viewpoint so that it's easy to tear apart; an empty victory that invites another cycle.]

[Even if one side wins through power, do they really expect the other side to simply shut up about it forever?]

[Open and honest dialogue requires the information shared to not be weaponized.]

spirits

[Ghosts and spirits are a more a language to talk about unknown forces that influence us and less a physical being that we can't interact with.]

What is your relationship to the unknown? What is it like to have sensitivity to nature and spirits?

[Ghosts are more heart-realm metaphors than head-realm beings.]

curiosity

[Instead of "are ghosts real?" ask "what experiences led you to your beliefs?".]

It's amazing to have a chance to peek into someone's belief systems and memories, a treasure trove wasted by a bad question.

To ask a good question, walk right up to the perimeter of your current understanding about something and find a question that you don't know the answer to.

[By realizing that we knew less, we felt somehow wiser.]

disagreement

[The fruits of disagreement include: 1. security (negotiating for foundation); 2. growth (taking risks to discover new possibilities and potential security); 3. connection (being able to relate to people with diverse perspectives); and 4. enjoyment, learning to enjoy fundamental disagreements because the discussion brings new nuance each time.]

[Going beyond battling for security diffuses the zero-sum game to enable everyone to gain and grow from the experience.]

[To any disagreement, you can ask: What's really at stake here? If true, what happens? What truth would cause you to change your mind? If this were no longer a problem, how would we get there?]

language

I changed the game from "online debate" to "potluck at my house." I changed the goal from "let's debate ideas" to "let's enjoy each other's company while having a stimulating conversation." I changed the conversational medium from "type into a comment text box" to "discuss over food and drink." And I changed the question from "What do you believe?" to the biggest unanswered question in my own head:
"What's the endgame for the gun-control debate?"

[A given name like 'honour killings' portrays that violence as somehow different than in the occidental nations: more barbaric and primitive. Is ours any better?]

the low doorway is meant to remind guests to enter with respect.

Part of Book Log (klog)

👋 Heads up: if you're looking for the shorter, less technical version, read pointing at the wrong thing.

I have been using my own Zero Data apps (storing all data on spaces you own) since 2018, starting with Hyperdraft for taking notes and gradually developing five more to optimize other meaningful workflows. It was enough back then to know that every iota of my data from these apps, including documents, configurations, and preferences, was in a place I control—a 'personal data store' (PDS).

It's been great, perhaps life-changing, and still continues to be a vital part of how I organize myself and my projects: my important stuff is with me at all times and eventually gets synced to all my devices; these web apps happen to be local-first and work fine without internet access; I've spent no time on spam, or proving to a machine that I'm human via captchas; and somehow I was even able to collaborate with other people on flashcards despite it not really being baked into my development frameworks—all without any felt presence of a large tech company deciding whether I can or not.

there, but invisible

One of the principles I listed on the Zero Data page is "do what you want with your data at any time", and I've been reflecting on some limitations of the current reality: it's technically true that I'm able to 'do what I want with it any time', but what can I actually do with this?

Most of my data in a PDS is stored in a format for machines ('JSON objects'), which I generally don't wrangle with my own hands—perhaps nobody should (to avoid throwing a computer into crisis by missing a comma). Sometimes I write code to maneuver this format into something meaningful, mostly for one-off situations that don't repeat and wouldn't be resolvable with any graphical interfaces ('GUI' software) that I'm aware of; I would prefer to avoid coding and can imagine it's not an option for most people (who still might not have the programming knowledge or mindset). More often, I use self-hosted n8n automations as a way to bridge different flows while using this data; it can be overall fantastic, yet still cumbersome and not quite low-code enough to include non-tech people. In the process, I learned about and self-hosted the no-code database Directus, which, although well-designed in many ways, feels quite heavy-handed and unfortunately not local-first. There are apps like Inspektor with useful affordances to edit key-value pairs as if they were 'fields', but it's not practical to do this regularly.

This data is somehow 100% mine, but as if I can't touch it or do much without technical expertise, as if I don't really have it even though it's right there; this is in some way strangely similar to having it stuck in one of those silos that I meant to avoid in the first place. The nicest way would be to simply use a variety of apps that can (inter-)operate on the same data without breaking each other. Observing how some of these Zero Data apps store the data (mine included), it seems there's a long way to go. Interoperability (interop) would make this better.

pure not practical

Related to silos, I've also been reflecting on how Zero Data shouldn't always mean asking people to leave the tools they know, or starting a new ecosystem from scratch. I've probably been as guilty of this as anyone else who claims to care about more ethical technology, and believed for a while in blank slates, but now I assume that things are and perhaps should be messy, because that's how it works in real life, with humans and their complex logistical or emotional entanglements. Only in the tech sphere would it be popular to 'start from scratch', with pristine self-declared confines unaffected by legacy; there's enough money and free time there to prop it up until there isn't, but for the rest of the world, subsidizing success isn't always sustainable: politically speaking, people generally gain leverage by forming imperfect coalitions rather than by staying 'pure' to any ideals or working exclusively with those who pledge the same; these pluralistic (messy) conditions for collaboration are exactly what an approach to apps and their data could exemplify.

In practice, that could mean:

• embracing popular formats, even if created by the devil
• not waiting for neat standards, instead letting systems grow from simple seeds
• not pushing people to a single blessed representation, instead perhaps supporting a dynamic vocabulary with something like Cambria
• having diverse options for import and export, then proliferating them through packages
• minimizing the 'destructive' tradeoffs of any decision.

Perhaps instead of forcing a choice to be made, there's potential to encourage a 'both and' mentality: alternative technology and the frameworks built in that world have an opportunity to become sort of 'data liberators' that help people avoid feeling stuck: personal data stores and apps built for them could, rather than feeling like silos, be considered bridges between or out of them by enabling credible exit where there is none. Interop would make this better.

function over formats

One way to restate and combine the above two perspectives is that the feeling of 'having your data in your hands' or 'handedness' (credit to Boris for the term)—being able to mold and maneuver it as you wish—comes not from a consecrated format but rather from access to diverse lenses, views, or 'applications' for the same data: maximizing what a human can do while minimizing the knowledge or skill required. I would say it's the variety in those possibilities that make the data tangible in this way, not the format itself, even though the format 'enables' it. Of course, interop would make this better.

apps as dumb, interoperable views

Various people (such as Ruben Verborgh and Geoffrey Litt) have articulated visions of apps almost like functions where your data goes in and a visual representation or interface comes out. I hope that by sketching out some more details around interop, something new can become discernible.

I've been thinking about this for my note-taking app and will use it as the main example, but there's probably lots that can be applied to other kinds of apps. As an aside, stealing these concepts for your project would not only be appreciated, but perhaps a way to 'do your part' if you're an interoperable app developer.

decouple type and location, enable pointing

Text editors are commonly used to 'edit text documents', often 'plain text' and sometimes 'rich text' with formatting. Unlike native apps where you can simply 'drag and drop' or 'share' files and the app will try to 'open' them, apps built for 'personal data stores' (Zero Data apps) currently link the format or 'type' to a specific location or 'path': for example, reading or writing note-like things in /notes versus /documents versus /$APP_NAME, which makes it hard to anticipate where your notes will be and breaks interop. There's also a tension here between 'app folder' versus 'type folder' (which I call 'chaos folder'), or 'document box' versus 'data graph'. One can debate whether there's such a thing as 'the correct' place, but let's assume it doesn't matter: if a Zero Data app wants to access a specific kind of data, ultimately it needs to be built 'knowing' about that relationship between location and type. Solid 'solves' this with type indexes, remoteStorage with data modules, but neither are guaranteed to be used when reading or writing data. Until there's a magical solution to that complex social problem of getting people (in this case, app developers) on the same page, it would be more flexible to perhaps have a default or preferred location but more importantly, like native apps, an option to 'point' the app at some data, whether local files, on cloud storage, or in PDS 'JSON objects'.

pointing at the 'wrong' thing

Would it make sense to point a notes app at your bookmarks? Or a maps app at your contact list? Or a flashcards app at your music collection? Some domains are more complementary than others, but regardless, the potential combinatorial possibilities of being open and flexible in this way are immense and would enable people to play with and combine data in interesting ways.

By pointing your notepad at a bookmarks app, for example, you might use fancier text-editing capabilities, rather than those of a simple text field, to add notes to saved links, perhaps more comfortably draft a personal message or blog post about that link, and have it automatically associated correctly with the corresponding document from a different app. Pointing at other things (like contacts, recipes, correspondence, etc.) might mean dealing with a 'plain editable text' representation of those 'items' or 'objects', and at the very least being able to read and search them. Consider also pointing a maps app at your contacts (maybe to see where your friends are?), or recipes (maybe to see where foods or ingredients come from or can be found?), or photos (maybe to see where you've made some memories?).

These are some of the possibilities when there's flexibility in the storage location and format; this sort of exists already with native apps and individual files, but pointing at 'collections of objects' in the way previously described often requires specific integrations (as Find my shows your friends or Photos presents places from geotagged images).

Again, I'd leave it to someone smarter than I to discover the best interface solution here: my imagination is currently limited to something like a 'file picker' without the burden of a deeply nested file system, where even on a mobile device you can say 'open this from there' with just a few taps; maybe the picker itself needs to be aware of various formats and how to convert random stuff into vocabularies that it knows the receiving app will understand—like the iOS Share sheet shows "what you can do with the shared content", but in reverse, to show "what content you can use with the current app"; anyone familiar with Quicksilver or Launchlet's 'pipe mode' might hear echos of 'subject' and 'action' ('with X, do Y').

two-way sync

Going a step further, let's imagine seeing contacts in this note-taking app (represented as plain editable text); modifying a name, address, or text blurb; and having the changes translate back from text into the original format (perhaps vCard). A bidirectional transformer or translator could be written once (perhaps even by one person), and any note-taking app could use that to flexibly view and edit all kinds of things. The closest usable solution I've seen for JSON objects (although not yet in common use) is remoteStorage data modules, encapsulating schema and logic together in a package that can enable any app to 'handle' specific data; similar efforts for Solid are currently in development. Lots of people use text editors (plain or rich) and would have an option to move data around fluidly while still benefiting from apps that use structured data under the hood. For a distant but novel approach, see how the Potluck research prototype cuts out the middleman and simply uses text in a notepad as the home for all kinds of data.

dynamic schemas from the start

It might take a lot of work to write and maintain many data converters, and although still useful under those circumstances, what if it could be easier or partially automated through a cheap pseudo-intelligent function? Perhaps a library could be preloaded with vocabularies from Schema.org or ShapeRepo and utilities that attempt a simple best guess when an input 'fits' a known structure? This could help with the issue of 'stale apps' (that either haven't been updated in a long time or may never be updated again) by enabling them to handle data dynamically from the start (as opposed to perpetually speaking only one fixed format), perhaps without requiring updates to learn about new schemas, and thus helping more of them remain compatible, interoperable, and useful without developer effort.

flexibility through pluralism

In addition to processing various forms of local data, I can imagine it being useful to have specific integrations with external services, transform their representations into one or multiple common data vocabularies, and package that integration to simplify inclusion in other apps. Imagine a text editor that can deal with input spanning the gamut of:

• .txt files in a personal data store, whether stored in /notes, /documents, or /$APP_NAME
• JSON text documents, whether stored as Schema.org/TextDigitalDocument or even Hyperdraft's occult format
• either of the above, whether stored on remoteStorage, Fission, Solid, Dropbox, Google Drive, iCloud, nextCloud, locally via the File System Access API, in a Git or GitHub repository, etc…
• documents from Apple Notes or Simplenote
• documents from Google Docs or Microsoft Word, editable as plain text, Markdown, or rich text
• blog posts from Ghost or Wordpress
• contacts, calendars, or correspondence as text by 'pointing at the wrong thing'
• perhaps not limited to one of the above sources or collections at a time, simultaneously handling multiple clouds or storage providers, multiple sources, or multiple formats

To more technical people, this might sound merely like 'integrating with 3rd party systems'. I would suggest that if those are the meaningful representations to someone using this kind of app, then it's what makes the data feel tangible and 'in the hands', clear that they actually have it without needing to trust any specific app, developer, or protocol.

What's the value of one app supporting a mix of these? Two apps? A whole ecosystem of apps? Not only reading but writing back via two-way sync? In the way we 'edit stuff as text' here, regardless of original format, what other affordances can be made for apps to 'edit stuff as X'? and how can it be enabled permisionlessly? This feels like an ideal for many protocol designers: a dynamic ecosystem where people are building and using software in unpredictable permutations, where progress happens faster than the speed of plugins, or perhaps even without codifying specific possibilities in advance. It's important to restate that these pluralistic potentials shouldn't be exclusive to Hyperdraft, as any note-taking app might benefit from at least some of this; ideally, it would be packaged in a way that minimizes complexity for the app developer while maximizing potential interop.

text editor as super-app

With all these concepts in mind, let's paint a picture of how software could be more interoperable.

Point your app at various formats and locations, and it will show you meaningful representations; where possible, it provides natural ways to shape those representations, transparently translating and syncing back if necessary. Use specialized features, shortcuts, and interfaces for text editing wherever some modifiable text is exposed: instead of 'editing text documents', simply 'edit text' wherever you see it. Try the same with non-text. Apps become smaller.

Connect multiple sources simultaneously, no need to have it all in one storage. Assume a messy ecosystem and embrace plurality. If the data's preferred transport is not available to web apps, make it available via something like sockethub. Bridges, converters, or dynamic vocabularies are written once and abundantly available—handy for whoever made them, but more likely for many other people; app developers can benefit without releasing new updates. At minimum, there are multiple useful options for import and export. Data is already everywhere, make use of it; rather than government surveillance and large tech companies monopolizing our data to cross-reference between multiple systems and silos, we own our data and the potentials that result.

It's a lot of work to consider, implement, and maintain storage, identity, CRDTs, encryption, and replication—on top of UX and the actual app: put it in the foundation, reduce pain for the interoperable app developer, minimize friction of having to choose—let them simply read and write data.

Every interoperable app becomes a super-app.

my future

I'm currently most excited to imagine: writing notes in Hyperdraft and 'seeing it' in Logseq; writing a Zero Data web app that syncs with my phone's contact list; a liberator app where you can read from (and maybe write to) your favourite centralized platforms; journaling 'daily notes' in Emoji Log and publishing as a digital garden via something like Quartz; a tool to edit arbitrary JSON objects; and my own apps supporting multiple clouds or sources simultaneously. It feels great to have space to progress on some of these ideas again: if you want to hear when I have this working in some way, sign up for the Zero Data mailing list here or follow me anywhere.

acknowledgements

Thanks (in reverse alphabetical order) to Sebastian Kippe, Michiel de Jong, Jess Martin, Heddi Ried, Gordon Brander, Elisa Guimarães, and Boris Mann for reading a draft of this and sharing feedback 🙏🏽.

P.S. Gordon shared some interesting notes which I'll quote here (with permission):

P.P.S. I was thinking about this post before Jesse got me 'interop-pilled', but our conversation certainly helped add fuel to the fire:

feedbox is an embed for previewing RSS feeds. Here's what it looks like:

Here it's configured to fetch the one from this blog, but you can use any RSS feed and drop in on your website with a few lines of code. I've added it to all my project home pages, including Zero Data App and my homepage.

It uses an instance of cors-anywhere to get around CORS complaints; I hope someday it will be simpler to just fetch the raw contents of a page.

Unlike most of my programming projects, I tried to write code that feels more 'messy' to me (simple human names instead of XYZVerboseNames, which is generally hell for other people). I also actually wrote a README (uncommon for most of the over 100 OldSkool modules) to describe the setup and possible options; hope to maintain this as a baseline for future modules.

Was kind of fun to let go, and not test everything, although I still wrote some tests…

As a more general complement, I automatically added link[rel="alternate] to sites that don't have one by setting an environment variable.

The sensation of stuff updating everywhere, even on static pages, without anybody doing anything, is kind of electric to me: isn't that what computers are for? bleep bloop!

Not sponsored

(Puts on infomercial hat bought explicitly for this post.)

Ever wanted to learn Spanish or French? Brush up on German? Understand Greek?

Are you tired of language learning apps leaving you with little feeling of progress?

Or did you try private or group classes without being able to say much after several lessons?

Well, you'll probably appreciate what I'm about to share with you!

(Removes hat, reacting with some aversion.)

The project

It's amazing how much depth and potency one can chance upon inside what might be labelled "some random person's project on the Internet". I'm not sure who to credit for my discovery—perhaps a language-learning YouTube rabbit hole or Olly Richards' StoryLearning (which itself is a great alternative method for acquiring languages).

Mihalis Eleftheriou's Language Transfer / The Thinking Method claims that it's "only as hard as starting…" and promises:

an instant sense of progress, and an ensuing learning journey like none other!

I hadn't read those phrases before trying it myself, yet my conclusions are the same, and so I find myself completely fascinated with this method of speaking new languages mostly by listening and answering questions

My experience

My prior attempts at learning various languages include group classes, private lessons, flashcards, conversations, friends helping me and vice versa, reading books, watching television series' and movies, writing daily journals in the target language, developing my own app, making vocabulary tables, memory mnemonics, transcribing talk radio, learning song lyrics—I've tried many things… Yet, I've never encountered or experienced anything like this.

No writing? No memorizing? The teacher claims he can't really speak the language? How could this make sense?

The basic experience is: an instructor introduces certain concepts to their student as the conversation is recorded in audio; you simply listen back and when encountering a question: 1) hit pause, 2) take your time to respond with clarity in the target language, then 3) hear what their student said to compare with your response; it's important to engage in this more 'active' process of pausing and answering "so that you have your own learning experience, rather than just listening to someone else's". You do it on your own terms, at your own pace, and start speaking phrases from the very first lesson.

Of course, it's recommended to supplement your learning with independent immersion, but it's remarkable how much you can progress only by following the recordings. Trying this with languages where I already had some experience (Egyptian Arabic and German), it's not noticeable to me that he "doesn't really speak them" and feels like he actually knows quite a bit; perhaps a native speaker should evaluate instead.

My partner enjoyed the Spanish course without much experience learning other languages, which means for me that it's not necessary to be a linguistic nerd like myself to get something useful out of it.

I confess to having not tried this as a beginner, but, by comparing it to all the experiences where I was a beginner, it feels like it would have been a thousand times more helpful than whatever I was doing. With German and Arabic, it gave me the clarity to feel like I understand how the language works, that I can actually speak a bit, as opposed to considering it a giant incomprehensible cloud of confusion. Some of the framings, such as German "putting important information at the end to minimize interruptions", were enormously useful to constructing my own mental models, whether or not they're 'true' in terms of why the language is the way it is. I'm curious to continue with the languages I know, perhaps someday try Turkish or Swahili, and maybe even make my own course for Brazilian Portuguese.

Method

The process of 'invisibly leading the student by asking guiding questions', modeled after the Socratic method, supports the student by building and refining their understanding of how the language works, to eventually produce language by thinking for themselves: for this reason, it's also called 'the thinking method' or sometimes 'thinking slow'.

There's a lot of invisible work (described with detail in the book for teachers below) involved to streamline communication and the ordering of concepts, making the experience as simple and focused as possible for the student. Following this, an instructor can move from 'teaching information tables' (which can get dusty and dry real quick) to 'meeting the student where they are and helping them across the next step'. The conversation appears fluid and spontaneous but moves with awareness of a pre-written script (more like a route), which leaves room to handle interesting happenings: 'mistakes' for example, can become useful feedback to understand what's challenging so that instructors can find creative ways to anticipate and solve it in the future without the student even realizing.

Who's it for?

I now recommend this to everyone when they ask me about language tips, but it still might not actually be for everyone. With new languages, one might learn to read, write, listen, or speak: although it often seems 'nice' to do all of them, it's better to define your goals and focus on the specific skills that are relevant to your interests. Do you want to read stories or poetry? Get hired in a specific domain? Understand family members whose language you don't know? My objectives are casual conversation so that I can travel and make new friends, which means prioritizing listening and speaking, with a little reading thrown in; the Language Transfer method suits me because, while following the recordings, I am constantly 'producing' with my mouth, to the extent that the only sounds I make are in the target language; it's hard to overstate how rare that has been in most of my previous attempts at learning, even in schools that speak one hundred percent in the target language.

Listening to the recordings, one could criticize the approach as a form of control or manipulation, where the only expression from the student is in the form of answers to the teacher's questions—no questions of their own or other feedback; there's even a notion articulated somewhere of 'submitting' to the experience and perhaps 'trusting' the method. I can see how that might be scary for some, but personally enjoy the thoughtful simplification from removing superfluous details and distractions, as well as avoiding obsession with rules and formalities, and feel grateful that the more 'broadcast-y' lesson design guides efficiently and enables an audio version that I can follow from anywhere; perhaps in the live experience the students ask more questions that have been removed to shorten the recordings… Feels like the right amount of everything: repetition, correction, firmness, and flexibility.

Other noteworthy details

Experience the audio course as an app for Android or iPhone or a podcast, or find them on SoundCloud and YouTube.

The list of free courses includes English for Spanish speakers and even music theory.

The project is self-funded via Patreon, PayPal donations, or buying physical versions of free online material from the non-shop.

Wishing a bright, diverse, and dynamic future to this wonderful project 🙏🏽☀️.

Book for teachers

I was so struck by the experience that learning about the book got my inner pedagogue excited. There's documentation on techniques designed to mask repetition, inhabit the student's mental theatre, get around stubborn habits, and build their confidence: all of which seem like great techniques for any kind of teaching.

I found myself impatient with many devices to teach specific aspects of specific languages, preferring to trust my own intuition as an improviser to figure out interesting pathways to navigate someone else's learning; for that reason, I glazed through much after the first quarter, but the initial parts were super interesting, and part of what I read is in the notes below:

I have taken few steps to simplify [the book's] content, deeming any simplification a complication in waiting.

language

it is this thought that we must transcribe into our new language, rather than the base language itself.

[Languages don't exist: there are only dialects, and some of those get promoted as a vehicle for national purposes, which makes it a political event.]

learning and teaching

Writing words down creates an external loop that becomes part of your process and means you aren't building affordances to recall without it.

[Teaching a language vertically is quickly tedious. Nobody makes a sentence from only prepositions. Better to tie together various concepts to enable creating simple expressions.]

[Teach common words after the necessary knowledge to understand them, not at the beginning.]

[We often already know, without realizing that we know.]

pedagogy

[They only know what we tell them when we tell it to them.]

[Often what looks like one concept to someone with experience is really several concepts to a beginner. Make a list of all the elements involved and there will usually be one that can be learned in isolation.]

[The learner should rarely feel like something is missing. The teacher presents one idea at a time, and the learner tries to apply it feeling complete and resolved.]

[Maintain an optimum cognitive load normally and increase or decrease tension deliberately to create contours of peaks and valleys so that the experience feels dynamic and engaging.]

[Recaps can help ease tension contours after intense learning.]

status quo

As language methods often completely ignore the language of instruction, they tend to have an irritating habit of describing absolutely everything a language does. Learners are often forced to spend too much time trying to make heads or tails of grammatical descriptions provided to them for a new language, without ever realising that the target language functions in the same way as the base language, or indeed realising it when it's too late and the knowledge can do little to spare the learner any effort. What's worse, is that superfluous descriptions run the risk of becoming mental debris that the learner is unsure how to apply. They may lurk in the shadows and raise their ugly heads later on, interfering with other thought processes (often in fascinating ways, mind!).

In short, we don't need to describe everything the target language does, and what should remain unsaid will have much to do with the structure of the language of instruction. To describe certain things in the target language which are indeed the same in the base language (without a particular reason for doing so) would serve to make our learner feel less in control than they would have with less information. We will avoid burdening our learners with irrelevant observations they're not sure what to do with, and in this way we also cue that what we do tell our learners is important.

spanish

Está rojo is what we might say when referring to the state of a glowing hot piece of metal, while es rojo, as a characteristic, would be used to describe a painted piece of metal.

When it comes to importing vocabulary, we are almost always using the vocabulary for something other than learning a word. When Complete Spanish opens with -al words, it is not so we can learn legal, normal and metal, but so that we can begin dissecting what vowels sound and look like in Spanish, whilst raising the learner's consciousness of word stress, too. In the same course, when we access verbs through the pattern 'cancelation - cancelar, we do so to highlight the infinitive and its function, to then begin establishing the infinitive as a launchpad for building other tenses. The vocabulary conversion itself is secondary to these goals. Our learner will be taken aback by all the free words, of course, but our own focus as writers is elsewhere!

More quotes in the log.

I'm not in the habit of documenting trips, especially sharing travel photos; I even used to avoid using my phone camera for some time, with an idea of 'being present instead'. Happy to see things differently now, but I notice that I take photos—capture, capture, capture—never re-visiting them much, even though it's often valuable for me to do that. This trip was special to me, so I would like to revisit what happened and create a nicely encapsulated memory for myself. I would like to generally share more about how I travel, as it's different from the way I usually see it happen and might even be interesting to some people. Perhaps this blog medium can break the 'photo album or stream' concept to share different kinds of things in context.

October 2023 was a busy month. I changed cities every couple days, knowing that I actually dislike travelling with that frequency, preferring instead to spend longer periods in places to go deeper. I explained my trip quite often as "I'm not here to see or do anything but rather to connect with my people", and it was a mindset that made bearable the hectic schedules and planning of bouncing around that much; 'attractions' visited can be counted on less than one hand, but there was an immeasurable quantity of diverse lenses into ordinary and everyday local life. With just my cabin-sized backpack weighing seven to nine kilograms, I was quite focused on going only where I felt called, connected, or welcome; this filled my experience with a sense of purpose, sometimes in completely unexpected ways.

2023.09.30 Winnipeg

My USA trip began in Canada with a visit to my cousin, who loves plants and lives in a small town near Winnipeg.

Then I headed south. I've had some anxiety about getting grilled at borders if I or my plans might seem strange, but I felt completely chill about showing up at pre-clearance without a return ticket. The agent actually seemed impressed with me 'not having a home address since 2019 as I often travel' and that I was 'planning to head to Brazil after maybe month in the United States'. "Let that guy in!" right?

2023.10.02 Minneapolis

Reef and I shared deep thoughts, Hamburger Helper, and lots of music.

2023.10.07 Chicago

I was hosted by a friendly stranger and made my signature oatmeal dish, called "Poor man's risotto".

2023.10.09 Ithaca

Not sure how else I would have ended up visiting a place like this without knowing Omar, one of several friends I've made from Interintellect. Also not sure how to describe the range of our many, many conversations; he's what I call a 'generator', with much to say about many things.

2023.10.12 NYC

I met Nathan again, and we talked about platforms, travel, and friendships. His room's walls are filled with cool posters.

I met briefly with Kaixi and Sruti, both of whom shared my residency experience at Moos, as well as Cristóbal, with whom I shared sentiments about Brazil, creativity, and computing.

For some reason, I met all of these people for the first time in Berlin last year.

2023.10.15 Fuquay-Varina

A small town where homes have front yards larger than public parks from most cities. I got to stand inside Jess' legendary office.

2023.10.17 Burlington

Life in April's co-op housing network, with many friends, groups, and projects passing through.

2023.10.20 Denver

I reconnected with Ted after many years, and stayed at Hearthstone Cohousing, where I had a fun jam with Danilo and Charlie.

2023.10.23 Oakland

What a dreamy place! I've never seen so many beautiful plants and home gardens in one neighborhood. Benji's father in Sausalito showed me the amazing "It's-It" ice cream sandwich. Zach, who I met at Proyecto Lingüístico in Guatemala, let me play his mother's Steinway piano for 7 minutes. My childhood friend Andrew and his wife invited me for a wonderful hang and where we were all treated to an excellent Punjabi dinner from his mother-in-law. Lots of chats with Jessica and Tristan about human development, technology, and life; we made homemade Migas.

2023.10.28 Los Angeles

First-hand experience of the sprawling car city of angels with Vivek, training capoeira with a local Mojuba chapter, Gujarati thali buffet, many jams and musical moments, a taste of Baileys and Coke (forgot it was supposed to be Dr. Pepper).

This was a journey of connection, generosity, experiences, conversation, Strolling, cooking, music, beauty, and transformation. Certain moments that relate to my presence there instilled me with a sense of greater purpose, such as: one person unexpectedly getting closure after meeting me for the first time; another feeling emboldened to take more chances when talking to strangers; someone else leveling up their Portuguese and feeling empowered while understanding and speaking a new language.

I think it's important to acknowledge how, despite some quite transformational moments for me and others, this all started as a vague idea that I thought about frequently for months—it just felt like a cool thing to do someday, maybe. I simply ran it by my friends as it occurred to me, and then again when the possibility felt tangible or within reach; perhaps that planted seeds which prepared everything for later. This ultimately happened because it felt like the right time and because people seemed to be open and available—everything manifested easily, and it was indeed magical.

Thanks (in alphabetical order) to Alice, Andrew (and family), April (and friends), Benji, Cristóbal, Despina, Douglas, Gatsby 🐱, Jess (and family), Jessica, Kaixi, LaJuana, Maitiu, Nathan (and roommates), Omar, Randolph (and family), Reef, Roshni, Russell, Sruti, Ted, Tristan, Vidhika, Vivek, Yatharth, and Zach, for being a part of this trip in some way and making it memorable.

If you want to hear some of the conversations from these times, sign up for the Strolling newsletter or follow me anywhere online to know when they're published.

Links

• Jess Martin
• DXOS
• "The Humane Interface" by Jeff Raskin
• "Credible exit" by Gordon Brander
• Zero Data

Without looking at my previous birthday reflections, I ask myself this year "why do this? and should I do this?", mostly for my own clarity. Today, I justify it as "helping understand what makes each year special"; "sketching out the shape of my experiences"; "documenting important changes or directions"; "having perspective to see a bigger picture"; and "reminding me of things I would like to remember". I also question to be more mindful when I copy patterns from other people, but my reasons today seem worthwhile and relevant. So I continue…

Duos and trios

Most of the last year was spent in a way I'm not so experienced with: 'life together'.

This goes beyond sharing a home with roommates, where, in my experience, days are mostly spent individualized from one another. I've done plenty of that. This is integrating plans, meals, work, conversations, life—everything, every day, for months at a time. In the various permutations of life with my partner, father, or both, I have learned so much about negotiating boundaries, expressing my needs, taking care (of myself and others), and travelling with people (rather than solo). It's year zero of a long journey towards being together fluidly; Holger said to me that "travelling solo is one thing, travelling with a partner is another thing, and travelling with kids is yet another thing;" well, now I've tried two of those things and can see why they're different…

My biggest challenge was making space for myself while the surrounding environment changed constantly and forced adaptation, as I default to being present for others and losing myself in the process. Although from the outside it may have seemed that I continue to get things done and publish stuff now and then, it was rough for me to not feel like I've made deep progress on projects for over half a year. I've come to terms with making my choices, 'going with it', and being satisfied with where I went—no regrets, it's a part of my process, and I feel richer for it. Perhaps I should also not consider life separate from my projects, since they likely make each other possible. My wise elder friend Yves taught me to be more intentional about prioritizing myself while together, that it doesn't happen automatically and takes deliberate effort (which can be as simple as asking each other "what do you want to do today"); I'm getting better at that going forward.

Music

I really stepped into singing while playing guitar, releasing seeds to share songs I enjoy, and writing Teddy Bear to recollect moments with my partner; one might notice a ritual of recording when leaving places I've inhabited for a while. This is not something I would have expected even a few years ago, as I was always more interested in the materials of music than text or lyrics, but songs with words are becoming a way to synthesize my experiences of travelling, languages, and the people I meet.

The biggest surprise was how Orazio's beautiful studio totally resuscitated my piano playing after years of inactivity. I really thought I would never return, but was pleasantly surprised that reflexes developed through guitar were helping me control my nerves while playing piano, enabling me to enjoy it in a way I had perhaps never done; I recorded a short excerpt of one of my favourite pieces (a Prokofiev sonata) to document this, and spent the summer in Toronto doing more. I believe we don't really forget things, but didn't expect that it could apply to my capacities with this instrument.

Connection

I'm also learning to step into connection with friends and family, understanding it as one of my powers and something I'm uniquely positioned to cultivate (because of my mother's gift and the million memories I've made meeting people throughout my life). It's nice to be an example of visiting somewhere for no reason other than to meet people I know and want to connect with. When it happens, everyone seems to be grateful without necessarily being able to articulate why—I guess it simply feels good, and I'm glad my presence can evoke that in other people.

After years of abstaining from Instagram, Nibras sold me on the ephemeral stories feature, and I now find myself using it there or in other messaging apps; helpful for non-intrusively keeping up with what my friends are doing and activating the serendipity network, especially as I know people across so many time zones where correspondence can be less than fluid.

I have a hunch that doing all of this will create some important future life possibilities (perhaps even in the next year) that I can't yet articulate or predict, but it's tangible at the moment somehow.

Inner strength

My posture is often less worried or fearful, more present. Bold, unapologetic, feeling like I can handle things unfazed, not waiting for validation. Utterly satisfied to sit with myself and breathe, keeping my head empty. Sleeping has historically been a challenge, but I'm closer to doing it when I want, sometimes almost hallucinating on demand.

The experiences leading to selling morality were some of the most turbulent in my life, but gave me a gaze that can cut through steel.

I'm grateful for the supreme reinforcements from my conversations with Kaixi and Nibras, who impressed upon me (whether consciously or not) that my spirit should burn brighter wherever I am. Haider probably thought it was cute to write "his eminence Rosano" on this airport welcome sign (blurrily captured on iPhone), but it's a special moment that energizes me.

Tech

Feels like I didn't do much with code, but did get comfortable with low-code automation and some skills that could save me or other people from tedious computer work; I imagine drawing a circle around what someone needs technologically and being able to create helpful solutions across the dimensions of servers, browser interfaces, shells, and APIs; nice to have, I guess…

Sharesnip was the only app thing I released, and might be the first of practical use to several artist friends (they appreciate a QR code generator without distractions).

Everyone told me they had read my text on making apps free. Reef seems to have followed suit with his newsletter. Let's have more?

Travel

Spending four months travelling around Southeast Asia with Heddi was wild. We both especially loved our countless food adventures in Chiang Mai and even tried learning some Thai. I was super inspired by how she improvises nourishing and creative food, quickly makes a home for herself in new places, and gets done her client work, all while travelling, something I've never felt able to accomplish but working towards now while 'strolling across America'.

I learned that I can sleep a night comfortably on a carpeted floor, and even on a yoga mat, which significantly expands the 'surface area' of places I can visit.

Looking forward to time in Brazil soon, and maybe India later, with no idea what to expect.

Conclusion

In fifteen years, I'll be fifty. A stranger told me life that goes by quickly, so make sure you have something to support yourself with later—I keep failing to take this advice, but hope to continue doing my life anyway.

From here I wonder for how long I will be surprised at what is possible for myself?

All yearly reflections: 32, 33, 34

In August 2023, I decided to remove all limits from my apps, cancel their active subscription payments, and transition to free and open access. This documents my thought process, why I think the previous model feels misaligned, and what could take its place.

Since 2019, I have been experimenting with a fund button integrated into my apps to create direct link between the app experience and people who want to support the project financially. The design seemed logical to me after seeing many lovingly crafted open-source projects poorly funded through other means. Building this custom payment system and various integrations was a technical achievement for me as someone who didn't consider themselves a 'real programmer', but I quickly regretted bringing that level of complexity into my life and cautioned against it whenever asked. Over these years, I was nonetheless happy to have some quite passionate and supportive people work through my maze of a system to send me their money and try something new. Ultimately, the various shortcomings of my own design made it limited, obscure, brittle, and relied on personal data stores that I imagine should be commonplace but aren't yet in the hands of most people. A better solution for me would be more simple and flexible, less transactional.

I was going to replace it with a Ghost membership system, as I'm familiar with it from other projects and have observed less technically inclined people navigate it with no issues, but halfway through creating the experience, I felt the pain of creating custom integrations once again and also the potential burden of having to maintain unofficial code bolted onto another active open-source project. I still amaze myself considering how I can just build this stuff given what I consider a limited background; too bad my snazzy passwordless, one-click login system may never see the light of day…

Trying free

I must have been so excited to present my fund button to the world, building into my first published web app, that I didn't think once about offering apps for 'free'; something was already settled in my thinking that perhaps it wouldn't work or would somehow overwhelm me. Seems worthwhile to at least try, I suppose? I 'owe so much to free' and easily accessible things on the Internet and would feel good contributing back to that pool. Free is also a chance to provide value in the 'give, give, give, then ask' framework I'm experimenting with.

From a maintenance perspective, many things become easier: by just giving it all away, I can remove complexity concerning my payment system to simplify code, interfaces, and my life; feels great to rip out old, unused stuff and chuck it. Maybe I still need to think about business models, but I can forget about access codes, logins, or infrastructure for now.

Socially speaking, I've always had an issue with dividing people into those who pay and those who don't—more on that in a bit—so it's nice to avoid this as well. As long as I'm able to keep myself afloat somehow, it would be great to popularize this approach, remove barriers, optimize projects for sharing and spreading ideas more broadly. Useful that the kind of 'static web apps' I make can basically exist online forever for free (which technologies can you say this for?)—sustainability in this case has less to do with any distribution or publishing cost and more to do with development, maintenance, and my own well-being.

Erroneous assumptions

The biggest learning I've had while thinking about this is becoming aware of patterns that I've been copying (from myself and others) that seem misaligned with how I'd like to do things.

Not business

For about a decade, I was paying my bills via my live music listings project and iPhone apps, which made me comfortable with the language of business, products, sales, and marketing. Until recently, I was thinking "I did those as businesses, hence this should be the same." Business got me to the point I'm at now, enabled me to live a life I enjoy, and can be a way to organize ideas, but doesn't need to be how I approach everything. Just because it carried me in the past doesn't mean it's the right mechanism to express my future visions. I would love to be in a world of abundance where people have what they need, and I may be in enough of a privileged position to present something that reflects this.

I'm starting to think of my projects more like Wikipedia, which is not a business, does not seek to 'choose a niche' or 'deliver value to the customer'—it might even be odd to 'expect' anything of the project. Those who like it make the most out of it; some people contribute content and help steward its collective spaces; some people donate money (hopefully enough to cover costs); there is no 'exclusive content' for those who pay; and free-riding is the point. It's definitely not a transactional space—a large diversity of people can engage with it because not everyone needs to pay, and any contributions take a variety of forms. Perhaps this could be a closer-aligned model for my own projects?

Not creator

It was tempting for me to connect the app world with that of subscriptions and memberships, thinking that 'indie creators selling exclusive content' is mainstream now, therefore I can also simply use that model. But I think I was too fixated on the technical mechanisms behind content-gating, without considering how to foster some kind of community around what I'm building; I learn repeatedly that technology doesn't magically produce social outcomes.

In my process to try this system, I had made a long list of creators I considered 'successful', which meant they were making an amount of money that reflected some kind of momentum around their platform: perhaps receiving $300 or $3000 per month, but not $30. Most of them tended to have some kind of large online following beforehand or were really focused in the scope of their activities. Although neither of those attributes might reflect me at the moment, I thought I could give this a try, at the same time clouding this approach with the idea of 'passive income in my sleep' without too many expectations (more common with people selling products online); this is a recipe for confusion, but dreaming about how everything would work out calmed my scarcity mindset. I realize now that this doesn't make sense for me either.

From a purely financial standpoint, I became convinced that subscriptions don't last forever, based on my own experience and solidified after listening to Lifetime pricing is underrated: there is no infinitely recurring source of income; effort is always required to find new revenue; and subscriptions are scary for a lot of people.

From a parasocial standpoint, I'm not sure if I 'play the part' of being active on social media to cultivate community or doing my thing in response to what other people have expressed. The dynamic of money in an indie creator model feels somewhat awkward to me. I'm lucky to have received money, but it feels like I'm not sure what to do with it. I sense some internal conflict around 'working more' for people who give me smaller amounts versus those who give me larger amounts without expecting anything. Funny that asking or even paying me wouldn't guarantee that I do something anyway, as I tend to make choices based on what my current situation and needs dictate, which someone once described to me as the approach of an artist showing zero consideration for any market or what other people think: "f*** you, here's my music." I'm happy to connect with people in a way that isn't proportionate to their financial contribution, but perhaps that's not 'business'. Also, I never figured out why people gave me money in the first place, or why they stopped. All that to say: I feel weird about how money goes through my projects this way and would prefer to be more intentional about how that happens, so that it feels better for myself and anyone who chooses to support me.

Not exactly

The tricky part of being exposed to so many patterns is understanding that although what I do might appear to conform to certain archetypes (indie hacker, developer, entrepreneur, etc…), it doesn't mean that I am one of those things or that the strategies employed in those contexts make sense here. My approach needs more reflection and calibration to find a model that aligns well.

My big realization about small money

For years, I've expressed my desire to support myself with '1000 people paying me $10 a year', because it seemed to me like a low-stress contribution for many, hopefully inclusive of people for whom the currency doesn't work in their favour, while adding up to a sum that makes a significant impact in my life. I've changed my mind. I learned that these 'small amounts' are simultaneously the wrong signal for people who would be willing to contribute higher amounts, yet still expensive for many people in non-Western countries. So it's better for people who have more to give more, which perhaps means I need to change my approach and messaging with money: to get clarity on what I can offer and what financial contributors receive by supporting me; I haven't figured this part out yet and would welcome any suggestions. I also no longer feel good receiving money if someone has to worry about how to make it work: if someone has to figure out whether they can afford to give me a small yearly amount, then I would prefer that they simply enjoy what I create, and if they want to help me, then they can share my projects with a friend or contribute in non-monetary ways—paying doesn't need to be the only way to feel like a participant in what I do.

Future approaches

So what will my path be in the future? I'm not sure yet specifically. My preference would be simple systems, likely supported by larger amounts of money from fewer people, and manifesting the spirit of the Internet by being open, free, and accessible.

Not charging directly tends to come with concerns like "will my data be sold?", "will it become overrun with ads?", and "will it stick around?". Well, for those specific concerns, I thankfully have zero data to sell, don't like ads, and work on things that can live online for a long time. For the others, I'll have to cross that bridge when I get there.

Thanks to everyone who has supported me thus far. I'll probably find a way to keep doing what I do, but if you'd like to make it easier by supporting me financially, be welcome to do so via a Strolling membership or a public contribution to my Open Collective.

I've also written about my experiments in Platform puzzle pieces for sustainable community and about my iOS apps experience in Going fully web.

I just had a fun conversation with Boris about note-taking, the overwhelm of tools, and future possibilities. Hints at some changes I might make in the way I've done things for the last years.

[Notes are inescapably chronological, even without organizing as a (b)log. Everything is written in the context of one's personal development, or in terms of history, or as humanity evolves—nothing is really devoid of time.]

This was somewhat spontaneously recorded, and prompted from a random thought I had about how effective graph-based note-taking apps are.

Fascinating to see how Boris writes in his own journal to detail conversations and thoughts…

more at rosano.ca/n-a-t-t

I've never really written a song with words before.

This one sort of came to me on a plane, thinking about and missing my partner who I wouldn't see for a few weeks.

Fragments of a melody, some words, and verses, arriving persistently in random order.

Even on an overnight flight, I was too excited to sleep observing this unfold.

It felt simply like listing "things I felt" or "things I wanted to say", and then applying note-taking reflexes to making music: putting related bits together, sorting and massaging text, tweaking for rhymes and musicality, moving undecided elements to a recycle pile.

I often like to describe this as 'writing without magic' and it's nice to see it happening with a song.

I'm happy with how this turned out and hope you'll enjoy.

Get the audio version on Bandcamp and some extra goodies here.

Recipe

Name

Flashcards from translations

Callback

const source = document.querySelector('textarea[aria-label="Source text"]').value.split('\n');

const pronounce = source.map(e => '');

if (document.querySelector('div[data-location="2"] div')) {
document.querySelector('div[data-location="2"] div').textContent.split('\n').forEach((e, i) => pronounce[i] = e);
}

const translations = Array.from(document.querySelectorAll('div[aria-live="polite"] > div > div > span > span:nth-child(2n + 1) > span')).map(e => e.textContent);

const cardsText = translations.map((e, i) => [e, source[i], pronounce[i]].map(e => e.trim().replace(/^- ?/g, '')).join(';')).join(' ');

return this.api.LCHCopyToClipboard(cardsText);


URL Filter

https://translate.google.com

Part of Cooking with Launchlet.

I'm currently in Thailand and trying to learn the local language using Kommit. As it's quite different from languages I'm familiar with or the ones most people learn, this might be trickier than usual. My goal is not to become fluent, but to experiment and see how much progress I can make within a few weeks using my method; although Thai is the focus here, you could apply the same techniques to many other languages.

In the following videos, I share how I:

• find useful translations
• create cards and hear them in Kommit
• use memory tricks to reliably recall things later

Part 1

00:00 intro
01:29 Omniglot
02:30 Wikivoyage
03:52 Google Translate
05:06 making cards in Kommit
07:05 hearing cards with Kommit
09:00 conclusion

Part 2

00:00 intro
00:23 memory tricks
02:01 orange — สีส้ม
03:54 afternoon — บ่าย
05:35 my name is Rosano — ผมชื่อโรซาโน
08:32 corn — ข้าวโพด
11:34 cheers — ไชโย
17:51 conclusion
20:21 one more thing

I think it's possible to independently learn quite a bit this way when doing it consistently: after trying the same with Portuguese, Arabic, and German, most native speakers I encounter find the results to be above average. What I hope comes through the video is that it doesn't require magic or talent to do this, and that you have what you need to get started (if you want).

In a few weeks, I'll likely post another video showing my progress to give a sense of how this worked out for me. Follow me on YouTube or Mastodon if you're curious to see what happens.

April 2023 update: 21 seconds of Thai

I'm making a QR code generator and scanner that works offline:

• no accounts ✅
• no popups ✅
• no customization ✅
• works offline ✅
• download as SVG or PNG ✅
• scan via camera or files ✅
• rounded corners ✅

It's designed to be a simple, pain-free way to quickly create codes that look nice. Will eventually be possible to save in a collection and sync across devices…

You might use it to create a QR code for event links, social media profiles, Wi-Fi access, contact info. Someday, I hope to incorporate custom icons.

To break with tradition a bit, this is unfinished and will be shaped by feedback from people who use it; would love to hear what you think.

I've been thinking about these three framings of what is possible with a specific technology:

1. Look what I can do
2. Look what you can do
3. Look what we can do

An example of the first would be when someone (maybe an artist/hacker/nerd) creates a bespoke experience that showcases a way of doing things: maybe a cool visualization of events in their life, a fun automation that connects disparate services and tells you things like the current height of a beloved plant, or an utterly custom web page design to be used only once perhaps as a portfolio site. It can be a way to demonstrate control over one's materials, and a marvel to observe and interact with, but you can't make your own—this isn't meant to cast the creation as selfish, but rather to draw where the line is in terms of your ability to build something with it—perhaps even the goal is to be unique and therefore not replicatable by others.

Most apps fall into the second category by encapsulating the 'principles of an experience' (to roughly paraphrase Steve Jobs): they enable people to create their own version of the thing, be it a text document, map of meaningful locations, photo albums, or pretty much anything imaginable. We now say "there's an app for that" and it's the default way for most people to express themselves through digital mediums. 'Look what you can do' empowers people to explore, create, and then share with others, more so than the first category, so there's an order of magnitude difference in the possibility space, but it's also more complex to build as one needs to consider the assumptions of multiple kinds of stakeholders or 'users'.

In the third category, adding social layers can encourage network effects and moves the technology beyond a tool or utility into collective creation; this can occur through follower graphs, timelines, multiplayer, ratings, etc… Producing a digital artifact has platform native ways for people to interact and react, either passively through comments and 'likes' or more actively through 'remixing' (such as reaction videos on YouTube or lip-syncing on TikTok). It's even more difficult to build than the second category because of the additional complexity of network interactions and identity management, but the result is that the technology starts to take on a life of its own as the experience becomes dominated by how other people use it.

Somewhere between these categories, one can find extensions and customization (achieved through some apps as 'scripting'). When someone extends an app for themselves, it might be an example of the first category, whereas passing that around brings it closer to the second, and sharable platform native 'plugins' or 'add-ons' or 'bots' can bring it closer to the third.

Usability and accessibility can impact where a technology falls on the spectrum: not paying attention to these dimensions makes it harder to move to higher levels of agency, staying more exclusive as "Look at what I/you/we can do, as the capable ones"; as in the first level, it's not necessarily selfish but if the intention is to maximize agency, then this creates a mismatch. Self-hosting generally suffers from this, but there are Easy Indie platforms that enable one-click installation, thereby broadening the potential base of people able to participate. Tools like WAVE can help spot simple improvements to accessibility in web-based projects. Although mainstream software expectations can be an antipattern, a cultural appreciation for the simple and functional can help raise usability standards, turning design into a language understood by more people.

I see adding interoperability between systems and enabling data to be re-combined in abstract ways as kind of another level, maybe "Look what a not-yet-existing entity can do": enabling future possibilities by opening data to be composed by the unknown is, in my opinion, just as transformative as moving from 'I' to 'you' or 'you' to 'we'. The emerging Zero Data ecosystem (keeping data and apps encapsulated from one another) feels promising as a usable example of what this could be like. Automation systems like Zapier or n8n are also useful as a way to ensure data is composable, or at least exposed as an API. It shows to me that #OwnYourData is not just about privacy or autonomy, but also about the cool cybernetic possibilities of a future we haven't imagined yet.

This is about a collection of songs I love to sing and why I'm publishing them online. Also feel free to skip right to the music.

The story

Although I was trained professionally in music, I never pursued it as a career—partly because of not feeling able to compete in a crowded 'market', and partly because I'm content to explore my other interests.

My focus was piano, which I had studied for about 12 years before university. After coming to the guitar later in life, first noodling (one note at a time), then singing a bit (with some chords), then in front of other people (unimaginable in the past), I feel like I've come full circle and am on the cusp of once again relating to music in a way that fills me with vitality and curiosity, and as my performance instincts relax and open up more, I feel compelled to share them, with you.

Similar to Tiny concert for a friend, the following set of songs are published with imperfections to reduce stress around 'mistakes', as it's more about capturing the process in performing them. I tried to record casually, which to me means: minimal preparation, not much editing, mostly do a few takes and choose the strongest one, maybe add a layer of harmony, perhaps some percussion by playing the chair I'm sitting on… It was a documenting process, mostly for myself, but I learned a lot about dealing with nerves, and stabilizing the self while playing. I'm surprised to feel comfortable with certain guitar chords that were previously indecipherable, and also to be able to project my voice more; it feels like being in a space of enjoying the sound my body produces, and creating with what's abundantly around me.

Sharing these songs online takes the place of a concert I would have liked to organize, as it wasn't possible before leaving Berlin. They're mostly in Brazilian Portuguese with a bit of German, Egyptian Arabic, and English somewhere in there. I hope at least one of them brings light to your heart and provides a glimpse of why music is so meaningful to me.

The music

1. Caetano Veloso: O Leãozinho
2. Joana Queiroz: Partida
3. Paulinho Da Viola: Samba Do Amor
4. Ingo Armbruster: Der Wald
5. Amr Diab: Bayen Habeit
6. Joyce Moreno: Tardes Cariocas / See You In Rio
7. Paulo Borges: Cabecinha No Ombro
8. Tom Jobim: Correnteza
9. Caetano Veloso: Trem Das Cores
10. Joyce Moreno: Juparanã
11. some seeds take a while

Get the audio version for free on Bandcamp.

Sometimes the best thing you can do for an idea is to not touch it for a while, giving it a chance to simmer or ferment. When stuck, a solution might appear once you've given yourself enough distance and perhaps focused on other things—similar to 'shower thoughts', but in this context the timeframe can be over days, weeks, or months.

Practically speaking, this can be a useful strategy to allow something already clear to refine itself. For example, when publishing an announcement or sending correspondence, it's common to wait until the moment of publishing to both write and send. But scribbling scraps down before the idea is complete, way back at the moment of realizing it needs to be done (even if it's just random words or fragments), can trigger a capture mechanism to perceive related ideas; Capturing creates a space for 'the answer to go'. The earlier you jot down notes, the more opportunities you'll have to glance it over and notice improvements and ways to tie everything together. Counter to the stressful approach of an accelerated culture that does things as fast as possible: the longer it takes here, the more flavourful the result.

If you've published your idea, the rest of the world needs time to become aware that it exists. You can help the process by promoting it, but at a certain point it's in the hands of other people to try it out and share via word of mouth. While that's happening, a popular habit is to keep grinding away, but it can also be enough to leave the idea as it is and let time pass: you might avoid burning out while also returning with a fresh perspective that helps you work smarter instead of harder.

Year two of my experiment in creating sustainable income as an independent creator.

I'm currently so optimistic and confident about how much better it's going to look next year that I have no shame about how bad it might look this year. Also continually surprised at my unwavering commitment to something that appears to bear only a small material result. One might question when it makes sense to stop versus persist, but it's so obvious to me that the things which excite me and absorb my curiosity should be where I spend my time, that I usually make compromises that a rational person wouldn't make… I still believe my vision is possible and realistic, but it will take time based on the parameters I've chosen.

Podcast

The most significant effort I made this year was in producing Strolling, and it was quite a trip.

My original concept involved an intense two-week editing ceremony per episode, resulting in a short version, long version, intro, outro, music produced for each episode, subtitles, guest playlist, and publishing to every platform. I was rather proud of the result and intended to continue for a while, as it was creatively fulfilling, but participating in the moos.garden residency changed things as I needed to record many guests in a short period, so I switched to publishing snippets with as little editing as possible. I'm also quite happy with this change and got lots of positive feedback (people like the tiny bites and enjoy them like little pieces of candy every now and then).

I learned to avoid a strict interview structure when possible, have more back and forth, film video from the waist up, and maybe care a little more about video quality than I'd like. Membership-wise I think I made a gross miscalibration in optimizing for 'people on the Internet' as a potential and somewhat generic audience: I learned that some common patterns for transacting (which I was trying to model) may not apply here, as the majority of members are people who know me somehow and want to support what I'm doing, not really in exchange for any 'exclusive content'—it's possible that I need to eventually optimize what I offer for a different kind of value exchange, where what supporters receive is not necessarily a material thing.

Freelancing a bit

I had a brief stint with getting paid as a freelancer again, curious to see how far I could pursue that: although it's validating to get paid for what comes naturally to me, I ultimately returned to what we want and felt unwilling to trade my time for money as there is no urgency for me to do so. It was also clear that I'm less fitting in organizations needing a specialist, and more cohesive when I can approach things holistically and fill various gaps based on that perspective (which comes from years of trying to 'make the whole widget'); this can result in me offering things that were never asked for, and that nobody else knew was needed. Also interesting to note that I might be hired based on the relationship, that people like having me around, or that I enjoy the company of people I work with. I plan to continued some freelancing as long as it doesn't get in the way of my projects, but I could also not, and I'm even willing to get into debt for some time if it gives me a clearer focus on what I'm passionate about.

Changes

A big shift last year was leaving the iOS App Store after going fully web, which freed up lots of mental and computer space to focus on other projects—I feel lighter, less stressed, and more excited to do my projects now that I've simplified my life in this way. Another shift was detaching from online life, which resulted in closing the Café, merging Ephemerata into my mailing list, and not doing online events; I think these projects were trying to accomplish a larger goal (of bringing people together), which I plan to continue working on via my podcast and other ways. That in mind, here is what the delta looks like:

I called this 'bad' in the beginning because even though the numbers are basically higher, it doesn't represent a noticeable growth in sustainable income—still feels like the amount coming in per year would be better per month. Nonetheless, I'm looking forward to continuing, and again, I'm super optimistic about my plans for the following year.

Do follower and visitor counts matter? I was asking myself as I fetched the numbers this year. I'm significantly more detached about them than before, as I feel focused on my process and can stay underwater there for a while, but part of me wants to publish them to give a sense of how traffic and vanity correlates to financial sustainability. Unsure if the message is clear, but I'm reflecting on this.

Conclusion

This was a year of dense learning despite being far less active in the majority of my projects. Next year, I hope to spend time maintaining and improving prior work, as well as launching new ideas; I'm specifically excited about a recent surge of thoughts around how to bring everything I do under a single hub.

Thanks to Ahsen, Andy, Boris, Brian, Charles, David, Deta, Feathers, Filippo, Heddi, Hibai, Holger, Mark Segger, Michael, Mustafa, my dad, Myke, Noel, Omar, Orazio, Paul, Stephen, and Vision for your financial contributions to my work in 2022.

I'm trying to integrate more of my musical side online as time goes on, and so will leave you with my top three musical moments from this year:

1—with myself, creating the Strolling theme music…

2—with Kaixi Yang, jamming after our podcast recording…

3—with my capoeira group, singing some of my favourite songs on earth (written by Paulo César Pinheiro)…

All fiscal posts: 2021, 2022

Avoiding employment was not an explicit choice I made: it's just how things ended up as I followed my passions.

(Okay, I taught piano lessons in various music schools for a couple of years, and maybe did some odd jobs here and there, but not as a career.)

While studying music in university I started working on an iPhone app for learning songs from recordings, to help myself get into Jazz music but also as a tool for other musicians and music students to improve their playing. This was a collaboration with Wil with various names that eventually became AudioScrub. Not so successful at launch, but after a year or so of more development and people starting to use it and share with friends, it became a meaningful amount—not a lot, but enough to pay my bills, stay independant, travel a little. I surprised myself by learning iPhone programming on the sixth try. It was gratifying to finally make a 'real app' after a while of feeling 'restricted to web apps', and I felt good hearing the emotion in how so many people describe that it's helpful it is to them.

And just after finishing my studies, I started a live music listings project called note the sound to help promote local music concerts by smaller, often unknown artists: I worked with local venues like restaurants, bars, and art spaces, charging a fee per event and created a technology stack that helped with data entry, showing event details, automatically publishing to social media, and generating printable calendars; for some time I even experimented with my own system (inspired by Amazon Mechanical Turk) to pay people to help with micro tasks like finding artist information.

From 2009 to 2021, my income was 40% from iOS apps and 60% from note the sound, regularly working alone. COVID-19 wiped out live music for a while, and when it came back I didn't want to continue with the same structure—customers repeatedly asked me if I would restart as they were happy with the service, which I guess was a good sign; I hope to someday try again but with a different structure where I don't need to be so involved. The iOS apps became less and less motivating because of the amount of work as a one-person operation, so I ultimately stopped. Although I didn't yet replace any of those incomes with something stable, and it might sometimes feel like a uphill battle to do so, I would say 12 years is not a bad run and I'm proud of what I've done.

I've been experimenting with a Fund button integrated into my web apps (which for me are now 'real apps'), gathering support on Open Collective, and using Ghost to power memberships for Strolling. I've often said that my goal was "to get a thousand people to pay me ten bucks a year" as a metaphor for living from passive income—in practice most people want to give me more than that, so the numbers probably will be a bit different; this might sound like a meager sum for many people, but 1) I believe that to achieve this implies that there's probably more than a thousand people and 2) I would be willing to sacrifice some comfort to maintain my freedom to spend my time on what excites me.

Obviously it can be fulfilling to be employed, have a salary, feel secure, work with a team of great people, and I respect the various reasons people pursue that path, but I'm clearly wired for something else and will try to exhaust other options before I go there.

I thought it would be easy to start a 'yearly tradition' at thirty-three, but I've changed more since then than in previous years. Now at thirty-four I'm questioning whether it makes sense to write this—maybe I'm too offline—yet erring to do it anyway and maybe not publish later. So then, what's special about this year?

Since coming to Berlin in March 2022 to do a creative residency with moos.garden, it seems like I've become another version of myself. My naive plan was to be there for a month and then do something unrelated next: I ended up staying three months, getting another visa, travelling solo in Germany while connecting with people around the country, and witnessing life unfold with less effort than ever. It's been exhilarating so far and I'm still not sure where it's heading.

Through building a stronger relationship with my father, there were many discoveries: feeling better equipped to ask for and accept help; noticing how I can care for others; gratitude for the ability to simply be myself with a parent, as this is not always the case. Our beautiful meetup in Europe taught me that it's possible for people to see things in a new way even as they get older, and that sometimes a little encouragement can be life-changing. More profoundly, I discovered how much positivity I can cultivate in others just by being sincere and empowering them to do the same.

As someone who was basically sedentary for three decades, I never thought movement would become a principal activity in my life. I'm currently training several days a week of Capoeira, which is a mix of music, dance, acrobatics, and martial arts; I started it for fitness and as a portal to Brazilian culture, but it's becoming something that I'll take with me wherever I go, even if I stop training. As a complement, I also started taking weekly classes for breakdancing, which probably has origins in or shares movements with Capoeira; although unthinkable for me a few years ago, I'm enjoying it and even starting to feel comfortable improvising with this language of moves.

In contrast to my usual octopus approach of having many simultaneous projects, I mostly focused on the Strolling podcast and meeting people to converse and see what comes from those experiences. It's been interesting to notice how strangely compelling it is for me and other people to enjoy the pureness of a friendly exchange; I'm unaware of a way to summon this magical quality on command, but I work towards it in each conversation. I'm also not used to hearing so many people comment nicely about my voice, but this had a similar impact to me calling myself a writer last year—not that I identify as a speaker or talker now, but it's something about myself that I acknowledge and step into more deliberately: an important milestone here was my first solo video where I just talk into the camera for a few minutes.

I might say I've struggled with romance for most of my life as I tend to live outside most of the societal norms that would help me meet and sustain deeper relationships with people. So what a pleasure it is to now feel deeply connected, loved, appreciated, seen, understood by someone who is also a creative peer bursting with ideas for fun, business, and life. I never thought it could be so effortless to spend time together with a person who often has a very different approach to things than I do. It's a bit new and slightly intimidating for me to imagine, but I'm looking forward to seeing how this evolves.

This birthday was 'celebrated' with a concert of music about Capoeira from one of my favourite albums ever. Might also be a nice yearly tradition and a reminder to myself that organizing events is a joy and in my blood. Hope you enjoy the music.

All birthday posts: 33, 34

In the spirit of 'document and share', here are some considerations for how I assemble an online collection of projects I've made since 2012.

Why bother doing this?

It's easy to forget what happened, and hard to re-create experiences as time passes. Files can also get lost, making it impossible to have traces of what was done. My personal reason is that a CV makes little sense, as it doesn't capture well what I do. Aside from that, it's just pleasant to have a more media-rich reminder of the past that's as simple as scrolling through your personal photo library.

What to document?

Not skills or roles. Focus on the work that was done, interesting aspects of the project, or what you're proud of. Although it would be fine to showcase just one artifact, I have chosen to document projects that result in multiple creations, as it better represents the different perspectives with which I approach things. This is less like a portfolio for potential clients and more like a diary: a reminder to oneself in the future of something to remember.

When to capture?

Wait until the dust has settled—usually not right after publishing something; let time work in your favour as changes and improvements accumulate, especially with digital projects that can be modified easily. Perhaps a good moment is when it's clear the project will no longer be public, but also even when it feels stable and unlikely to change much.

For documenting processes or 'the making of', take screenshots (not with 'version control' or something that needs to be re-constructed later). It should be simple to scroll through to get a sense for what's going on, without complex interactions.

Where to store it?

Ideally on a space you can control (using Ghost or WordPress for example), or a platform with decent export functionality. I use Tumblr for nostalgic reasons and because I trust their parent company Automattic to keep it running after I turn to dust, but I suppose it would be wise to also have a self-hosted backup. It's useful to be able to organize with tags or search so that there are flexible ways in and out.

Hope that's helpful for anyone wanting to do something similar. If you end up also creating a project archive, feel free to share with me.

i've been less and less online since coming to berlin in march, and recently shared why in Strolling episode 0080. haven't had enough time to write that i haven't had enough time. so much has changed in the last five months and i look forward to see where everything goes.

the podcast is the only thing i'm regularly doing online at the moment and people seem to volunteer positive feedback. if you want to get a sense for what it's like, check out my snazzy random clip generator on the front page. last time i emailed was for the launch and there have been lots of lovely moments since then.

sharing links i've encountered currently feels like an older version of myself, so i decided to merge the ephemerata list here. time to focus on travelling, life, music, movement, and making the most of my experience

Welcome to the thirty-first ceremony of Ephemerata: reflections, observations, and life at the edge.

I’m doing this to stimulate discussion around what I find interesting, and also to share things before they disappear into the void of my journal.

CONTENTS

1. Berlin arrival reflections
2. Strolling format
3. Events
4. Asides
5. Music

ARRIVING HERE

Since arriving here three weeks ago, I’ve been enjoying my time with the Moos collective, meeting lots of cool people with interesting projects and ideas, and hearing tons of funky music around which I hope to share. For the first time in a while, I have a feeling of being not so online and spending time around mostly ‘not internet people’—learning lots, stretching myself, understanding collective living, finding my own rhythm within this context to be creative and productive. I’ve always wanted to be in Berlin and am super grateful for this opportunity; hope to stay a while longer.

STROLLING

I changed the podcast format to publish shorter bits and more spontaneously, as there’s not enough time to have a two-week editing ceremony for each interview. Although I miss the music, I’m happy with the result so far and think it’s more digestible. What do you think?

• 0004: Bilal Ghalib — why Arabic is awesome
• 0005: Bilal Ghalib — cryptocurrency via proof of inner work
• 0006: Bilal Ghalib — death awareness / merging spiritual and secular / Islamic economy
• 0007: Bembo Davies — musical we versus me
• 0008: Bembo Davies — not needing to change one’s mind
• 0009: Bembo Davies — everyone growing together
• 0010: Bembo Davies — plan your crisis
• 0011: Bembo Davies — clown school / Unmonastery / liberation through improvising

EVENTS

• March/April, 2022: Probably still in Berlin
• April 5-7, 2022: Probably in Leipzig
• April 18-25, 2022: Maybe in Amsterdam

ASIDES

[It’s hard to see how funny-shaped the box is from inside]
— Jack Rusher

Polyphony Project. Preserving musical folklore from Ukrainian villages with high-definition audio and video recordings. Scroll down for a multitrack player where you can isolate voices to hear each part or combine them in different ways. (via Jacob)

[The value of therapy is not only what the other person says, but an opportunity to find the words and perhaps hear yourself say them.]

MUSIC

All the following items can be accessed as a one-click playlist via Joybox without accounts or sign up—just open and play.

Short

Jacob Collier: Don’t Stop 'Til You Get Enough (2018 single). Overlays himself with a grand piano that can loop, re-creating the vibe of Michael Jackson’s original using purely acoustic sound. Wild funky solo and lush harmonies as always. During the halfway point he goes into a time signature that I can’t figure out; anyone know? (via Ahsen)

Michel Camilo, Anthony Jackson, Horacio (El Negro) Hernandez: Calle 54 (2000). An excerpt from the documentary about Latin jazz featuring some ways of playing the piano I haven’t seen before. The beginning more resembles something you might hear elsewhere, but I’m starting at the mid-section which has some very intense improvising with Latin rhythms. Impossible to sit still as they have too much fun creating this from nothing. (via Lars)

More

Check out Fleeting Arrivals for more music.

(I heart music)

I always love receiving music. Send me recommendations anytime, anywhere!

❤️

Help me continue creating projects that are public, accessible for free, and open-source, consider becoming one of my financial backers.

That’s all folks!

Feel free to reply and share any reflections you might have, or just say hello. Have a great week 🙂.

If you enjoyed this, please consider sharing on Twitter or WhatsApp or Email.

(I also have a more sporadic private mailing list if you’d like to hear only when new projects are released.)

Welcome to the thirtieth ceremony of Ephemerata: reflections, observations, and life at the edge.

I’m doing this to stimulate discussion around what I find interesting, and also to share things before they disappear into the void of my journal.

CONTENTS

1. Strolling pace
2. Berlin
3. Transcendence of twerking
4. Music

STROLLING PACE

I ended up getting slightly burned out from trying to keep a certain pace with episodes of Strolling—grossly underestimated how much editing and production is involved. I’m pretty happy with the finished products, but I need to go slower to avoid making the project a source of stress. Might also help to do more spontaneous or short single-take “record and publish” episodes.

It’s hard for me to overstate how restorative it is for me to explore music composition in the episodes: there’s still something there after all these years of neglect and I’m excited to reconnect with that part of myself.

Looking forward to doing fifty more, just need to go a bit slower.

BERLIN

Hoping to arrive in Berlin later today to do a month-long artist residency with moos.garden. Can’t wait to meet this collective of funky people who are generally exploring alternative ways to do things. I will also likely travel in Germany and maybe Europe after, so say hello if you’re around 👋🏼.

TRANSCENDENCE OF TWERKING

In the third episode of Strolling, I spoke with Elena Stoodley, who shared about her profound relationship with twerking; in the extended version, she goes deeper to talk about its connection to ancestral traditions.

I also love the story of a speech she gave to her mother as a child.

❤️

Help me continue creating projects that are public, accessible for free, and open-source, consider becoming one of my financial backers.

MUSIC

All the following items can be accessed as a one-click playlist via Joybox without accounts or sign up—just open and play.

Short

DUCKWRTH: I’M DEAD from I’M UUGLY (2016). Time feel for instant body shaking, decorated and supported with seventh chords, bass patterns that repeat with variation, and effects to create contrast between sections. Lyrics slot into the drumming like Lego. (via Elena Stoodley)

Zventa Sventana: Мужа дома нету from Мужа дома нету (2019). Combines electronic sounds with folk singing. Lots of cool percussion and odd production details throughout to keep things dynamic (several only occurring once in the whole song). Touches elements of techno music without being too formulaic, might be the combination with various vocal timbres that keeps it feeling alive. (via Alexei)

Hundred Waters: Particle from Currency (2017). Starts with delicate acoustic piano tones and chords. I usually find it interesting when to use blocky (predictable) patterns from techno music without the music feeling too repetitive; the constant contrast here makes it always dynamic and alive. Lots of triplets and dotted rhythms throughout, twice used in the melody to create this feeling of continuously moving, dropping (for example, around 57s). The lyrics and melody help evoke a sense of flying, soaring, falling.

Bites

Vulfpeck: Back Pocket from Live at Madison Square Garden (2019). Inspiring to hear a thousand-strong audience sing a complex line in three part harmony. Lots of beatboxing, music via voice and the body. Guitar shredding partially mirrored on voice. Surprising to clarinets at the end in this context. Good vibes, happy times, saudades for live music. (via Russel Ramos)

Pongo: Bruxos at COLORSxSTUDIOS (2021). Massive sound in this body-shaker, both in the powerful voice and in the beat. The synthy flute about halfway in is a timbre I don’t hear often. (via April)

Nostalgia

Carpenters: Top of the World from A Song for You (1972). Caught me by surprise to hear this while looking for something in a local Asian supermarket—my mom used to sing it as a kind of showpiece and even recorded it once in a studio. Listening more closely, I hear for the first time that there’s electric piano everywhere, orchestral strings, and these cool IV-I cadences before the verses start.

More

Check out Fleeting Arrivals for more music.

(I heart music)

I always love receiving music. Send me recommendations anytime, anywhere!

That’s all folks!

Feel free to reply and share any reflections you might have, or just say hello. Have a great week 🙂.

If you enjoyed this, please consider sharing on Twitter or WhatsApp or Email.

(I also have a more sporadic private mailing list if you’d like to hear only when new projects are released.)

Welcome to the twenty-ninth ceremony of Ephemerata: reflections, observations, and life at the edge.

I’m doing this to stimulate discussion around what I find interesting, and also to share things before they disappear into the void of my journal.

CONTENTS

1. Hyperspeed
2. Musical note-taking
3. Technology as parent
4. Asides
5. Apps disappearing soon

HYPERSPEED

For a few weeks now, I’ve been dedicated to recording and editing the podcast like a fire-breathing dragon (as well as making music for it), which has given me a sense of “using everything I’ve got”. This is a very special moment for me, as it feels I’m coming into a new version of myself previously thought impossible. It’s been amazing to reconnect with music and actually enjoy playing the piano again—I had a glimmer of this with Tiny concert for a friend, but various ruptures since that time have forced me to find other ways into this space.

Everything seems focused and fast at the moment. I’m seeking silence to concentrate, and so haven’t listened to much music for the last while. Also suddenly visiting Berlin in March and planning for that… It leaves me overloaded sometimes, but with the best possible things on my plate. Looking forward to so much this year and I wish it to be profound for anyone in need of the boost ⭐ 🌊.

MUSICAL NOTE-TAKING

I’ve finally started applying note-taking reflexes to making music:

Since acquiring my first iPhone 3G in 2009, with the ability to record voice memos that can be synced to the computer, I hoped my system would naturally extend to music at some point—it didn’t, until 2022. [continued…]

TECHNOLOGY AS PARENT

During our conversation in Strolling 0002, my guest Vivek talked about the idea of technology as a place of refuge when life circumstances are difficult:

Technology in many ways has parented me. It gave me a soft place to land when nothing else did.

ASIDES

You remove the clothes of your soul when traveling.
— Vivek

Have You Ever Had A Dream. Charles Cornell created complex jazz piano arrangements for a whole compilation of various memes with people speaking—this one is my favourite. If i listen to the original audio, I can’t help but hear this music…

The roads to funding your community network projects…. I spent a whole day pondering my motivations after watching this because of my immense respect for this person, and although my ultimate conclusion was to maintain my approach, I think there’s a wealth of great information here for anyone who wants to ‘make a difference’ in their local community. Although the ‘goal-oriented’ approach probably makes sense in various contexts, I think it’s in conflict with the ‘risk-taking’ that’s involved in entrepreneurship or artistic endeavours. Nice to see these kinds of projects knocking it out of the park though.

[Make goals that are quantifiable, and achievable: big enough to matter and small enough to win. You want to overshoot your goal every single time. Set it up so that you win every single time.]

[In pre-advertising: announce what you’re going to do and how people can get involved.]

[Delivering on the goal means not failing: if you’re short, cover out of pocket.]

[Making people feel they’re participation made the difference isn’t just for humility, it’s to help them feel their impact.]

APPS DISAPPEARING SOON

All my iOS apps are currently free and will disappear from the App Store around February 21st, 2022; I described my reasoning in Why I’m leaving iOS development to go fully web after 12 years. Download before they’re gone to avoid eternal regret.

❤️

Help me continue creating projects that are public, accessible for free, and open-source, consider becoming one of my financial backers.

That’s all folks!

Feel free to reply and share any reflections you might have, or just say hello. Have a great week 🙂.

If you enjoyed this, please consider sharing on Twitter or WhatsApp or Email.

(I also have a more sporadic private mailing list if you’d like to hear only when new projects are released.)

I have been satisfied with various versions of my productivity trinity since the late 2000s: developing reflexes to note things down as they occur, put them where I'm likely to encounter them again, and deal with them at the appropriate moment; this served me well for to-dos, writing, programming, and most of my personal projects. Since acquiring my first iPhone 3G in 2009, with the ability to record voice memos that can be synced to the computer, I hoped my system would naturally extend to music at some point—it didn't, until 2022.

The problem was that I captured musical ideas and then didn't do anything with it afterwards, lacking the 'organize' and 'purge' phases of the trinity. Part of this has to do with the tools (first, Apple's Voice Memos app, then, my own Quick Record) as they are not designed for much other than capture: you need to export and move ideas to another app in order to organize or expand them. Although there are plenty of apps for music production or developing musical ideas, I also got stuck on the (perhaps programmer-minded) idea of trying to turn each audio fragment I record into some kind of abstract 'module' that can be incorporated in various projects—musical Lego blocks, each with their own ID number, perfectly encapsulated from any specific context—and although this might be achievable, and perhaps even useful, it requires the labour of cataloguing and classifying, which makes the trinity complex: plausible with tens of ideas, less so with hundreds or thousands if you have other things to do. I ended up accumulating about three thousand recordings of singing, piano, guitar, ambience, noise, and nature, without 'turning them into something', and this is for lack of some way to let the ideas mingle together.

My ideal workflow would be something that lets you put groups of ideas together and lay them out in various ways. Although I generally avoid using spatial canvases to organize ideas, something like Muse would be super useful here, but then it would require switching apps to create something musical after organizing; wouldn't it be great to use that interface to organize the data of a different app? For now, I settled on the session view in Ableton Live, which I find spatially cramped (and unfortunately lacking any mobile or tablet interface), but it allows me to improvise and mash up musical ideas in a non-linear way and then easily move into a traditional linear timeline view afterwards; the interface enables a kind of serendipity which led me to create this jungle / drum and bass track after accidentally hearing two things that sounded nice together.

Focusing on a 'song' as the context or shelf (to lay down good, bad, related, and unrelated ideas) strangely makes the fragments seem easier to reuse and repurpose than when I tried to 'abstract' them away into isolated blocks: there's meaning to each song, and that meaning is memorable, which makes the ideas findable; in contrast, making a folder or project for each fragment lacks personal significance, which makes them fade away, effectively designed to disappear.

I'm excited to have finally—after thirteen years—figured out an approach that synthesizes my tendencies towards note-taking and organizing information with creating music. So far, the result of making music for Strolling is a growing album of short sketches, each with a different vibe. Perhaps one day I might even create my own tool that makes this process even easier.

Welcome to the twenty-eighth ceremony of Ephemerata: reflections, observations, and life at the edge.

I’m doing this to stimulate discussion around what I find interesting, and also to share things before they disappear into the void of my journal.

CONTENTS

1. Strolling
2. Apps disappearing soon
3. Asides
4. Music

STROLLING

Finally launched my podcast last week after describing with a short trailer.

The first episode features Judy Perly, who has been running a Jewish restaurant and folk music venue in Toronto for over 40 years—we had a wide-ranging conversation that touched on recipes and expertise, giving people characters, creative funerals, and much more. I ended up making some music in the process too.

Feedback so far has been generally positive and curious for more, which I take to be a good sign.

APPS DISAPPEARING SOON

My iOS apps are currently free and will disappear from the App Store in February 2022; read Going fully web to understand why. Download before they’re gone to avoid eternal regret.

ASIDES

[I love seeing someone living their extraness.]
— Elena

Hear - Advanced Listening. An app that listens to your environment, adds filters, plays it back to you via headphones in real time. Filters include ‘relax’ (drone in the background higher frequencies turn into water dripping), ‘happy’ (as if raining and everything is echoed with long decay), ‘sleep’ (combination of waterfall or white noise and echoes the environment); each filter has various levels that can be customized. Fun to play with, regardless of whether it actually helps you chill out or doze off—I’m curious to try them with more intention. (via Beat)

Notes from a mystic:

[Bliss is just a word: you can desire it but not know what it is. Only one who has tasted it can give it to you, and without doing anything: from their presence alone the unknown flows toward you.]

[A master is an availability, not a teacher. A teacher may not know, having perhaps learned from other teachers. A master gives you a taste.]

[A great teaching doesn’t give you instructions for doing, as it is concerned with your being.]

❤️

Help me continue creating projects that are public, accessible for free, and open-source, consider becoming one of my financial backers.

MUSIC

All the following items can be accessed as a one-click playlist via Joybox without accounts or sign up—just open and play.

I had the privilege of attending a Musical Potluck for Interintellect members, and would like to share some of my favourites:

• Clogs: Kapsburger from Lantern (2006). Pure instrumental bliss in this journey that lasts just two minutes. Simple harmonies on guitar that surprise by shifting with subtle voice-leading (often changing one note of the chord at a time). There might be hints of Bach in here, or maybe I’m just projecting what I want to hear. (via Kasra)
• Amit Trivedi: Shubhaarambh from Kai Po Che ! (2013). Soundtrack for a Bollywood film, with lyrics in Gujarati. The introduction has a strong time feel without any rhythmic accompaniment. There’s bagpipes (!), and I know how odd it might be to feature that in Indian music, but the duduk-like instrument called ‘shehnai’ went right to my heart. (via Vivek)
• Lisa Hannigan: What’ll I Do from Passenger (2011). Starting hook got my attention right away. Bright, sunny vibes created with vocals, strings, bass, percussion, and clapping; some of it would normally feel cliché to me, but I enjoyed this. The constant offbeats create a deep swing effect: your body will move. (via Daniel)
• Murali Coryell: Softly Let Me Kiss Your Lips from Eyes Wide Open (2000). Prepare yourself for nine minutes of ‘stank-face inducing’ blues vocals, guitar solos, lush organ chords, straight on the triplet drums, scatting… Imagine starting your day with this. (via Norm)

More

Check out Fleeting Arrivals for more music.

(I heart music)

I always love receiving music. Send me recommendations anytime, anywhere!

That’s all folks!

Feel free to reply and share any reflections you might have, or just say hello. Have a great week 🙂.

If you enjoyed this, please consider sharing on Twitter or WhatsApp or Email.

(I also have a more sporadic private mailing list if you’d like to hear only when new projects are released.)

i'm beyond excited to present to you my (second) foray into podcasting, which i call Strolling. i published a trailer last week to describe it, but i wanted to wait until the first episode before sharing with everyone, and it's finally out https://strolling.rosano.ca/0001

can't wait to do like fifty of these. the process feels really wholesome and i'm using it to provoke me into making music. although i'm producing it solo, the result is fundamentally a collaboration and i'm glad to finally incorporate more of that in my work.

hope you'll enjoy this ride. i'm sitting on the saddle of a star today.

Welcome to the twenty-seventh ceremony of Ephemerata: reflections, observations, and life at the edge.

I’m doing this to stimulate discussion around what I find interesting, and also to share things before they disappear into the void of my journal.

Thanks to Mark Segger for becoming a backer this week ❤️.

CONTENTS

1. What we want
2. Podcast coming soon
3. Asides
4. Music

WHAT WE WANT

When it isn’t possible to both make money and do something meaningful, I’ve always opted for the latter. In What we want, I attempt to understand the reason for this:

Why is it that when confronted with the choice between ‘popular and profitable’ or ‘esoteric but meaningful’, I always take the hippie route and just do what makes me happy(, man)? Why is my primary motivation generally creative expression or being original, despite coming at the cost of my financial comfort? Is it just my millennial urge to be a unique snowflake? [continued…]

❤️

Help me continue creating projects that are public, accessible for free, and open-source, consider becoming one of my financial backers.

PODCAST COMING SOON

Almost finished editing the first episode. I’m usually excited when releasing new projects, but my measurement meters are overloading on this one. Can’t wait to see how and where this goes: https://strolling.rosano.ca

ASIDES

The Truth Behind ‘Birds Aren’t Real’. I was really hoping this would last forever, but it’s good that the guy can move on with his life and get closer to his family. This ‘hit job documentary’ is a fascinating look behind the scenes at the movement’s origins—feels kinda deep to be honest. Going to miss this important example of what’s possible when people come together.

[Embodying lunacy can be a way to express the absurdity of reality.]

[People participate without even realizing.]

[Everyone acts and plays their role, but there’s no rehearsal.]

I had a day of bingeing funny videos last week and went through some of Chris Fleming’s little skits. Had some good laughs with uncle or famous?, Halloween Candy Countdown, and Teens Who Drink Coffee.

Punctuation in novels. Visualizing texts by frequency of their punctuation marks. I’ve always been a fan of data visualization, especially condensing an entire work into a single graphic to facilitate comparisons. I did this once when studying Hindustani music by transcribing an improvisation and mapping out which notes of the raga were used and how they were approached (laborious but interesting to look at). Curious to try this on my own writing some day to know what it ‘looks’ like. (via Alexei)

Notes from a mystic:

Your seeking creates a smoke around the flame. You go on running around and around, you stir much dust, and you create much smoke, and it is your own effort that stirs the dust and creates the smoke, and the flame becomes hidden. Rest a little, let the dust settle back to the earth. And if you are not running very fast, not in a hurry, you will not create smoke. By and by, things settle and the inner light is revealed.

MUSIC

All the following items can be accessed as a one-click playlist via Joybox without accounts or sign up—just open and play.

Short

Bobbie Gentry: Reunion from The Delta Sweete (1968). Complex interleaving of multiple parts with folksy Southern USA accents. Listen to the percussive clapping, bass drum, and guitar on the left channel, with voice and trumpets in the right channel. Reminds me of Moondog. (via Debora Ipekel)

Israel Fernández: Fiesta (Bulería) at COLORSxSTUDIOS (2021). The simplicity of a powerful voice accompanied by delicate clapping and feet hitting the floor, heard in stereo. Even without understanding the lyrics, one can appreciate how the fierce singing cuts through your prefrontal lobe. An example of making music with the body and whatever’s around (the desk might have been my primary instrument for years). As an aside: there’s too much good music on this show, and I would appreciate recommendations. (via Brian Ginsburg)

Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith: Rare Things Grow from EARS (2016). Mishmash of many exquisite textures: water glugging, saxophone flutters with delay and reverb, possessed drone voices, quartal harmonies, celestial singing, some shakers in just the right places. Hinting at indigenous musics through instrumentation and motifs, but unapologetically electronic, jazz, and modern. The cover art might be a good metaphor for how this strange and beautiful thing makes you want to keep staring, or listening. (via Gordon Brander)

Two oldies gems (via Pat Power)

The Dixie Cups: Chapel of Love from Chapel of Love (1964). Super soulful vibe created from vocals, bass, horns, glockenspiel, drums, and clapping—fewer ingredients than ice cream.

The Everly Brothers: All I Have to Do Is Dream (1958 single). One of the first things I played in public on the piano when growing up; the harmony fits perfectly in one hand and can be pretty satisfying to repeat for hours—great way to learn about thirds and sixths.

Bites

Ornette Hawkins: Raw Sun Live Sessions (2018). Live jazz-infused drum and bass from an artist with a killer name.

More

Check out Fleeting Arrivals for more music.

(I heart music)

I always love receiving music. Send me recommendations anytime, anywhere!

That’s all folks!

Feel free to reply and share any reflections you might have, or just say hello. Have a great week 🙂.

If you enjoyed this, please consider sharing on Twitter or WhatsApp or Email.

(I also have a more sporadic private mailing list if you’d like to hear when new projects are released.)

When it isn't possible to both make money and do something meaningful, I've always opted for the latter. This is my attempt to understand why.

In 2021, I went through several periods of self-questioning, not feeling positive or certain about the path I had chosen. Although I usually ended up affirming myself and staying the course, it still sometimes feels like an unanswered question. I recently drafted this text when having similar doubts about my upcoming podcast project: I once again ended up 'advocating for myself', but I clearly have a lot to say and would like to externalize it.

Growing up as an observer of Silicon Valley from afar, I was exposed early on to startups, entrepreneurs, thought leaders, motivational speakers, productivity gurus, self-improvement books, hustle culture, and other vogue exports from the region. I've gone in and out of touch with this over the years, but recently found myself adjacent again with the indie hacker and independent creator movements (of which I am a practitioner). I avoid paying too much attention to what everyone is doing, but try to keep it in the corner of my eye for the occasional nugget of useful information that can help my projects become more successful; keeping distance is important because it's ordinary for me to be influenced by my surroundings, and I often find myself applying other people's patterns to my own situations because it seems interesting or worth exploring: "So-and-so has a thank you page or YouTube channel or newsletter; hmm, maybe I could try that?".

One popular motif from these worlds that I've never taken to imitating is the celebration around 'making enviable amounts of money every month as an independent creator', or the rags-to-riches equivalent of audience building ('zero to thousands of subscribers in no time at all'). Although I am trying to make money with projects and increase awareness of my work, it's never been a rat race or the main motivation for what I do. My intention is not to judge people who are primarily pursuing that: many of them do so out of a sense of responsibility to care for and serve others, which I can respect. I want to explore why I have such a hard time with this for myself.

Why is it that when confronted with the choice between 'popular and profitable' or 'esoteric but meaningful', I always take the hippie route and just do what makes me happy(, man)? Why is my primary motivation generally creative expression or being original, despite coming at the cost of my financial comfort? Is it just my millennial urge to be a unique snowflake? Why do I avoid listicles? commercial pop music? technology selling user data or cultivating addiction? Why can't I just make a button that does what people want? These things are often lucrative, sometimes even without provoking ethical dilemmas, so what is it that stops me from getting into it? Do I consider myself better than everyone? Am I 'fighting the good fight'? Am I really even acting in my own interests?

In exchanges about making my initiatives sustainable, 'providing value' and 'doing what pays' tends to come up, and this is usually where I derail: it's hard for me to agree on what 'valuable' means as I typically derive most of my meaning from things that aren't considered as such by the mainstream. It's odd that my most memorable experiences have usually been around what doesn't conform to metrics of 'value' like having lots of followers or revenue or commercial appeal (for example, jazz concerts, communal eating spaces, travelling in poorer countries, meeting in parks), and that despite having a profound effect on me, they may not be considered 'valuable'; probably doesn't help that I am not super motivated by money, can get by with less, avoiding materialism, kind of detached from things… Part of my conflict might even come from a resistance when what's popular is what's perceived as desirable by other people—wanting what everybody wants because that's what everybody wants—this feels kind of degenerating to me, as it leads to the tail wagging the dog. Could it be highly profitable to make us more whole? or detached from money? or live healthier? or in balance with one another and the environment? If not, then what does it mean when we idealize profitability?

The other reason I diverge from considering 'supply and demand' no doubt relates to creating as a response to my own inclinations. It has been years since I've produced something specifically because another person asked, partially because I haven't come across deeply fulfilling ways to work at a company or sell my time or do what markets want, but also because I tend to respond to my own needs, desires, and ambitions. Although what I create is rarely for everyone, there's usually someone in mind, and I strive to make it available to more people after building for myself; this may not be completely 'in service of others' and must be interesting to me, which might be perceived as selfish. I feel it's like an artist mindset of imagining new things and throwing one's contribution into humanity's pool of ideas, and then observing how people react. Being able to address your own needs can generate concepts that turn out to be important in retrospect: it's hard to arrive at something like sonogrid, or Joybox by following 'what people want'—nobody asked for it, nobody will, and yet I think it's vital for these visions to exist to celebrate what is possible. Of course, they do resonate with certain people, and there is often a sense of "I never thought of that, but now that it's visible, hell yeah"; these dynamics are nicely articulated in the metaphor of explorers, miners, and bridge builders. Sometimes you use alternate materials when certain ideas are cut from a different cloth…

There's actually nothing wrong with pursuing the alternative route: we only question it because our surrounding environment values material success, on which our survival likely depends, but that really says more about the environment. I'm not exempt from having to think about 'material conditions for existence' and respond; I clearly don't do things that I know will only serve myself, generally preferring to put outward with a possibility of others resonating, or, augmenting themselves—I have no doubt that this will work out over the long-term. Being either purely esoteric or highly commercial is not interesting to me. If I was in a position of desperation, I would likely try to remedy my situation, but I've consistently been almost well-enough to graze by, and keep trying to see how far I can take it. My choice has been made, I'm okay: at peace again, I continue. I like what I like and don't have to justify it—I'm writing this for anyone who needs the extra push. If lots of people are trying to do what sells, and what sells doesn't feel conducive to a meaningful life, then perhaps it's worth examining what makes us feel that way. I support creating a healthy, restorative motion towards wanting what we really need, and really needing what we want.

Welcome to the twenty-sixth ceremony of Ephemerata: reflections, observations, and life at the edge.

I’m doing this to stimulate discussion around what I find interesting, and also to share things before they disappear into the void of my journal.

Thanks to Boris Mann for becoming a backer this week ❤️.

CONTENTS

1. Secular churches
2. 2021 recap
3. Apps disappearing soon
4. Asides
5. Music

SECULAR CHURCHES

I’ve thought for a while that the modern world needs a secular church, and a recent Interintellect writing challenge (which I ended up winning…) prompted me to document my thoughts:

I tend to describe modern life as ‘fragmented’. Lacking a ‘canonical place’ to create continuity from shared experiences, people rarely collide on a regular basis and end up separated from one another, despite wishing otherwise.

Although there is an abundance of spaces, events, and communities, they tend to lack continuity unless you are a part of groups specific to work, school, clubs, activities [continued…]

2021 RECAP

I went back and forth on this, but ultimately decided to write an end-of-year recap.

This year gave me a bazillion things to be thankful for, but I can’t express enough how grateful I am to have found writing as my current medium of choice for making sense of the world. I ended up writing over 12,000 words between all the longer-form texts (enough to fill a small book)!

❤️

Help me continue creating projects that are public, accessible for free, and open-source, consider becoming one of my financial backers.

APPS DISAPPEARING SOON

My iOS apps are currently free and will disappear from the App Store in February 2022; read Going fully web to understand why. Download them now to avoid eternal regret.

ASIDES

[Listen as if people are telling you a bedtime story.]
— Elena Stoodley

Miraculous cake. Talks about the ingredients in cake to give a sense of how the entirety of humanity is part of everything we do. I appreciate being able to look through a profound lens like this every now and then—it fills me with gratitude for seemingly mundane things. If the same process is active at this moment, what would be the future equivalent of ‘cake’?

You certainly can’t make a cake by collecting a few eggs in Asia and walking across an entire continent to where the wheat is, all while picking up milk and sugar somewhere along the way.

I became a member of Resonate and it only took me a minute. They’re building a fair stream-to-own platform that compensates artists more while charging listeners less (with no monthly fees or b*chain) 🤯. If you know anyone who can support them, please share their call.

If I have the space and freedom to give attention to others spontaneously, the same applies to self-care: there is no bad time to attend to myself, be welcome.

Jazz Pianist Reacts to SKATE by Anderson .Paak and Bruno Mars. I was once fascinated by the feeling of being moved nearly to tears by a series of chords, yet not able to explain what that means to people without lots of experience making music… Charles Cornell gets at some of this, albeit still talking to musicians, but with more heart-warming enthusiasm than I might display publicly (for something that can seem so technical): it’s clear that he has a strong personal and emotional connection to what he’s hearing, and that this is enriched by a deeper understanding of the materials. As he mentions, there are different ways to interpret musical harmony, but this might be a good way to get a glimpse at how music nerds (like me) hear songs. You might also learn a thing or two about theory, and share his excitement at how this song brings complex techniques into mainstream music. (via April)

The Phrase “No Evidence” Is A Red Flag For Bad Science Communication. Prompts us to examine the language we use to communicate certainty, as the same mistake can be made by professionals and amateurs, with helpful or malicious intent. Perhaps ‘via negativa’ is more understandable: instead of “no evidence” to support a claim, focus on ‘yes evidence’ that a claim is false. We can be more aware of our own limitations to understand what is knowable.

[“No evidence” is ambiguous because it can simultaneously mean that 1) there were no studies; 2) there were studies proving the claim is false; 3) we assume it foolish to test.]

MUSIC

This week, I’m going to share music from my yearly recap: the five most listened to albums of the year from my personal library of purchases.

All the following items can be accessed as a one-click playlist via Joybox without accounts or sign up—just open and play.

• Paulo César Pinheiro: Capoeira de Besouro (2010)
• João Donato: Quem É Quem (1973)
• Cristina Buarque e Samba de Fato: O Samba Informal de Mauro Duarte - Volume 1 (2008)
• Joyce: Revendo Amigos (1994) (featured in #005)
• Pedro Martins: VOX (2019) (featured in #001)

More

Check out Fleeting Arrivals for more music.

(I heart music)

I always love receiving music. Send me recommendations anytime, anywhere!

That’s all folks!

Feel free to reply and share any reflections you might have, or just say hello.

If you enjoyed this, please consider sharing on Twitter or WhatsApp or Email.

(I also have a more sporadic private mailing list if you’d like to hear when new projects are released.)

Thanks for being here. Wishing you good vibes for the year ahead 🌊 💫.

After mentioning in my last birthday reflection how I wanted to avoid doing an end-of-year recap, I've decided to do an end-of-year recap… Ever since reading the Pinboard anniversary posts, I felt the urge to make one—the charts and odd commentary, uh, inspire me. So this will be less personal and more fiscal—a mix of reflection, stats, link roundup, and (of course) music.

The biggest question of the year for me (asked by friends, strangers, internet acquaintances, parents, my therapist, the occasional bird, and myself) is: "How do I plan to make all this sustainable?" This hit me like a small pebble at least once every few weeks and my best answer was always "I'll do whatever I can to last a year or two and everything will work out after that…"—it makes sense to me (even now), but leaves many others raising one of their eyebrows. It's hard to see, I get it: I too questioned things, especially during periods of fatigue from doing too much… I wondered towards the end of the year about what energized me versus what didn't, and came to the conclusion that the work of recurring events needs to go for now.

The idea was an imitation of various individuals and organizations who create continuity through group meetups. Although the reasons for doing them align with my motivations and objectives, it would make more sense if I had fewer projects or if other people did most of the organizing. Even though it isn't that much on a day-to-day basis, the psychological load impedes me from concentrating on other things and I end up being able to handle only smaller tasks for most of the month, not advancing on my main projects. This was probably amplified because I was doing not one, but generally three events per month, but I think even with a single date, I would rather not deal with the before and after of making it happen. Also draining is the feeling that experiences don't accrete: the lack of recordings (often for good reason) leaves no collective artifact to share afterwards, which means I'm less present during the event as I frantically take notes to avoid letting everything 'slip away'—it's important for me to 'have something to show after', and I don't think written notes capture the experience well enough, so I might exclusively do recorded events from now unless it's mostly social in nature. I imagine focusing more on my upcoming podcast project, which could solve all these issues by 1) requiring less planning or promotion, 2) being recorded, and 3) compounding more easily over time.

A useful question that helped me find clarity is "How does it help you to continue producing for another year?" I would typically be satisfied with intrinsic motivations and the fulfillment of creating, but it ultimately isn't sustainable without what one might call 'material conditions for existence'. Perhaps now is a good time to look at stats and talk about money:

I've been re-imagining my income situation since the COVID-19 pandemic knocked out note the sound in the first quarter of 2020; it used to be 60–70% of my income and will likely not return for the foreseeable future (but hopefully, maybe someday). I also decided to stop making iOS apps and lower prices or make them free, which reduced and eliminated the other 30–40%. In 2021, I experimented with in-app payments via my fund button and direct patronage from financial backers, describing tradeoffs of each in Platform puzzle pieces for sustainable community. The amounts that came in so far are too small to sustain me in most places, but I think it's a useful start and with some changes (see [[Why the fund button is slow (TBA)]]), I think I can dramatically improve the result.

On the bright side, everything else is growing! See Measure progress for more commentary on the other figures or 100 steps to success for these eighteen experiments from 2021:

1. Create icons for feature lists
2. Use bolder design for landing pages
3. Set an example for how to use a new medium
4. Help friends to get started
5. Create tutorials to demonstrate how things work
6. House everything in the commons
7. Centralize project discussion and community
8. Start a weekly thing
9. Create original content on a regular basis
10. Offer calls to action across projects
11. Differentiate unrelated elements with contrast
12. Announce the latest thing across projects
13. Overview the universe
14. Host events
15. Measure progress
16. Broadcast the exit
17. Collaborate with others
18. Try everything

I don't have any doubts about all this becoming sustainable, especially with long-term persistence and constant learning. Doing anything worthwhile takes time, and I'm opting to use my current flexibility (year of savings/runway) to organize things in a way that gives me maximum leverage over my future—I hope that next year it will be easier to see why.

Below are my most popular texts from this year.

• Secular churches for continuity (which won Interintellect's first Writing Challenge)
• Dating apps, take one (sparked many conversations with friends and strangers)
• Wetware of writing and doing (video presentation with text version)

(Apparently I wrote over 12,000 words when you count the other long-form ones, which is not quite a novella but comfortably a novelette)

It should come as no surprise that the albums I've most listened to are from Brazil.

• Paulo César Pinheiro: Capoeira de Besouro (2010)
• João Donato: Quem É Quem (1973)
• Cristina Buarque e Samba de Fato: O Samba Informal de Mauro Duarte - Volume 1 (2008)
• Joyce: Revendo Amigos (1994)
• Pedro Martins: VOX (2019)

Last but not least, shout out to Brian Ginsburg, Elisa Guimarães, Lawrie, an anonymous donor, miguel francisco, Andy Matuschak, Reef Loretto, Feathers Cloud, Charles E. Lehner, Deta, Sasquatch in Orange Shoes, and Boris Mann for becoming backers in 2021. You're all pioneers ❤️💫.

Thanks to everyone using my apps, reading my words, sharing my projects, and contributing in innumerable other ways. I look forward to see what the future holds and hope you'll join me there.

All fiscal posts: 2021, 2022

I tend to describe modern life as 'fragmented'. Lacking a 'canonical place' to create continuity from shared experiences, people rarely collide on a regular basis and end up separated from one another, despite wishing otherwise.

Although there is an abundance of spaces, events, and communities, they tend to lack continuity unless you are a part of groups specific to work, school, clubs, activities—I'm not aware of something that spans all of these contexts, other than places of worship. I re-encounter people mostly 'by chance' (it so happens we showed up to the same thing at the same time) or 'by appointment' (we booked a one-off time to meet and honoured it)—with luck, it might happen more than once, but continuity is a struggle. Committing to a recurring schedule is challenged by modern forces, including but not limited to: 'survival' responsibilities (like work, family, self-care, etc…); a culture of busyness; the feeling of limited time to pursue one's own interests; the idea that recurring meetings stagnate the dynamic (perhaps there won't be enough to talk about); compartmentalized living creates friction to knowing one's neighbours…

I might not be seeing past my personal difficulties in dealing with this, or maybe I'm just hoping to recreate something I felt was lost when I left the church, but I'm sure other people also struggle with these impediments, or worse, feel like they have no place to go.

What's missing

I grew up inside the church and it was a significant part of my life until adulthood, so it's the context I'm most familiar with. After spending the more recent portion of my life mostly in secular spaces, I notice things that I miss and would like to have as part of my experience:

• it happens every week, but it's okay to miss it; even if people attend different time slots than you, you might catch them between services and have a chance to connect; you can pass various stages of your life there, or possibly all of it.
• 'everybody' is there; a mix of friends, colleagues, coworkers, family, acquaintances; across interests, age groups, levels of education, and physical or mental capacities.
• low barriers to participation encourage the previous point; being a 'professional' is not necessary; there are no entry fees or technical requirements; 'non-believers' are usually welcome.
• community space where other things happen during the week; probably a local, physical place, but various aspects could be translated online; there's probably one near you.
• not cohort-based like schools; people may leave, but not on a schedule; it's natural for different waves and generations to interact over time.
• 'everyone' doing something together, perhaps through music or rites; there are various roles for people to participate (singing, reading, communion, announcements, organizing, training, collection); kind of a giant communal moment where all participate.

There are likely plenty of structural issues to consider, but I'm focusing on the parts that would be useful in other contexts. The result is a microcosm or universe with many subgroups and intersections, and a great serendipity generator.

Defragmentation possibilities

I'm not sure what to propose as a way to cultivate these properties in a secular context, but I have seen some ideas hinting at 'broader ranges' of people together on a regular basis.

The Sunday Assembly might be a literal translation: a weekly gathering of people who listen to talks and sing popular music together.

Places devoted to social lubricants like coffee or alcohol are probably more accessible and prevalent these days. I like the way Emmet Shear describes how congregation in these places have decreased with technological change:

Vienna in the 1900s, was famous for its café culture. And one of the big drivers of that café culture was expensive newspapers that were hard to get, and as a result, people would go to the café and read the shared copy there. And once they're in the cafe, they meet the other people also reading the same newspaper, they converse, they exchange ideas and they form a community. In a similar way, TV and cable used to be more expensive, and so you might not watch the game at home. Instead you'd go to the local bar and cheer along with your fellow sports fans there. But as the price of media continues to fall over time thanks to technology, this shared necessity that used to bring our communities together falls away. We have so many amazing options for our entertainment, and yet it's easier than ever for us to wind up consuming those options alone. Our communities are bearing the consequences. For example, the number of people who report having at least two close friends is at an all-time low. I believe that one of the major contributing causes to this is that our entertainment today allows us to be separate.

Online communities may have some potential as they are always-on and can bring together the largest possible quantity of people, but molding the technology to avoid chaos or context collapse is a challenge. I'm most optimistic about decentralized communities around writing (longing for the blogosphere days), and deeper conversations with a diverse range of people (as might happen in Interintellect). Social networks each have subsets of 'your people' depending on how they relate to technology, and I've been trying to get around this by starting a weekly thing, creating affordances for more participation, and leveraging specific platforms to increase sustainability.

My hope

I would most like to see lifelong communities built around continuous learning, as described in this post about Free Schools:

Communal spaces (and schools) should be like this: always open, welcoming, and safe. A space like this, provides a place for people to learn, build, get practical experience, and express themselves.

Imagine schools or libraries as plentiful, and run by people within their own communities. Normalizing the desire to learn and grow would give anyone a common 'place to go', regardless of what they believe. How can this be encouraged today?

If you're thinking about ways to defragment society, please share your thoughts here with me, or in your public square.

Welcome to the twenty-fifth ceremony of Ephemerata: reflections, observations, and life at the edge.

I’m doing this to stimulate discussion around what I find interesting, and also to share things before they disappear into the void of my journal.

CONTENTS

1. Icons with words
2. Capoeira
3. Asides
4. Music

ICONS WITH WORDS

Adding visible text to https://rosano.ca after years of being purely iconic and visually wordless was kind of dramatic for me, but I’m happy with the result and think it will be more helpful for other people. Felt like a significant enough change that I (of course) wrote about it:

Imagining what it’s like for someone arriving there, I feel it would be overwhelming to click on anything: a giant list of icons, each one descending into a rabbit hole of who knows what, not one seeming to offer a sense of the landscape or horizon—how does one decide where to start?

CAPOEIRA

I started taking capoeira classes this week. My body is aching from never having moved so much in my life, but the movements feel great and make the apparatus of this meat more visible. I’ve enjoyed the music for a while now so I’m looking forward to seeing what sounds I discover from going deeper into this practice (stay tuned for some relevant albums). If any of you have had experience with it, I’d love to hear about it.

❤️

Help me continue creating projects that are public, accessible for free, and open-source, consider becoming one of my financial backers.

ASIDES

Let’s talk about disaster relief being transformative…. Beau of The Fifth Column unpacks a peculiar sentiment of ‘hoping that a hurricane happens while friends are visiting him in Florida’ so that they’d have the opportunity to do disaster relief. This transformative experience exposes you to foes who normally don’t work together but set aside differences to achieve a common mission; ceaseless moving from one thing to another for days on end; an environment without most of what we take for granted (like internet, electricity, fuel, water, etc…) despite being in the ‘developed world’; learning to become more resourceful or see (notice) what’s around you. I never thought I’d be curious to try this some day, but it does seem highly formative. The more open we are, the more we can learn from anyone (even people we don’t like). We could all benefit from being more prepared to help one another and resourceful in times of scarcity.

[Nothing phases you after doing disaster relief because you helped others and made the world better under the worst possible conditions.]

Overheard at a gathering of travelling people:

God drugs those who drug themselves.

Noguchi filing system. Frequently used documents automatically end up together so that one can safely archive what hasn’t come up after a long period, similar to that ‘touching moves it to the top of the list’ paradigm common in messaging and note-taking apps. I love learning about simple systems that are built with the right incentives to encourage what’s natural, without impeding flow. Organization can bring peace of mind and increase cognitive bandwidth, so it’s powerful to achieve this automatically. (via Gordon Brander)

MUSIC

All the following items can be accessed as a one-click playlist via Joybox without accounts or sign up—just open and play.

Alvin Lucier

Grateful to have heard some work from this modern experimental music composer who passed away in 2021.

Alvin Lucier: The Duke of York from Bird and Person Dyning (1972–1973). I skipped the Latin recitation in the beginning, but feel free to hear from the start—either way, try to stick with it for the whole experience. Simple processes and simple inputs over time transform your perception; instead of proposing ‘what’ to listen, the composer guides us ‘how’ to listen. The use of stereo is for guiding your attention (if you allow it). As it develops, it feels like being inside of someone else’s trip: notice how provocations create a chain of effects in sound, how it still feels ‘organic’ despite being heavily electronic; observe the unfolding of a process, someone playing with their own perception and yours, often leading to surprise without shock. (via Meara O’Reilly)

Alvin Lucier: I Am Sitting In A Room (1981). Speaking seamlessly morphs into ‘room’, sounding ethereal like a vortex has opened, alive and shimmering. Simple production technique on a simple text to create something profound. It takes a magician to create something out of nothing, or maybe just perception… We can always listen more.

I am sitting in a room different from the one you are in now. I am recording the sound of my speaking voice, and I am going to play it back into the room again and again, until the resonant frequencies of the room reinforce themselves, so that any semblance of my speech, with perhaps the exception of rhythm, is destroyed. What you will hear, then, are the natural resonant frequencies of the room, articulated by speech. I regard this activity not so much as a demonstration of a physical fact, but more as a way to smooth out any irregularities my speech might have.

Long

Asmaa Hamzaoui, Bnat Timbouktou: Oulad Lghaba (2019). I love Gnawa music. Powerful sound from this all female group (the backup singers translate to “Timbuktu girls”). A smattering of polyrhythms everywhere makes it feel like there are usually multiple meters happening simultaneously. Listen to the intricate yet free-flowing ornamentation in the lead singer’s voice and to the bluesy notes of the guembri (like a bass). Hope I will have the privilege to hear them live some day; if you want to get some idea for how the music is performed, see this live concert from Poland.

Short

Ondatrópica: 3 Reyes de la Terapia from Ondatrópica (2012). Intense combination of beatboxing and breathing (or perhaps hyperventilating) with a repetitive pattern that seems like it’s performed live and not a copy/paste of the same audio. This backdrop makes a strange fusion with the Cumbia-style improvising accordion. Dark and interesting like chocolate 80% noir. (via Laura Sinisterra)

More

Check out Fleeting Arrivals for more music.

(I heart music)

I always love receiving music. Send me recommendations anytime, anywhere!

That’s all folks!

Feel free to reply and share any reflections you might have, or just say hello. Have a great week 🙂.

If you enjoyed this, please consider sharing on Twitter or WhatsApp or Email.

Since 2013, I was using a website design with no visible words—icons only; it was an obsession with The icon is a promise and the perspective of words being 'limited' in expressing things. Eventually I added text available only to screenreaders, and thought it was interesting to have a context where visually impaired persons (VIPs) would be able to 'see more' than sighted people. I digged the pure visual aesthetic and the design seemed like it would last forever (just keep adding icons to the list). I also avoided explaining 'me' because I thought that 'what I do should explain me', and seeked to make everything 'about the projects'. So for almost a decade, I have been 'explaining' myself to the online world with a list of icons, and a small amount of project-specific text essentially invisible to most people. After contemplating this recently, I began to notice issues.

Imagining what it's like for someone arriving there, I feel it would be overwhelming to click on anything: a giant list of icons, each one descending into a rabbit hole of who knows what, not one seeming to offer a sense of the landscape or horizon—how does one decide where to start? I suspect that the poor sense of 'what to click on next' might cause me to lose many people who arrive there and feel lost. It would be selfish to expect people to essentially gamble with their attention and click many links at random in order to understand the larger picture—if they aren't able to understand, the medium of communication has failed. Worse, I realized recently that although it was possible to hover on icons to see the name and description of each icon, this was not possible on mobile devices. I sometimes thought I was raising awareness about the needs of VIPs, but in retrospect it was kind of a jerk move which made it harder for most people on purpose… So it's time to try something different. It should be simple to get an overview of what's going on: perhaps better to present with more information.

Comparing current and previous layouts: text is now visible everywhere without any special interaction or hardware and there is a small blurb about me which links to an about page for a more textual overview. I think both frame everything in a way that's more accessible for everyone, making it simpler to understand what on earth I'm doing with my life. I feel happy with the result: I still dig the aesthetic and actually find it more friendly. Looking forward to see how this next phase of the design goes, and how much time passes until the next change.

As a bonus, check out the pre-2013 layout on Wayback Machine.

Welcome to the twenty-fourth ceremony of Ephemerata: reflections, observations, and life at the edge.

I’m doing this to stimulate discussion around what I find interesting, and also to share things before they disappear into the void of my journal.

Thanks to Sasquatch in Orange Shoes for becoming a backer this week ❤️.

CONTENTS

1. This is a ceremony
2. Platform puzzle pieces
3. A way of fatherhood
4. Automatic associations interface
5. Asides
6. Music

THIS IS A CEREMONY

Ephemerata has always felt like an event to me (some kind of gathering or party), but David Luecke recently put that ‘c’ word in my head, and I find it most fitting—thanks David 🙏🏽. It shall hereby be referred to as such ✨.

PLATFORM PUZZLE PIECES

Currently thinking about how to integrate multiple systems while building community and sustainable income.

It’s possible for me to ‘build my own system’ but that would take time from doing what it’s designed to support, especially as a single-person operation; this might be a case where it’s better to use existing parts and close gaps by creating plugins or automating with tools like Zapier or n8n. Let’s review the existing systems…

❤️

Help me continue creating projects that are public, accessible for free, and open-source, consider becoming one of my financial backers.

A WAY OF FATHERHOOD

I’m very attached to my kid, but I don’t expect him to be attached to me. I don’t want him to feel more tied to some people than others. I hope he ventures out into the world, makes new bonds, and feels no obligation to me. He doesn’t owe me anything. His life is his own. He didn’t ask to be born, and has no debts.
— Derek Sivers

AUTOMATIC ASSOCIATIONS INTERFACE

I often find myself glazing over conceptual interfaces for computing because I usually just want to use the thing to see how it feels, but the nice demos on this one stopped me.

The promise of digital systems for me has always had something to do with ‘surfacing the right amount of meaningful things at the right time’. I have approximated this in my apps by requiring explicit actions to surface things because it’s beyond my capacity to imagine how to do this more automatically, and also generally distrust machines to automate this well. So how nice it is to see a vision for creating structures and associations with little friction, more or less by directing your attention. Computers should be good at this while allowing us to tweak things, to avoid relying completely on a black box:

The system can handle most of the heavy lifting by simply paying attention to how we move through our items within different contexts, but we can further manage the associations manually as we like.

Bringing things to view in the way presented here is so much more compelling than clicking around through filesystems or apps. The closest that I’ve seen and used is Quicksilver’s way of ‘knowing’ by key combinations and their frequency, but this requires explicit association. Successfully capturing intent passively instead of explicitly makes it so that being a programmer is not necessary.

It’s important to have higher-level primitives baked into lower levels, rather than reconstructing them in each app–this can mean schemas, file formats, or an operating system itself. Your trail or history is valuable and shouldn’t be siloed in or built bespoke for certain apps. How can this be constructed without a universal app for all the things? (or is that just another operating system?) How can this be done in a way where the data is not siloed within this system (even though it seems to afford great flexibility across app boundaries)?

ASIDES

My book is in my body.
— Elena

Pay What You Want and the Four Currencies. Breaks down the ‘cost’ of something into “money-dollars”, “time-dollars”, “pain-in-the-butt-dollars”, and “integrity-dollars”, which is a useful framework for thinking about why people might choose to pay versus pirate something. The whole series considers the perspective of a buyer, but this part focuses on why donation-based software doesn’t work. Worth paying attention if you sell apps…

[Optional contributions in software don’t work because they’re more of a pain in the ass than the free experience. If you forced a minimum price of even a cent, people would likely be more generous than the minimum because they’re already in the payment process.]

Notes from a mystic:

[Knowledge, like a drug, gives you a hallucination of knowing.]

[Logic has never led anyone to truth.]

[Nothingness exists without support or creator.]

The roads to understanding misinformation…. Tons of tips on how to recognize signs of misinformation, but more about understanding sources than shaming people. Heightens your attention to certain ways of communicating without too much explanation. I thought I had a good grasp of this kind of thing but learned lots here. Maybe worth sharing this even with people who have experience?

[If a headline provokes an emotional reaction, be on guard: it should pique your curiosity more than convince you to form an opinion—inform over inflame.]

[The context of a poll, how it was collected, is as important as the findings.]

[The words ‘seems’, ‘appears’, ‘apparently’ is an indication of opinion about intent.]

Advice on hosting a group discussion:

[Challenge people to contrast with what others have said. Encourage them to talk to each other.]

[Togetherness needs a plurality of relationships. Demonstrate a personal connection with you during intros. Show them they can participate in different levels.]

[Prompt in the event description to collect and come with thoughts about questions.]

[People love to be invited, and feel egotistical about barging in on a conversation (‘everyone seems smart, why should I talk?’).]
— Casey Sokol

MUSIC

All the following items can be accessed as a one-click playlist via Joybox without accounts or sign up—just open and play.

Long

Ayyuka: Maslak Halayı (2020). Unapologetic and seamless weaving of Turkish scales and melodies, psychedelic rock, prepared electronic ambience and live instruments. Pay attention to the effects, the intensity without ‘loudness’, the microtonal inflections played on seemingly ordinary electric guitar. Tight drumming and a badass vibe throughout the album. My favourites: Maslak Halayı fills me with power; Yukadans is alive, helps body move, cool harmonizing between the two leads near the end; Komalı’s got that pitch bending that I love from some kinds of Arab music; Ah Be Baba is an adventure filled with sudden turns and odd meters. (via @kevin@merveilles.town)

Short

Lyra Pramuk: Tendril from Fountain (2020). The celestial feeling evoked without words shows what is possible with the simplest of materials: only voice, no other instruments, minimal effects (mostly reverb and echo); the layering of parts to create rich harmonies; a variety of vocal textures, syllables, sounds. There is a kind of static rhythm throughout the whole work, but contrast in the form keeps it interesting. A sublime creation. (via RVNG Intl.)

Tkay Maidza: 24k from Last Year Was Weird, Vol. 2 (2020). Velvet smooth electronic dance grove, lyrics and breathing slotted into the beat perfectly. Nothing to do here except ride along. (via April)

Bites

Fareed Ayaz, Abu Muhammad Qawwal, Party Ghar ki Mehfil: Chaap Tilak Sab Chheeni (2014). Great example of music as communal experience: the lead singers invite people in the ‘audience’ (using words, or music and movement itself) to participate—at times it feels like a salon discussion even though it’s mostly musical throughout. I’m not familiar with this style of music, but it’s wonderful to observe singing with devotion intense ornamentation. Fun to see others enjoying music not just in the mind but with hands and much of the upper body. I linked to a part that skips the introduction with many individuals in the room ‘taking the spotlight’ to sing, which is beautiful to watch (start from the beginning if you want to check that out). As asides: 1) bonus points that this occurred in Montreal; and 2) refreshing and nostalgic to hear this pre-pandemic performance with people coughing loudly without masks or stigma. (via Pedro Silva)

The Halluci Nation: Electric Pow Wow Drum from A Tribe Called Red (2013). There’s already so much power in traditional indigenous chanting, to add blasting electronic synths and amplification gives it just a little more oomph. Possible to tastefully connect such far away aesthetics. Super simple form, but interesting timbres from metal shakers and leather-skinned drums. (via RVNG Intl.)

More

Check out Fleeting Arrivals for more music.

(I heart music)

I always love receiving music. Send me recommendations anytime, anywhere!

That’s all folks!

Feel free to reply and share any reflections you might have, or just say hello. Have a great week 🙂.

If you enjoyed this, please consider sharing on Twitter or WhatsApp or Email.

Thinking about how to integrate multiple systems while building community and sustainable income.

This year, I started to prioritize community building, which led to the creation of the Ephemerata newsletter and The Café forum (see My mother's gift for some origins). Seeking a hub to house everything and make it accessible with one account, I was determined to make it work with forum software and published the newsletter there as a way to have 'something' happening; it's been nice to see people sign up and share comments without me inviting anyone, but it could be more active, and I should invest there once I feel comfortable doing less in other communities. Seeking also to explore patronage or voluntary contributions as a way to fund what I do, I was determined to use a homegrown payment system or an Open Collective profile, but neither are well integrated with community space or the unlocking of 'perks'. Since beginning these experiments, I have become more aware of other platforms and am trying to reconcile the benefits of each one with the properties I would like to have in my toolkit. It's possible for me to 'build my own system' but that would take time from doing what it's designed to support, especially as a single-person operation; this might be a case where it's better to use existing parts and close gaps by creating plugins or automating with tools like Zapier or n8n. Let's review the existing systems…

Community (Talking together)

Discourse is modern forum software that onboards people to participate, encourages reading, and nudges the right things. It's an exciting set of tools and primitives on an open-source foundation—an increasingly common extensible language—and even can be accessed with a native app to see notifications from all servers in one place. It's good for asynchronous communication, giving people badges, and a comments layer for content written elsewhere. As much as I hoped to do everything here and leverage its various affordances for community, it demands more effort (or friction) for people to post, and it's not so elegant as a 'home' for long-form writing (see Evolution one).

I have despised Discord for its chaotic arcade-like approach to communication, but after learning of a unified notifications pane which doesn't require me to click and bounce around dozens of channels to keep up, it's more manageable for me. The main advantage is that it's low-friction, either when signing up (as one account is shared across multiple communities) or when posting ('easily posting quick things' is not just for 'less dedicated people' but also makes it simpler for your tribe to participate); people can sign up and move from passive to more active at their own pace. It's better for synchronous communication—which I generally avoid as it can be anxiety-inducing—giving people a sense of 'together, now'. It's not good if you avoid proprietary systems (the only closed-source project on this page), vendor lock-in and its network effects, information overload from over-notification noise, or chronologically-emphasized systems which are inherently Designed to disappear. I would be open to using this if the messages delete automatically after a certain period, thus making it easier to change platforms later.

These posts talk more about the tradeoffs of both and how to integrate them better:

• Discord and Discourse - Better Together
• Effectively using Discourse together with group chat
• You should use forums rather than Slack/Discord to support developer community

As an honourable mention, I like the ideas in Luma: events require email addresses to attend, thus providing a sense of how many people are interested, while also building a mailing list and offering a discussion space for people to connect in between. You can also accept donations or charge money for things, which relates to the next section. Too proprietary for me, but I think it's well-made and can help you to grow faster.

Funding (Sustainable income)

Thinking about the best long-term solution for funding my work, I started at the outset by building my own payments system and integrating it into my apps (see the fund button): this enables direct integration with my apps (unlocking of features), while supporting both Paypal and Stripe. The novel idea behind this is that there is no data stored by me (everything is embedded in the transaction, which is stored by the payment processor) and people can use 'their own accounts' (but the 0data concept is so early that most people don't have one yet). It lacks a more elegant 'manage your subscription' mechanism, which means that although it's possible to modify and cancel at any time, it might feel cryptic. Another major flaw is the design decision to not collect contact information of the subscriber: anonymity has its merits, but I think if people pay me subscription money, I would prefer to have a communications channel in both directions in case anything goes wrong. In short: my system is functional, but might be a fail.

Open Collective is a new way to crowdfund on a recurring basis. Unlike more popular patronage platforms, it promotes transparency and implements fiscal hosting so that one doesn't need a legal entity to receive payments. The visual design lacks warmth (figures-oriented, as if for accountants) and only makes it faintly visible when it's possible to 'give more than the minimum' (non-techies might miss this option entirely)–I believe both of these things decrease the income potential. I was avoiding it for those reasons, but after trying it out, I think the ideals make sense, and so far it's more 'financially successful' than my other avenues even though contributors aren't getting something material in return (yet).

Ghost has made me turn my head several times in the last few months: own your newsletter and your subscriber payment data; patron-only content; passwordless signup via email and magic links; nice external and internal design; integration with automation systems; easy to host it yourself… Their 'Portal' (a slicker alternative to my own fund button) is super compelling: seamlessly handles free and paid memberships (but no PayPal), offers an elegant 'manage your subscription' interface, and (perhaps not so well-known) you can embed it on other sites. I wish it were less 'broadcast and business'-oriented, but I think you don't have to use it that way—might be better to combine it with other platforms. There are some great interface patterns that could become a common language across the web, and active development is supported by a sustainably-funded team.

The ideal solution

Seeing as none of these individual projects span both community and payments, my imagined ideal system would have these properties:

• own your community data; badges; asynchronous conversation; extensible (like Discourse)
• own your subscriber data and payment relationship; patron-only content; nice interfaces everywhere (like Ghost)
• bring your own account (like my fund button, 0data, or Delta Chat)
• transparency and fiscal hosts (like Open Collective)
• passive signup and synchronous conversation (like Discord), but ephemeral messages

To work towards this, I think I will try a mix of all these tools, but I'm inclined to put Ghost closer to the center. Despite working on my fund button for about half a year, I might switch to the Ghost 'Portal' as it is a pattern language people understand, has a more robust account system that's passwordless, and can be embedded on any site–it should also simplify the programming integration while giving a better experience for people using my apps. Stay tuned over the course of next year to see how all this evolves.

Thanks to Boris for the prompt to write about this.

Welcome to the twenty-third edition of Ephemerata: reflections, observations, and life at the edge.

I'm doing this to stimulate discussion around what I find interesting, and also to share things before they disappear into the void of my journal.

Thanks to Charles E. Lerner and Deta for becoming a backer this week ❤️.

CONTENTS

1. The feeling of being magical
2. Evolution one
3. Fleeting Arrivals
4. Events
5. Asides
6. Music

THE FEELING OF BEING MAGICAL

I may not generally present myself with fancy clothes, or visually obvious ornamentation, but I am that multi-coloured dragon who has a certain thing that cannot be found elsewhere, and it's a privilege to feel when this inspires and brings joy to others.

EVOLUTION ONE

Using a blog system has opened up a new channel of expression for me, curious to see how far this goes.

Since the first edition of Ephemerata, my intention was to share things that give a sense of my world and spur discussion, grouping them in a single digest to avoid overloading people with real-time messages. I still think […]

FLEETING ARRIVALS

I'm starting a Tumblr to practice articulating why I'm sharing something, and to 'distribute the workload' of writing Ephemerata by publishing as I go. This makes it possible to explore or even subscribe to music, articles, or podcasts via tag.

❤️

Help me continue creating projects that are public, accessible for free, and open-source, consider becoming one of my financial backers.

EVENTS

• December 8th to 11th: Visiting Montreal 👋🏼
• December 9th, 2021: Attending Fission MTL DWeb Social

ASIDES

Let's talk about society, laws, and two phrases..... Frames pathways for change in a way that feels approachable: we can start where we are. Interesting to consider representatives without their own voice as mere channels for their constituents. If you want to change society, change the way people think; law is a lagging indicator of what people want.

[Political representatives shouldn't make any decisions, but rather simply vote the way a majority of their constituents want.]

[By the time a law passes, most people have already changed their thinking: it's not a leading indicator but an enforcement mechanism.]

[Societal change happens in your skull.]

Lessons from a Feline Gaze. My former professor started writing in public recently and managed to describe transcendence in what we, here on the Internet, refer to as a "cat picture". I'm fond of lenses that help us see the sublime in ordinary experiences. There is so much we can learn from animals and nature, such as paying attention to our natural reactions and inhibitions. Feels also like a kind of oblique strategy.

Here is Stella, instructing us on how to look at something we’ve never seen before. As our resident cat-comedian with a gift for irony, she is wondering whether this item — a conductor’s baton — can be worked in as “A” material for her next vaudeville show. The baton is also about to become a tooth sharpener, but we’ll explore that in a moment. Here, Stella is elevating attention itself into an art form, and teaching us to do the same. If that idea doesn’t resonate with you, please find your inner still-point and a moment to drink in her lucent, emerald gaze.

lectronice made a cardboard computer, with all the features a young child needs.

MUSIC

All the following items can be accessed as a one-click playlist via Joybox without accounts or sign up—just open and play.

Long

Kidi Band: Gimme Gimme (2016). Another release from Kidi Band (featured in #022). I initially didn't make the connection that this was the same group, so they truly managed to captivate me twice—it became distracting to do anything else and I just wanted to listen. I tend to avoid 'loud' music, but this reminds me that it's possible for me to enjoy it. Thoughtful, complex, and emotional. My favourite moments: How Long with busy, intricate, active drumming in the midst of graceful, expansive, widening sung phrases, plus a polyphonic polyrhythmic sundae in the middle; the rhythmic singing in Mountain, feeling like a collective rhythm machine with sudden metric changes; Fever Driver's dense, rich texture, heavily lilting from side to side (or maybe in circles) might get you high.

Short

Frédéric Chopin: Ballade No. 1 in G minor, Op. 23 (1835). A live performance (with hands as the focal point) of a friend and pianist from Italy playing this masterpiece, followed by an analysis explaining what makes certain parts of this piece stand out from other repertoire. I enjoy this fluidity of being able to talk about music that one performs, to help other people hear what's going on and find their way in.

Caetano Veloso: O Leãozinho from Caetano Veloso (1986). I'm overwhelmed by the simplicity of this little tune: just voice and simple guitar patterns can vividly paint an entire scene, with this bright, lilting mood. The singing and accompaniment are rhythmically fused in a way that makes it natural to embody. It was written for Caetano's sister Maria Bethânia, whose hair may resemble a lion's mane. The percussive clicking might be unique to this version of the song. See the lyrics for a translation. (via Dani)

More

Check out Fleeting Arrivals for more music.

(I heart music)

I always love receiving music. Send me recommendations anytime, anywhere!

That's all folks!

Feel free to reply and share any reflections you might have, or just say hello. Have a great week 🙂.

If you enjoyed this, please consider sharing on Twitter or WhatsApp or Email.

Since the first edition of Ephemerata, my intention was to share things that give a sense of my world and spur discussion, grouping them in a single digest to avoid overloading people with real-time messages. I still think there's value in sharing them (especially the music I find, as it might be hard for most people to come by)—now and then I get feedback that there's something compelling in there—but there seems to be a clear stronger reaction to my original writing (for example, about community or analytics, where people have gone out of their way on various channels to share their impressions), so I'm going to focus more on that.

I initially thought about writing something original for every edition, which would be motivating for me, but zooming out further I felt something unexpected click. I could atomize these texts so that they live on their own space (sort of like a blog) and publish them any time without being tied to the release schedule of Ephemerata. I can write about my experiences, document what I learn, share my thought process, and expand beyond the conceptual or 'reference' focus of my garden—this text is an example of what I might do. By giving myself permission to explore 'transient' things and write as it happens (perhaps even multiple times between editions), I feel a new outlet of expression opening up, and I'm excited to see what I would put there.

Using the same Ghost installation that now powers the newsletter, I've compiled an archive of texts from the newsletter with other long-form writing; as much as I've avoided the traditional blog organization for most of my life, it still feels like a better interface to explore collections of writing than a 'forum'. I'm still using Discourse for comments on individual texts and for newsletter editions.

Setting up a new Tumblr, I've organized the links I share into a chronological stream. This still forces me to take time (contra the urge to post a link in a box and have an app fetch the context) to reflect on what I want to communicate by sharing and be more deliberate. I suspect also that receiving many links on a weekly basis might be kind of overloading (despite my intentions to the contrary), so now there's more than one way to check it out. This also makes it possible to explore or even subscribe to music, articles, or podcasts via tag.

So in summary: 1) the newsletter is still a weekly package and an important rhythm for continuity; 2) the blog is for anyone who just wants original texts (and maybe via RSS Feed); 3) the Tumblr is for getting the links as I share them and also for things that don't make it into the newsletter. I would also re-state about Ephemerata that you don't have to read any of it—it disappears, and if you miss a week there's nothing to catch up on; just come in when you feel like it and know that it's consistently there and ready for you.

Welcome to the twenty-second edition of Ephemerata: reflections, observations, and life at the edge.

I’m doing this to stimulate discussion around what I find interesting, and also to share things before they disappear into the void of my journal.

CONTENTS

1. Dating apps
2. Brian Lovin’s portfolio
3. Events
4. Asides
5. Music

DATING APPS

Writing about my first experience using apps to meet people:

For most of my life, I have not been so open to the idea of using technology to find romantic relationships. Coming from a culturally conservative background, dating itself could only happen under…

BRIAN LOVIN’S PORTFOLIO

His personal portfolio has some affordances to make it interactive like a web app, and participatory like a social network: people can ask anything, comment on writing or bookmarks, say which apps they use. There are also some ‘evergreen’ resources like this digital security checklist and app dissection blog.

Demonstrates that we can construct spaces for community within a context that’s often highly individual, and without asking people to create accounts (sign in with Twitter, data stored on Firebase); like a purpose-built room with specific and relevant activities.

Hosting one’s own ‘Ask me Anything’ reminds me of Pat Metheny’s Question and Answer.

Would be nice to have RSS feeds for each ‘type’ as opposed to for writing only. The list presentation is unfortunately Designed to disappear.

See the source code for how it’s made.

(via @julianlehr)

❤️

Help me continue creating projects that are public, accessible for free, and open-source, consider becoming one of my financial backers.

EVENTS

• November 24, 2021: Co-hosting Zero Data Swap #4: Hello World with Noel De Martin. (Looking for a volunteer to code a small demo with remoteStorage or Fission. Let me know!)
• November 28, 2021: Co-hosting Improvisation, Spontaneity, and Oneness with Vivek
• November 30, 2021: Hosting remoteStorage monthly hangout

ASIDES

I usually don’t find good musical metaphors for people coming together to do things, but I love this one: (via Friendships, Scenes, and Growth salon)

a good scene provides the rhythm within which people can improvise and find their own melody
— Bird of Play

Notes from a mystic:

[Seek and you will not find, because seeking strengthens the ego.]

[When you’re hollow like bamboo and the divine lips are on you, you become a flute and the song starts.]

[A child who holds their father’s hand neither trusts not doubts: they are undivided, not missing anything.]

Listening to Justin Jackson’s Indie Bites interview on Bootstrapping Transistor.fm made me realize the importance of balancing your resources with the trajectory you pursue. It changed a perspective I’ve maintained for a while of “avoiding things that are overly commercial because there’s something superficial about that”; I’m still not so motivated by money, but feel more inclined to follow a path that isn’t purely about ‘the idea’. I found it provocative to think that “[it should be easy to become financially successful as an indie hacker]” and make sustainability a priority. Also important to take into account the mental health cost of taking risks over a longer period: better to pick opportunities that can have some kind of return within a year or two—any longer and you’ll need more material resources and likely a strong support network to keep your mind in balance.

[It’s uncommon for successful entrepreneurs to ‘start from zero’: they likely have experience, connections, skills, or a financial runway that provides the conditions to take risks.]

[If it takes longer to get to a sustainable income than you have runway, the market fundamentals might not keep you afloat.]

[A mental health balance is an important part of your runway when taking on something as stressful as indie hacking.]

MUSIC

All the following items can be accessed as a one-click playlist via Joybox without accounts or sign up—just open and play.

So Good

Kidi Band: So Good (2021). Has lots of cool things that I like in jazz and indigenous music, but as if an indie rock band did it. There are stereo effects, hocket-like devices, odd meters, and highly rhythmic singing throughout. So many tracks with an individual charm: the polyphonic ending of Mary (Merry) with crunchy harmonies; Burn It Up‘s intricate interlocking rhythms in multiple voices with wild vocal bending, all in a five-meter polyrhythmic time feel; Man of Endless Motion‘s heavy head-banger groove, again in five-meter, with cascading interlocking vocal interjections; the incessant intense rhythmic vocals in Free Will; Ingomar is like a complex Rube Goldberg machine that sings in seven; Go On has a wicked African three-against-two time feel; Across the Sea lilting triplet feel, pleasant yet precise. (via @natehn@merveilles.town)

Long

Pat Metheny Group: Secret Story (2007). Eclectic sonic materials throughout that resemble the album cover’s collage, yet it all seems to belong together. There’s always emotion and sentiment despite compositional complexity. Generally enjoyed the cinematic moments, mood of the 1970s, and the mixing of orchestra with electronic sounds. My favourite moments: an interesting vocal texture to start the album in Above the Treetops; the sound of a sitar played like a guitar in Facing West; the raw earthy vocal scatting and hard sever-meter groove in Finding and Believing; the high-energy vortex soloing environment, abundance of lush harmonies (typical of Metheny’s music) in See the World. (via Sushma)

Short

Little Simz feat. Obongjayar: Point And Kill from Sometimes I Might Be Introvert (2021). Makes body move, and if your eyes are open, the visuals are sublime. Words and rhythm fit like a glove. Feeling an unapologetic artistry through fashion and music. Concludes with a sudden change to African instruments but with the same time feel. (via Elena)

El Masreyeen (المصريين): Bahebek La (بحبك لا) from بحبك لا
(1977). The warmth in this funky disco gem from Egypt goes straight to your shoulders. A simple composition with slight contrast between sections, yet it stays interesting throughout. “I love you, no; I need you, yes.” (via Debora Ipekel)

Bites

Sam Gendel: Cold Duck Time from Satin Doll (2020). space hyper jazz bebop swing squeal sax glitch loop vibe. The rest of the album is comprised of quirky interpretations of jazz standards.

(I heart music)

I always love receiving music. Send me recommendations anytime, anywhere!

THAT’S ALL FOLKS!

Feel free to reply and share any reflections you might have, or just say hello. Have a great week 🙂.

If you enjoyed this, please consider sharing on Twitter or WhatsApp or Email.

For most of my life, I have not been so open to the idea of using technology to find romantic relationships. Coming from a culturally conservative background, dating itself could only happen under very specific and limited circumstances. Moving past that, a lifetime of experience with computers and everything digital filled me with distrust towards matching systems whether old-school (long questionnaires leading to compatibility rates) or the swiping systems (the 'Hot or Not' game somehow still prevalent today), a perspective that can be summarized as 'machines are stupid'. I decided to give it a try towards the end of 2020 as I was feeling isolated during the pandemic, mostly as a way to make friends and meet new people (which might have been counter-intuitive given the context).

This was my first attempt ever at using dating apps, and I was in Brasília (the capital city of Brazil) between various upper middle-class neighbourhoods with preference for those who conform to something (padrão) that I don't really do well. I tried five of the more popular apps: Tinder, which I loath, but it's where most of the people are and therefore fairly diverse; Bumble, where women make the first move in heterosexual matches, but not as well-used; OkCupid, with more opportunities to be thoughtful in how you present yourself; Happn, highly location-based (literally who passed you by), where I had a handful of calls with fairly sincere people; and Inner Circle, for rich people, where I made somewhere between one and zero matches.

All of them (and likely even most of the ones I didn't try) focus on photos and swiping left or right to indicate intent, while trying to inject random bits of serendipity though game-like mechanisms—like chicken sexing, but maybe more fun. A multiplicity of ways to portray oneself is sacrificed in the name of speed, favouring visual representations and perception through those signals. This might be fine in specific contexts, but when universally applied, mainstream stereotypes of beauty tend to dominate everyone's experience, which pressures people perceived as 'abnormal' to conform, or floods them with noise. I don't think most people realize how much technology steers culture towards certain outcomes: an app starts with affordances for visual communication, then as it grows, we influence each other to do what succeeds in that format; when that shifted culture becomes our new baseline for how billions of people relate to one another, what does it say about our agency, or ability to be intentional in how we shape our world? The emphasis on photos turned me off to the point that I would reflexively tune out attractive people if they seemed to project affluence or a sort of 'mass-market beauty'. The swipe gestures are also error-prone, probably ableist, and not always consistent between apps; there's more than one way to do this, and I hope the well-paid developers of these apps explore a greater vocabulary of matching than 'left or right', perhaps attempt to approximate the spectrum of possibilities in meatspace. When I asked women (sometimes from these apps, sometimes from my own circles) about their experiences using these apps, they seemed to commonly receive too much of what they don't want from people they don't want to engage with—maybe this approach isn't working for everyone? What if, in addition to pictures, you could hear the person describe themselves (like a sort of answering machine greeting)? How would changing the velocity of selecting between profiles impact how much attention we give to each one? What would it look like if apps encouraged us to be vulnerable or authentic?

I managed to have some good experiences despite the shortcomings of these apps, but the connections generally felt disposable. One of my favourite words in Portuguese is 'correria' (translatable as 'rush' or 'scramble': imagine lots of people frantically running around), and for me, it describes the feeling of everyone simultaneously texting dozens of people; it's hard for me to have more meaningful exchanges this way (I'm 'slower'), and having infinite options makes it 'cheaper' for everyone (including myself) to cast a wider net. My months of exploring these apps could be quantified as: hundreds of messages with thirty to fifty matches, maybe a dozen interesting conversations, some video calls, a couple of dates, and essentially no friendships or relationships whatsoever. It was during a pandemic however, and I think the result would have been better if everyone could easily meet in public. The environment seems to encourage people to play games and create a false sense of scarcity, which is odd when you live by abundance and actively dismantle that when it happens. I felt relieved to stop using them, to not need to pay attention to so many notifications and engage in superficial conversations. Everyone has different expectations there, and mine may not have been aligned with most people, or with what the environment encourages.

That all sounds pessimistic, but I do think there's hope for these things if they're made with more thoughtfulness: the bar is currently so low that there's an open field for cultivating more meaningful interactions via matchmaking. Showing people at 'random' can be useful, and maybe even necessary, but there needs to be more than one method of exploring who's out there, and ideally multiple ways for people to represent themselves: less visual, more filterable. I think this kind of tool could have great outcomes depending on how the culture wields it; I'm less interested in seeing what happens when the app wields culture without us realizing it. Although I generally make more meaningful connections in my own contexts, I might give dating apps a second chance post-pandemic, but I know that anything good occurring will likely happen in spite of the apps, not because of them.

Welcome to the twenty-first edition of Ephemerata, a weekly-ish digest of ideas, learnings, links, and sounds.

I’m doing this to stimulate discussion around what I find interesting, and also to share things before they disappear into the void of my journal.

Thanks to Feathers Cloud for becoming a backer this week ❤️.

CONTENTS

1. Going fully web
2. Events
3. Asides
4. Music

GOING FULLY WEB

The gist: My iOS apps are currently free and will disappear from the App Store in a few months. Read more to understand why.

I have been working on iOS apps since 2009, starting by a collaboration with Wil on AudioScrub (née iLift), and eventually going solo in 2014. After twelve years on the App Store, I’ve decided it’s time to go all in on the web, and would like to share what that means and outline the tradeoffs involved.

The spur for this change occurred years ago after the launch of my seventh app sonogrid. Although the project had iterations over several years, it mostly came together in the summer of 2018: I overworked myself for months, with incessant attention to detail, and was eager to present this to people I would meet during my upcoming trip to Colombia (they really love music there, and this app was for music lovers). The app launched to a good reception online within various iOS music app communities, but to my dismay, most of the Colombians I met in person were not able to access it because Apple devices are prohibitively expensive there. I would offer to demo the app on my phone and let the other person play with it after: repeatedly, they would enjoy the interface and become immersed in a fun creative process, only to become disappointed on learning that it’s not on Android. It was hard to resolve the contradiction between producing something I was super proud to share—a kind of magnificent zenith in my iOS trajectory—and realizing that only half the world can use it. This was a bit deflating, and I wasn’t motivated to do double the work just because of platform duopolies. Added to this was the more subtle but long-standing aversion to the ‘review process’ that native apps go through before appearing on the App Store: I was hesitant to invest further in an environment with little control and leverage over my own future, with a constant fear of ‘reviewer rejection’ and the rug slipping out from under me at any time. So I took a step back and haven’t updated many of my iOS apps since then.

In place, I worked on various web components and put them together to create about a dozen web-based projects. Contrasting the experience between the web and native (i.e. iOS) worlds, I feel more enthusiastic about how the web is evolving. It can still be ‘limited’ in comparison to native apps, but that gap is gradually closing and most of my ideas already fit within what’s currently possible.

Just to review, in case it’s not obvious, there are some more commonly understood reasons for choosing the web over native:

• Basically all current and future devices (mobile, tablet, desktop) and operating systems (iOS, Android, macOS, Windows, Linux) are supported.
• Projects are simpler and more cost-effective to build and deploy, with tools and skills that are easier to acquire.
• A thriving universe with bazillions of communities spanning the entire Internet provides lots of answers to questions, and most knowledge is based on open standards and therefore highly transferable.
• Backwards compatibility is a priority, which means your project is likely to continue working despite technology evolving over time.
• You can make changes whenever you like and have them online within seconds or minutes, as opposed to requiring third-party approval for everything, which could take days or weeks.
• The environment makes it more and more empowering for single-person or small team operations to produce things, without requiring the resources of a large company.

The challenges of the web for developers like myself is to help people ‘cross the chasm’ that exists due to a lack of common patterns for interacting with apps:

• There is no obvious ‘App Store’, so people are left to search the wider web (amongst articles, videos, cat pictures, and everything else), but maybe there could be one that celebrates the ‘instant’ nature of this platform, or a subscription bundle like SetApp to help with discovery.
• There is no universal ‘buy’ button—every project does this their own way, but the Ghost Portal is becoming more and more common, and I’m trying something similar with my Fund Button.
• The idea of an ‘install’ button isn’t ubiquitous, and some web apps may not be mobile-friendly or local-first, but for the rest there are libraries like a2hs.js that help guide people to make accessing web apps a more familiar experience: simply click on an app icon to launch.
• The lack of an integrated payment system means that every project needs to re-build trust and help others be comfortable enough in the environment to support them financially, but Stripe Checkout, PayPal Checkout, and Web Monetization are contributing various solutions that reduce friction from this process. (I would also love to see fiscal hosting become more prevalent so that having a legal entity is not necessary to receive money.)
• Performance has often held back the types of applications that can be built on the web platform, but WebAssembly will eliminate this issue for a whole class of ideas.

There are plenty of people working to create open solutions to these ‘missing features’; it seems like a solvable problem with time.

(Feel free to skip this section if you’d rather not hear me complain about Apple.) I’m sharing some negative aspects of my experience making native apps with hesitation, not to be a downer but because there might be people that aren’t really familiar with the developer side:

• The paternal review process can be soul-crushing at times: reviewers don’t enforce rules consistently; bad app(le)s get approved and grift people out of money or personal information; it’s an anxiety-ridden process that can feel unpredictable. You may have a good impression of Apple if you’ve bought their products: calling them for support usually means speaking to a friendly person who takes responsibility for your issue and tries to resolve it. App Review on the other hand might as well be an outsourced company, incredibly bureaucratic, and often feels like talking to a rock; any sensuality around the Apple brand quickly vanishes under these bright white office lights as you find yourself filling out TPS reports in the developer cubicle all of a sudden.
• Large companies dominate the App Store listings and generally get better treatment. The lucky independent developers are ones who have the ear of someone who works at Apple to support them if there’s a dispute and either push their app through App Review or get it featured.
• It’s quite a task for an individual or small team to produce an app, create screenshots and videos, localize everything in multiple languages, respond to reviews, and keep on top of technology that changes every year. The prototypical success looks more like a large organization than two guys in a garage.
• It feels like feeding into a device ecosystem of planned obsolescence and overconsumption, where developers and consumers need to keep upgrading—an insatiable appetite for more.
• The certificates and signing from the build process is complex and can bring development to a halt if you don’t have the right combination of XCode and macOS (hint: keep buying new Macs).
• The expanding variety of screen sizes forces you to learn responsiveness primitives which are platform-specific and create a complex array of image and video assets at different sizes for distribution.
• The constantly changing environment will break your app and force you to either hurry and accommodate the changes or receive messages from customers asking why it doesn’t work anymore.
• You can’t simply share your app with a friend or even install it on your own device without paying rent or getting permission through App Review.

There’s obviously lots of positives to native platforms as well, but these kind of things weigh down smaller operations like mine, favouring large companies with resources and time to deal with this ever-growing complexity.

Despite the web’s challenges, there’s much that excites me about its future and and some of these characteristics are intrinsic to the platform:

• The concept of instant games promotes highly shareable apps via a simple link that require no install process: show up and start.
• Having multiple payment providers, potentially with the addition of cryptocurrencies means if you wanted to also just invent your own value system, maybe some kind of post-money coupon thing, it’s possible to integrate with existing systems…
• User-controlled personal data stores are already being used on the web and will eventually make their way to native apps.
• Edge apps that work completely in the browser are easy to mirror or fork, and virtually free to distribute: imagine having your site/app available everywhere via IPFS
• The culture of perpetual improvement, with less focus on versioning, is normal: people do not need to ‘install updates’ for each app they use on every change.
• It’s just more fun and with a lower barrier to entry, which results in more diverse and dynamic communities who form part of a larger public commons: more sparks, more life, more weird.

My iOS apps have been quietly free for a while and I’m officially announcing that now. Early next year, they will disappear forever; I’m not completely sure how this works—I understand you can continue to use them, perhaps even re-download them, but only if you already have it. I would like to eventually re-make them for the web (be welcome to join me or keep me alive). In the meantime, enjoy these apps while they last. I’m jumping head first into a world bubbling with new possibilities, and excited to develop for the largest open pool of people on the planet.

❤️

Help me continue creating projects that are public, accessible for free, and open-source, consider becoming one of my financial backers.

EVENTS

• November 14: Attending A Field Guide to Internet Emotion > 3.0 Atomize, or Bit-Sized Emotions
• November 14: Attending Friendships, Scenes, and Growth
• November 24: Co-hosting Zero Data Swap #4: Hello World with Noel De Martin
• November 28: Co-hosting Improvisation, Spontaneity, and Oneness with Vivek
• November 30: Hosting remoteStorage monthly hangout

ASIDES

Try these two smart techniques to help you master your emotions. Relates the size of one’s emotional vocabulary to their well-being, which makes augmenting one’s capacity as simple as learning new words to name feelings or internal states. (via Pamela Pavliscak)

The Technium: Scenius, or Communal Genius. I love the idea that genius is not found only in contexts blessed by institutional validation, and can be occurring without someone noticing it, in ‘ordinary’ places. We can learn to recognize genius when this happens and fan the flames by cultivating and participating. If you look around, you might find it nearby.

Mutual appreciation — Risky moves are applauded by the group, subtlety is appreciated, and friendly competition goads the shy. Scenius can be thought of as the best of peer pressure.
…
Rapid exchange of tools and techniques — As soon as something is invented, it is flaunted and then shared. Ideas flow quickly because they are flowing inside a common language and sensibility.
…
Network effects of success — When a record is broken, a hit happens, or breakthrough erupts, the success is claimed by the entire scene. This empowers the scene to further success.
…
Local tolerance for the novelties — The local “outside” does not push back too hard against the transgressions of the scene. The renegades and mavericks are protected by this buffer zone.

You should use forums rather than Slack/Discord to support developer community. Frames the issue not only in terms of information architecture or participant usability, but how it fits into the larger Internet ecosystem, including search engines. Although the title suggests a particular course, it drives the reader to use both more thoughtfully. (via @expede)

The global streaming boom is creating a severe translator shortage. Makes visible the industry that produces different translations for streaming content. Despite the fact that machines are used to aid in the process, it ultimately relies on people. If there wasn’t enough incentive already to learn languages, maybe this provides a financial motivation.

[Netflix lost about half a million subscribers in the United States and Canada, but gained over a million in the Asia-Pacific region.]

[Translating Korean to French through English makes as much sense as translating English to French through Korean.]

MUSIC

All the following items can be accessed as a one-click playlist via Joybox without accounts or sign up—just open and play.

BASU

BASU: BASU (2021). Badass, unapologetic burst of weird energy from David Binney and Kenny Wollesen. Filled with swirly saxophone solos, glitchy effects, synth accompaniments. Constantly mixing electronic with analog, improvisation and composition. Lots of multi-layering soloing. Note the separate cover art for each track.

Long

Jacob Collier, Mathis Picard: Improvised Piano Duet At The Blue Note (2017). So much beauty in people making music socially, just having fun, enjoying the experience together. Re-assuring to see professionals accepting rough edges, not having professionalism as the primary objective; less thinky, more youthful and playful. 10:59 has notes of Brad Mehldau, Keith Jarrett, stride pianists, so many textures and styles referenced. 57:16 has a surprise vocal duet of My Romance a cappella with Bobby McFerrin style accompaniment. Music is a language.

Groovy Kaiju: Destroy All Monsters (2021). Groovy, tasteful mixing with warm upbeat vibes. Reminds me of J Dilla’s Donuts with more modern music.

Tom Misch: Tiny Desk Concert (2018). Uses simple, common musical forms and devices, but with tasteful harmonic surprises. Everything is rhythmic, including the singing. Body-shaking, head-banging grooves, makes you go ‘ooooh yea’. (via Shawn)

Short

Yaeji: Raingurl from EP2 (2017). Manages to use repetitive elements with cliché chord progressions without sounding tired or stale. Infectious chorus makes body move. Slight bongo/hand drums keeps it from having a ‘pure electronic’ sound. (via Eva B)

Blood and Dust: Around Your Grave I’ll Light a Ring of Fire (2021 single). This new release very quickly enters a world of their own creation. Kind of impressed how someone like me who doesn’t listen to music with this aesthetic can thoroughly enjoy it—still not sure why. The intense and dark beat becomes into something simultaneously slow and fast. Love the crunchy noise synths throughout.

(I heart music)

I always love receiving music. Send me recommendations anytime, anywhere!

That’s all folks!

Feel free to reply and share any reflections you might have, or just say hello. Have a great week 🙂

.

If you enjoyed this, please consider sharing on Twitter or WhatsApp or Email.

I have been working on iOS apps since 2009; I started with a collaboration with Wil on AudioScrub (née iLift), and eventually went solo in 2014. After twelve years on the App Store, I've decided it's time to go all-in on the web and would like to share what that means and outline the tradeoffs involved.

The spur for this change occurred years ago after the launch of my seventh app sonogrid. Although the project had iterations over several years, it mostly came together in the summer of 2018: I overworked myself for months, with incessant attention to detail, and was eager to present this to people I would meet during my upcoming trip to Colombia (they really love music there, and this app was for music lovers).

The app launched to a good reception online within various iOS music app communities, but to my dismay, most of the Colombians I met in person were not able to access it because Apple devices are prohibitively expensive there. I would offer to demo the app on my phone and let the other person play with it after: repeatedly, they would enjoy the interface and become immersed in a fun creative process, only to become disappointed on learning that it's not on Android. It was hard to resolve the contradiction between producing something I was super proud to share—a kind of magnificent zenith in my iOS trajectory—and realizing that only half the world can use it.

This was a bit deflating, and I wasn't motivated to do double the work just because of platform duopolies. Added to this was the more subtle but long-standing aversion to the 'review process' that native apps go through before appearing on the App Store: I was hesitant to invest further in an environment with little control and leverage over my own future, with a constant fear of 'reviewer rejection' and the rug slipping out from under me at any time. So I took a step back and haven't updated many of my iOS apps since then.

In place, I worked on various web components and put them together to create about a dozen web-based projects. Contrasting the experience between the web and native (i.e. iOS) worlds, I feel more enthusiastic about how the web is evolving. It can still be 'limited' in comparison to native apps, but that gap is gradually closing and most of my ideas already fit within what's currently possible.

Why you should choose Web over Native

Just to review, in case it's not obvious, there are some more commonly understood reasons for choosing the web over native:

• Basically, all current and future devices (mobile, tablet, desktop) and operating systems (iOS, Android, macOS, Windows, Linux) are supported.
• Projects are simpler and more cost-effective to build and deploy, with tools and skills that are easier to acquire.
• A thriving universe with bazillions of communities spanning the entire Internet provides lots of answers to questions, and most knowledge is based on open standards and therefore highly transferable.
• Backward compatibility is a priority, which means your project is likely to continue working despite technology evolving over time.
• You can make changes whenever you like and have them online within seconds or minutes, as opposed to requiring third-party approval for everything, which could take days or weeks.
• The environment makes it more and more empowering for single-person or small team operations to produce things, without requiring the resources of a large company.

The challenges of the web for developers like myself is to help people 'cross the chasm' that exists due to a lack of common patterns for interacting with apps:

• There is no obvious 'App Store', so people are left to search the wider web (amongst articles, videos, cat pictures, and everything else), but maybe there could be one that celebrates the 'instant' nature of this platform, or a subscription bundle like SetApp to help with discovery.
• There is no universal 'buy' button—every project does this their own way, but the Ghost Portal is becoming more and more common, and I'm trying something similar with my Fund Button.
• The idea of an 'install' button isn't ubiquitous, and some web apps may not be mobile-friendly or local-first, but for the rest there are libraries like a2hs.js that help guide people to make accessing web apps a more familiar experience: simply click on an app icon to launch.
• The lack of an integrated payment system means that every project needs to re-build trust and help others be comfortable enough in the environment to support them financially, but Stripe Checkout, PayPal Checkout, and Web Monetization are contributing various solutions that reduce friction from this process. (I would also love to see fiscal hosting become more prevalent so that having a legal entity is not necessary to receive money.)
• Performance has often held back the types of applications that can be built on the web platform, but WebAssembly will eliminate this issue for a whole class of ideas.

There are plenty of people working to create open solutions to these 'missing features'; it seems like a solvable problem with time.

What it’s like making Native Apps

(Feel free to skip this section if you'd rather not hear me complain about Apple.) I'm sharing some negative aspects of my experience making native apps with hesitation, not to be a downer but because there might be people that aren't really familiar with the developer side:

• The paternal review process can be soul-crushing at times: reviewers don't enforce rules consistently; bad app(le)s get approved and grift people out of money or personal information; it's an anxiety-ridden process that can feel unpredictable. You may have a good impression of Apple if you've bought their products: calling them for support usually means speaking to a friendly person who takes responsibility for your issue and tries to resolve it. App Review on the other hand might as well be an outsourced company, incredibly bureaucratic, and often feels like talking to a rock; any sensuality around the Apple brand quickly vanishes under these bright white office lights as you find yourself filling out TPS reports in the developer cubicle all of a sudden.
• Large companies dominate the App Store listings and generally get better treatment. The lucky independent developers are ones who have the ear of someone who works at Apple to support them if there's a dispute and either push their app through App Review or get it featured.
• It's quite a task for an individual or small team to produce an app, create screenshots and videos, localize everything in multiple languages, respond to reviews, and keep on top of technology that changes every year. The prototypical success looks more like a large organization than two guys in a garage.
• It feels like feeding into a device ecosystem of planned obsolescence and overconsumption, where developers and consumers need to keep upgrading—an insatiable appetite for more.
• The certificates and signing from the build process is complex and can bring development to a halt if you don't have the right combination of XCode and macOS (hint: keep buying new Macs).
• The expanding variety of screen sizes forces you to learn responsiveness primitives which are platform-specific and create a complex array of image and video assets at different sizes for distribution.
• The constantly changing environment will break your app and force you to either hurry and accommodate the changes or receive messages from customers asking why it doesn't work anymore.
• You can't simply share your app with a friend or even install it on your own device without paying rent or getting permission through App Review.

There are obviously lots of positives to native platforms as well, but these kinds of things weigh down smaller operations like mine, favouring large companies with resources and time to deal with this ever-growing complexity.

Developing for Web

Despite the web's challenges, there's much that excites me about its future and some of these characteristics are intrinsic to the platform:

• The concept of instant games promotes highly shareable apps via a simple link that requires no install process: show up and start.
• Having multiple payment providers, potentially with the addition of cryptocurrencies means if you wanted to also just invent your own value system, maybe some kind of post-money coupon thing, it's possible to integrate with existing systems…
• User-controlled personal data stores are already being used on the web and will eventually make their way to native apps.
• Edge apps that work completely in the browser are easy to mirror or fork, and virtually free to distribute: imagine having your site/app available everywhere via IPFS
• The culture of perpetual improvement, with less focus on versioning, is normal: people do not need to 'install updates' for each app they use on every change.
• It's just more fun and with a lower barrier to entry, which results in more diverse and dynamic communities who form part of a larger public commons: more sparks, more life, more weird.

My iOS apps have been quietly free for a while. By mid February 2022, they will disappear forever; I'm not completely sure how this works—I understand you can continue to use them, perhaps even re-download them, but only if you already have it. I would like to eventually re-make them for the web (be welcome to join me or keep me alive). In the meantime, enjoy these apps while they last. I'm jumping headfirst into a world bubbling with new possibilities and excited to develop for the largest open pool of people on the planet.

We're going to present 'the simplest possible integrations' for the various protocols. Noel De Martin has already started a Hello World for SOLID. Rosano will try one or both of remoteStorage and Fission (although a volunteer for either would be very much appreciated). Be welcome to join us and ask questions: let's learn together.

See also the previous swap.

Rosano and Vivek invite you to a salon on creation and consumption becoming one.

Improvisation, Spontaneity, and Oneness

What can various traditions of non-duality teach us about being spontaneous? What makes someone a good improviser? What makes for a good experience on improvisation? How much do improvisers plan? Is it something that is “manufactured” or simply “channeled?” Can improvisation be a portal into an experience of shared consciousness?

Let’s talk about improvisation in comedy and music, and how to encourage more spontaneity in life.

Further reading/watching

• Miles Davis on “wrong notes and lines”
• Speaking of Music interview with Keith Jarrett
• Brian Katz: Juggling Musically
• Casey Sokol: Musical Improvisation
• Harry Mack: Improvised freestyle for a man’s late fiancé
• Venkatesh Rao’s summary of the book Impro by Keith Johnstone
• T.M. Krishna on spontaneity in Carnatic music and how creativity must surprise us

—

Additional notes

Image by Alex Alvarez.

If you have any difficulty participating due to financial reasons, send us a message and we’ll buy your ticket.

Welcome to the twentieth edition of Ephemerata, a weekly-ish digest of ideas, learnings, links, and sounds.

I'm doing this to stimulate discussion around what I find interesting, and also to share things before they disappear into the void of my journal.

WETWARE OF WRITING AND DOING

This is a presentation I gave at Tools For Thought Rocks on how I use my apps to make things happen. The video and slides are available and there is also an expanded text version for anyone who wants to read. Here is an excerpt:

I talk often about my apps and their features, but rarely about how I use them day-to-day—partially to leave space for people to imagine their own workflows, but also because I didn't think it wouldn't be of interest to share mine. This changed after a conversation with pvh, who remarked that after reading the website for Launchlet and trying to play with the compose interface, it wasn't clear how all the parts came together until watching my tutorial videos—I found that interesting coming from someone who has plenty of experience with computer programming and its paradigms. It made me realize 1) that interfaces clearly communicating 'features' doesn't mean people appropriate them, 2) the importance of good affordances to help people go beyond merely 'using the app' to extending themselves in the process. The larger question to address here is: how can the environment better transmit what is possible so that those within it can take fuller advantage? It will likely take some time for me to find my own answers and implement them in projects, so for now, I feel motivated to do what is knowable and share more about how I use my apps to illuminate the wetware. What I find myself 'doing' most of the time involves […]

INTERVIEW WISDOM FROM THE WISE (via Tali)

[Every conversation has an arc.]

[Focus on how their brain is working.]

[You can't listen in anticipation of what you're expecting.]

[People tend to be close-minded about what they truly believe.]

❤️

If you would like to help me continue creating projects that are public, accessible for free, and open-source, consider becoming one of my financial backers.

THOUGHTS FROM THERAPY

[To feel unrestricted by what comes from outside without being isolated from what comes from outside.]

[Bitterness has its own life and doesn't let us be lightweight.]

[Indifference is love transformed, anger too. Self-love transforms into shame. Reactive emotions come from wounded love.]

EVENTS

• November 1—7, 2021: ✈️ Visiting Vancouver (reach out if you're around 👋🏼)
• November 10, 2021: Hosting remoteStorage monthly hangout
• November 20, 2021: Co-hosting Improvisation, spontaneity, and oneness with Vivek Thyagarajan
• November 24, 2021: Co-hosting Zero Data Swap #4: Hello World with Noel De Martin (looking for someone to make an easy example of remoteStorage or Fission's webnative)

ASIDES

Cory Doctorow's The Memex Method gave me much food for thought about writing, capturing, publishing. In relation to sharing (like what I'm doing right here) I notice my tendency to describe 'what it is' as opposed to 'the importance to me'—will try to work on that more.

[It's neither my last word nor a repetition of what I have to say.]

it represents the synthesis of recent events with a long run of earlier events, interventions, scandals and actions. Further, it represents the evolution of my ability to convey these complex and thorny ideas, based on the reception earlier pieces on the same subject received.

[If writing is about clarifying your thoughts, your older work will naturally make you cringe. But systematically reviewing older work to observe what you got wrong and right makes it easier to avoid your own pitfalls. The structure can even be a public recap of what happened 5, 10, and 15 years ago on this day.]

Jacob Collier improvises versions of 'Danny Boy' on the piano to never before seen index cards with names of emotions that become increasingly complex, while transitioning as smoothly as possible between one card to the next. I felt initially that this would be kind of a gimmick, but hearing his analysis after each set gives you a sense of how intertwined his improvisational process is with compositional thinking. I appreciate his 'handedness' with tonalities, modulations between keys, decorative devices. I'm always a fan of "giving people who aren't familiar with free improvisation a way into the concept".

This Global Clock uses letters of the alphabet to 'spell' time the same way across zones; I imagine that once you get used to the letters, you would not need to convert as much. Here's the best meeting time between Vancouver, New York, and Paris. (via @cinnamon@merveilles.town)

The idea is to have a unified time zone that works for all locations on earth by using the same time system we all know (24 hours, 60 minutes, 60 seconds) and adding on top of it a rotating UTC layer as the global time. This layer is presented in alphabet. The reason for that is to distinguish the local time in numbers from the global one in letters.

John O'Nolan from Ghost speaks on the Indie Hackers podcast about building Internet businesses with non-capitalist organizational structures.

[Blogging used to be writing about your experiences.]

[Use a paywall to give yourself space.]

[Enable an ecosystem of businesses to thrive around what you build.]

That's all folks!

Feel free to reply and share any reflections you might have, or just say hello. Have a great week 🙂.

Consider sharing on Twitter or WhatsApp or Email.

Originally presented at Tools for Thought Rocks on October 29, 2021 (with slides and timestamps). Below the video is an expanded text version of my presentation for anyone who prefers reading.

I talk often about my apps and their features, but rarely about how I use them day-to-day—partially to leave space for people to imagine their own workflows, but also because I didn't think it wouldn't be of interest to share mine. This changed after a conversation with pvh, who remarked that after reading the website for Launchlet and trying to play with the compose interface, it wasn't clear how all the parts came together until watching my tutorial videos—I found that interesting coming from someone who has plenty of experience with computer programming and its paradigms. It made me realize 1) that interfaces clearly communicating 'features' doesn't mean people appropriate them, 2) the importance of good affordances to help people go beyond merely 'using the app' to extending themselves in the process. The larger question to address here is: how can the environment better transmit what is possible so that those within it can take fuller advantage? It will likely take some time for me to find my own answers and implement them in projects, so for now, I feel motivated to do what is knowable and share more about how I use my apps to illuminate the wetware.

What I find myself 'doing' most of the time involves: making apps and websites; writing texts about personal experiences and interests; recording screencasts about programming; organizing online events; and generally working on personal projects. It all adds up, and to keep things from overwhelming me I practice a productivity trinity which can be summarized as:

1. Capture everything: get ideas out of your head as soon as possible.
2. Organize if needed: move it where you are likely to encounter it.
3. Purge: do it or delete it as soon as possible.

The mix of details below might seem chaotic, but they all relate to these three points in some way.

One objective of Capture everything is to keep going: I avoid interruptions like checking out links people send me and do everything later; it helps to maintain focus on whatever has my attention. Making time to read articles or watch videos can be a challenge and often gets neglected, but in my experience it usually happens eventually and delaying consumption has the benefit of obsoleting some things before you get to it. When there's a lot of collecting from streams or timelines and placing into queues help batch the process of reading, watching, listening, and writing, it helps to have a place to put things.

Most of my queues are digital now (although at one point I did write and organize my life with small pieces of paper): Pocket is for reading because it syncs with my e-reader (to read without internet access, and with something closer to paper than a screen, and without the distractions of my computer or phone), and for checking out websites because I like to close all my browser tabs as soon as possible; 1Feed is for newsletters (as it interrupts my flow to read long text while checking e-mail), and for following Internet things with a timeline presentation; Joybox is for audiovisual media segmented with tags for listening, watching, and passive consumption; Kommit is for words and phrases that I want to learn from foreign languages; Launchlet is for shortcuts and removing friction from workflows; Emoji Log is for personal tracking and time-bound journaling, like books I read or recipes I cook, or more personal thoughts and monitoring emotions. For everything else, there's Hyperdraft, which is mostly reference-oriented and not time-bound—it functions as: dashboards of to-dos for dozens of projects; space to mix private and public writing; an environment that spans the entire arc of 'capture, brainstorm, organize, outline, draft, write, publish' that is on all my devices and local-first, thus minimizing discontinuities from needing to be in a specific place or not having internet access; writing queues my for various newsletters and a templating system for Ephemerata; quick jot-pads for when I'm not sure where to put something; and a convenient place for Ideas increment automatically when they are captured.

All these queues provide, on the one hand, a sense of space that I find relaxing because there is a place to put things, and on the other hand, an uneasiness about being overwhelmed as they are easy to neglect and intentionally out of sight; the serenity is stronger when you trust yourself to attend to them. How does one maintain balance and create healthy rhythms for processing these queues? Many of my strategies help me avoid being 'completist' and find reasons to purge things when there's a backlog: if I read until the halfway point and haven't found anything interesting, if the video doesn't hold my attention, if I haven't moved on it in weeks, if it's expired or irrelevant now, into the void it goes. It took me a while to realize that 'delete' can mean "I don't want to be reminded of this"; we have to train digital systems to not show things 'forever'. I try to prune my lists frequently in addition to actually doing things, but it's hard for me to repeat at specific intervals as life tends to get in the way: I've found it useful to observe how I feel and find the cadence that works for me—we are not machines. One rhythm I frequently engage in with enthusiasm is work digress cycle.

I've been surprised at how this idea of queues helps me 'write without magic'. It feels like writing happens without great pain or earnestness, and I think of it reductively as "mostly just moving things around". Let's say there's 3% which is creative personal expression (that everyone has but in their own way), and 97% which is stuff that requires no talent, such as: capturing ideas as they occur, allowing details to passively collect over time, periodically perusing through the old to find potential connections to the new… Here the queues function like buckets collecting drips of water: some have zero drops, some have one, some have a few; eventually some have 'enough' or are overflowing and can be marked as prompts for finalizing, which for me implies taking a queue or list of items to sort, group, massage, tidy, and publish. It's easier than confronting a blank screen, or twiddling thumbs to figure out how to start, and showcases the power of Capturing creates a space for 'the answer to go': with little effort, I find myself having lots to write about, unintimidated by the process of finishing. I think everyone has the necessary pieces to do this, but most people get stuck in their 97%, which is a tractable problem that can be encroached upon by finding tools and workflows that fit, making things simpler or perhaps effortless, and cultivating calm spaces to write and reason that are free from judgement.

Understanding the wetware is not always obvious and I'm still not sure of how it should be presented, be it in words or an interface. I hope that with plenty of examples of how I use my apps, it helps unveil how they can be leveraged to do more. In the future, I would hope to integrate an understanding of my own processes into the onboarding of my software so that it doesn't require more than the experience of using the app to feel empowered by all its possibilities. I might summarize this first exploration as 1) collect, organize, purge with lots of queues, 2) let time work in your favour, and 3) spend time on what motivates you.

P.S. Thanks to Jess Martin and Tools for Thought Rocks community for the invitation to present, and the prompt—this wouldn't exist if it wasn't for your concept of 'Workflow Walkthroughs' 🙏🏽.

P.P.S. For anyone who made it this far, please enjoy this short video of my old-time analog to-do dashboard.

I talk often about my apps, but rarely about how I use them to make things happen. Going share some of my process on October 29th at Tools for Thought Rocks.

ToolsForThought.Rocks October Meeting

Video for the event with timestamps and links below. See also the chat log.

A while ago, after years of being "analytics-free", I decided to try Plausible Analytics and I want to share what led me to start thinking differently.

The original provocation was learning that Photopea, despite financial success as a one-person operation, earns most of its revenue from advertising and only four percent of its revenue from subscriptions or memberships. Considering that I am trying to finance my own sustainability directly via the people using the app, I thought it curious that this income equalled a sort of 'minimum wage' despite being a well-known, high-traffic project. I don't intend or know how to make something as complex and deep as a Photoshop clone, and so I wondered if I would have fewer opportunities than this—perhaps I need to be open to selling ads at some point in the future, if that's what it takes to keep content freely accessible on the web. (On the other hand, I believe it's better to avoid comparing yourself to others and complexity is not synonymous with income, but I'm not sure how to think about all this at the moment).

Another reason is that I had a hard time turning garbage numbers like 'requests' (which include bots and counts multiple files for each pageload) into something that gives me an idea of 'how many people are actually looking at this?'. I believe in talking to the people who use what you make, but I think many (or most?) people don't have time to write in their impressions, and so this will always be smaller by a magnitude you cannot know; there is value in passive feedback and I think most people would prefer this if it's done with purpose.

So far it feels good. I aggregate visitors to various projects into a single picture. It's nice to have more meaningful numbers and to find out about interesting places that link to you, like this Brazilian guy's tech blog. One of my 100 steps to success, still in-progress, is to track your growth over time, and this is another way to do that.

I hesitated all these years because Google Analytics has become a form of surveillance capitalism, and this taints most other approaches to analytics (or at least our perceptions of it). How can this be remedied? Does it help to use open-source technology? Or if the company hosting the technology aligns with your values? Collecting data generally requires trust because one cannot verify beyond the 'privacy policy'—what about being transparent and just showing what one collects?

Similar to Buttondown, which I use to send mailing lists, I dig the spirit behind the project and its team and would like to lend my support. All this feels holistic so far, but I'm open to having my mind changed again. What do you think?

Originally posted in Ephemerata #014.

Welcome to the nineteenth edition of Ephemerata, a weekly-ish digest of links, ideas, learnings, and sounds that I think are worth sharing.

I'm doing this to stimulate discussion around what I find interesting, and also to share things before they disappear into the void of my journal.

(Lots of writing in this one, sorry if it's overloading, I missed sending last week… Will try to balance more in the future.)

COMMUNITY ESSENCE

Reflecting on why events are work, I realize that the exhaustion comes from doing too much on my own. And in thinking about how to be more collaborative in what I do, I'm starting to notice an issue in my way of thinking: I start from the perspective of "X, Y, and Z are all important to the project's success, and since there doesn't seem to be anyone volunteering, I guess I'll just do it." It might be the case that I'm taking initiative or being proactive, but it seems as if my vision of involving others is to start by completing the work of six people, and then wait until individuals appear to fill particular roles (like promoting, note-taking, audiovisual editing, logistics coordinating, etc…). This is perhaps a bit backwards in this context, creating a failure mode where people would contribute in my way as opposed to theirs, thus not seeing themselves in the collaboration, thus likely not even getting involved to begin with. Rather than having pre-defined slots that someone can conform to, a more vibrant community approach would enable people to create their own possibilities for contribution.

In thriving communities like Precious Plastic or Interintellect, it seems like the leaders activate others to become leaders as opposed to doing everything solo. Compare "doing narrowly-scoped tasks in someone's project" with "starting a recycling centre" or "self-organizing an event for group conversation". What does it take to afford someone maximally radiating their individual expression within a shared purpose? One way I'm exploring this is to have a constant reminder near my to-do lists which encourages me to [somewhat extremely] "avoid doing anything unless it involves another person." I don't recommend that framing for everyone, it certainly has its issues, but I'm ready to try something really different after being in a solo phase for such a long time.

My long-standing unawareness of these dynamics may have something to do with being a digital native or 'very online', as I might be more susceptible to the ways in which technology can mislead. Only now do I understand that the 'forum' or 'chat' is not 'where the community is'. This might be obvious to many readers, but it's tempting for people like me to interpret platform metrics as an indicator of community-ness: a place may seem to have few posts or little public activity, but things might be happening in private channels or offline, and a place with a flurry of interaction risks being superficial or spammy. Content is not community in the same way that the map is not the territory.

To understand where the essence of community is, I found it useful to imagine a more low-tech approach to organizing events, perhaps for an offline in-person gathering. "Let's get together and go into that thing that gets us going." You might reach out to people you know via phone calls, or while running into them somewhere along your way, and ask them to also invite others in the same manner. No announcements, no notifications, no social media posts, no recording, no summary, no place to leave a comment: just whatever happens together. In this scenario, the community exists in interactions with one another, with no digital representations that can imply otherwise. Despite being a very online community, Interintellect exemplifies this well as, the 'substance' of it doesn't really have a digital representation: you need to attend a salon and experience the interactions with other members to understand the essence of it.

Let's contrast this with a high-tech approach like the GitHub platform, where an enormous amount of software is being built collaboratively. Although many projects successfully advance with collective effort, much of the long tail suffers from lack of contributions, or burnout from too many contributions and interface anti-patterns; collaboration begins via "Issues" (reporting a problem) or "Pull Requests" (suggesting changes you made), as opposed to making a personal connection. When everything is a digital representation and it's rare to have moments together, the essence is in the back-and-forth of discussion threads and editing files, which is a bit more abstract than 'getting to know one another' or 'inviting the people who would make it more meaningful'. It has been a struggle for me to model the methods of collaboration incentivized by this platform in my own projects, until I realized that it's better to just ignore all of them and start somewhere more interpersonal, perhaps fill the togetherness void with my own solution. What are good affordances for community in a platform like this? And what is the software encouraging? If the basis of community is relating to one another, I think it happens on GitHub in spite of the software, not because of it. For me, considering more analog approaches helps me interact more meaningfully in this kind of pure digital space.

I don't have a clear conclusion to all this at the moment, but these reflections are giving me a new perspective on community essence. Letting people come as they are and share what they have to offer allows for them to be better represented in the process. I would avoid paying too much attention to what software wants you to do, think, or feel, and start with personal connection, perhaps considering how it would come about without the Internet. Community is a verb and it exists in doing with others, more-so than in its representations.

P. S. If you wonder about how we are affected by patterns that come from technology platforms, come join Vidhika Bansal and I on October 23rd for a group discussion called Are Apps Making Us Better Or Worse?.

❤️

If you would like to help me continue creating projects that are public, accessible for free, and open-source, consider becoming one of my financial backers.

THIRTY-THREE

I started an annual birthday reflection last week.

GOING DOORLESS

I fleshed out some ideas about apps as public spaces, with a more detailed vision for how they can become as shareable as most Internet content.

EVENTS

I'll be travelling a bit in the next few weeks, please hit me up if you're around 🙂.

• October 19—24, 2021: 🚘 Visiting Montreal 👋🏼
• October 20, 2021: Hosting remoteStorage monthly hangout
• October 23, 2021: Co-hosting Are Apps Making Us Better Or Worse? with Vidhika Bansal
• October 27, 2021: Co-hosting Zero Data Swap #3: Maker Meet with cblgh
• November 1—7, 2021: ✈️ Visiting Vancouver 👋🏼

ASIDES

Edward Loveall made something wonderful called Scribe, which lets you read articles on Medium with much less suffering by simply changing the link, slightly. Here's an example using one of my favourite posts by Anthony Bourdain: https://medium.com/parts-unknown/guns-and-green-chile-3a019b1f5bc1

I've been slowly working through Tim Urban's series on how society has become so polarized. So far I'm at the third chapter which has an interesting framing of stories as viruses: (via Omar Shehata)

[Viable story viruses need to be teachable and understandable for simplicity, hard to disprove and specific as absolute truth for conviction, and applicable to a wide range of people for spreadability.]

[To drive behaviour of its host, story viruses needs promises of pleasure or pain to create incentives, claims that your behaviour will be known to facilitate accountability, coverage of the spectrum that humans believe for comprehensiveness.]

[Story evolution favours the hosts who survive.]

[Having a supreme leader and identifying yourself with the story ('I am a [story]ist') creates the tribal mindset that enables larger groups of humans to act in concert.]

Kat Vellos' Alternatives to "How are you?" provides some other options for a question I've had difficulty with for a while. I prefer asking more specifically about someone's life, but I don't judge it anymore as I understand it's not really about the words but the movement between people to connect. If you have other suggestions, I'd love to hear them. Here are some of my favourites: (via Cassandra Zawilski)

What’s top of mind for you right now?
…
What did you do today?
…
It’s good to hear your voice.
…
How’s your heart today?

Jacob Collier shares an anecdote about making a song for each of the multiplication tables when he was younger. No further comment.

That's all folks!

Feel free to reply and share any reflections you might have, or just say hello. Have a great week 🙂.

If you enjoyed this, please consider sharing on Twitter or WhatsApp or Email.

Reflecting on why events are work, I realize that the exhaustion comes from doing too much on my own. And in thinking about how to be more collaborative in what I do, I'm starting to notice an issue in my way of thinking: I start from the perspective of "X, Y, and Z are all important to the project's success, and since there doesn't seem to be anyone volunteering, I guess I'll just do it." It might be the case that I'm taking initiative or being proactive, but it seems as if my vision of involving others is to start by completing the work of six people, and then wait until individuals appear to fill particular roles (like promoting, note-taking, audiovisual editing, logistics coordinating, etc…). This is perhaps a bit backwards in this context, creating a failure mode where people would contribute in my way as opposed to theirs, thus not seeing themselves in the collaboration, thus likely not even getting involved to begin with. Rather than having pre-defined slots that someone can conform to, a more vibrant community approach would enable people to create their own possibilities for contribution.

In thriving communities like Precious Plastic or Interintellect, it seems like the leaders activate others to become leaders as opposed to doing everything solo. Compare "doing narrowly-scoped tasks in someone's project" with "starting a recycling centre" or "self-organizing an event for group conversation". What does it take to afford someone maximally radiating their individual expression within a shared purpose? One way I'm exploring this is to have a constant reminder near my to-do lists which encourages me to [somewhat extremely] "avoid doing anything unless it involves another person." I don't recommend that framing for everyone, it certainly has its issues, but I'm ready to try something really different after being in a solo phase for such a long time.

My long-standing unawareness of these dynamics may have something to do with being a digital native or 'very online', as I might be more susceptible to the ways in which technology can mislead. Only now do I understand that the 'forum' or 'chat' is not 'where the community is'. This might be obvious to many readers, but it's tempting for people like me to interpret platform metrics as an indicator of community-ness: a place may seem to have few posts or little public activity, but things might be happening in private channels or offline, and a place with a flurry of interaction risks being superficial or spammy. Content is not community in the same way that the map is not the territory.

To understand where the essence of community is, I found it useful to imagine a more low-tech approach to organizing events, perhaps for an offline in-person gathering. "Let's get together and go into that thing that gets us going." You might reach out to people you know via phone calls, or while running into them somewhere along your way, and ask them to also invite others in the same manner. No announcements, no notifications, no social media posts, no recording, no summary, no place to leave a comment: just whatever happens together. In this scenario, the community exists in interactions with one another, with no digital representations that can imply otherwise. Despite being a very online community, Interintellect exemplifies this well as, the 'substance' of it doesn't really have a digital representation: you need to attend a salon and experience the interactions with other members to understand the essence of it.

Let's contrast this with a high-tech approach like the GitHub platform, where an enormous amount of software is being built collaboratively. Although many projects successfully advance with collective effort, much of the long tail suffers from lack of contributions, or burnout from too many contributions and interface anti-patterns; collaboration begins via "Issues" (reporting a problem) or "Pull Requests" (suggesting changes you made), as opposed to making a personal connection. When everything is a digital representation and it's rare to have moments together, the essence is in the back-and-forth of discussion threads and editing files, which is a bit more abstract than 'getting to know one another' or 'inviting the people who would make it more meaningful'. It has been a struggle for me to model the methods of collaboration incentivized by this platform in my own projects, until I realized that it's better to just ignore all of them and start somewhere more interpersonal, perhaps fill the togetherness void with my own solution. What are good affordances for community in a platform like this? And what is the software encouraging? If the basis of community is relating to one another, I think it happens on GitHub in spite of the software, not because of it. For me, considering more analog approaches helps me interact more meaningfully in this kind of pure digital space.

I don't have a clear conclusion to all this at the moment, but these reflections are giving me a new perspective on community essence. Letting people come as they are and share what they have to offer allows for them to be better represented in the process. I would avoid paying too much attention to what software wants you to do, think, or feel, and start with personal connection, perhaps considering how it would come about without the Internet. Community is a verb and it exists in doing with others, more-so than in its representations.

Originally published in Ephemerata #020.

Rosano and cblgh and invite you to a show-and-tell. Come and share what projects you’re working on: experiments, works-in-progress & under construction, mundane or extraordinary—anything goes, as long as it’s yours~

See also the previous swap.

Summary

Over a dozen people attended or presented a wide range of software and hardware projects. We took collaborative notes with HackMD, tracked seven-minute timers with DuckDuckGo, and determined the order of presentations via Python's Random.shuffle().

hoody: 'moderator'

Running collaborative tools on low-power devices, indestructible distributed 4chan dark-net market place, quick to disappear, using tech from Aljoscha Meyer.

cinnamon: Earthstar

• inspired by trying to fix scuttlebut ui/ux issues that run deep
  • device-oriented over people-oriented, can't use same identity on different devices
  • processing the entire backlog is network/storage/cpu intense, slow
  • immutability is not good for a social network. what's safe to say today might not be safe tomorrow, need to be able to delete stuff
  • need to be able to download a subset of data related to stuff you care about
• earthstar fixes all of the above
  • people-oriented identity, can log in from multiple devices
  • can download a subset of data as needed
  • everything is mutable and can be deleted by author
  • also can have mutable docs that anyone can edit
  • designed for small groups, ~100 people, separated into "workspaces". not a big single global network.
  • trying to use simple boring technology as much as possible
  • very detailed specification: https://earthstar-docs.netlify.app/docs/reference/earthstar-specification
• simple CRDT last writer wins merge strategy. Better CRDTs exist but are complicated, we decided to use the simplest one
• every peer has a copy of the data they care about. pubs exist to get around firewalls; they are just peers in the cloud.
• goal: pubs are easy to run by community members, keep governance as local as possible, avoid moderations external to local community
• pubs are easy to run, push buttons on glitch, no need to use a command line, pub owner has no power, can only turn it off, can have multiple pubs run by different people for redundancy
• zero data event with rosano at some later point?
• cinnamon stepping down for health reasons, looking for contributors

mix: ssb-crut

Pre-recorded presentation.

juha

Wants to track carbon via Zero Data apps and integrate with Home Assistant.

mauve: hypergodot

P2P for godot game engine.

• avoid managing server-stuff for games by using hypercore https://hypercore-protocol.org
• works like bittorrent: downloads your platform binary, gateway gets spawned, game sends http requests to gateway for doing p2p; user just plays game, dev just imports node to scene graph
• https://github.com/RangerMauve/hyper-gateway
• https://github.com/RangerMauve/hypercore-fetch
• https://github.com/hyperswarm/hyperswarm

rosano: automated testing via github actions

gwil: letterbox

• runs anywhere javascript runs (browser, node, deno)
• would be great to have libraries in other languages, shouldn't be hard to port to another language
  • refer to the detailed spec: https://earthstar-docs.netlify.app/docs/reference/earthstar-specification/
• and join our discord: https://discord.gg/RGsvu9a9

cblgh: lieu

a community search engine

• code: https://github.com/cblgh/lieu
• thread of recent feature update: https://twitter.com/cblgh/status/1455197377065799689

nanomonkey: recipe manager

UI works with both keyboard and mouse

• frontend https://github.com/nanomonkey/scratch
• backend https://github.com/nanomonkey/ssb%5Fclj%5Frepl

Chat

13:36 cblgh says: order ['hoody', 'juha', 'mauve', 'fellow jitsi', 'cinn', 'mix', 'rosano', 'cblgh', 'gwil']
13:39 Mauve says: https://agregore.mauve.moe/
13:40 cblgh says: https://merveilles.town/web/accounts/57295 <-- amatecha
13:42 cinnamon says: https://github.com/earthstar-project/earthstar
13:42 cinnamon says: p.s. I use they/them pronouns
13:44 cblgh says: (updated order: ['hoody', 'juha', 'mauve', 'fellow jitsi', 'cinn', 'mix', 'rosano', 'cblgh', 'gwil', 'geoffrey', 'interfect'])
13:44 cblgh says: o ya he/him/they i guess 😃
13:44 rosano says: he/they
13:46 Juha Autero says: he/they also
13:48 rosano says: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=timer+7+min&ia=answer
13:49 cblgh says: https://github.com/AljoschaMeyer/bamboo
13:49 cblgh says: https://collapseos.org/
13:55 cblgh says: o/ nanomonkey 😃
13:56 gwil says: fully sick
14:07 cblgh says: https://github.com/AljoschaMeyer
14:07 cblgh says: https://github.com/fraction/oasis
14:07 cblgh says: https://github.com/earthstar-project/earthstar
14:09 nanomonkey says: So, I built the first two boards for the disaster radio project. I have some experience with building Lora antannas in Kicad if you need any help.
14:10 interfect says: Thanks!
14:12 cblgh says: https://cblgh.org/trustnet/
14:12 cblgh says: (pardon the orange halloween theme x)
14:16 hoody says: earthstar is dope
14:17 cblgh says: https://buntimer-earthstar.netlify.com
14:21 cinnamon says: https://earthstar-demo-pub-v6-a.glitch.me/
14:21 cinnamon says: https://github.com/earthstar-project/earthstar-pub
14:21 cblgh says: https://gitlab.com/ahau/lib/ssb-crut
14:21 cblgh says: https://ahau.io/
14:22 nanomonkey says: Any suggestions on how to get mics working? I've tried all the options available through jitsi that I can find.
14:23 cblgh says: hm not sure 😕 replug it probably, or try chrome and see if that does it?
14:23 gwil says: which browser are you on? safari always gives me trouble
14:23 rosano says: @nanomonkey i think you probably did it right, maybe try a different browser?
14:23 nanomonkey says: firefox
14:23 rosano says: yea safari doesn't work for me
14:23 nanomonkey says: on llnux
14:24 Mauve says: I'm on Firefox on Linux and I think my mic works FWIW.
14:24 Mauve says: I'm guessing your mic gain is up and your system is seeing stuff when you try to test it outside the browser?
14:25 cblgh says: once i had to click on the lil tab above the mic and pic another microphone, cause it was picking up a different one
14:25 cblgh says: (guess you already tried that tho!)
14:25 cblgh says: hey cryptix 😃
14:25 cblgh says: we're streaming mix (not sure if you can see it)
14:26 cryptix says: hey ya'll!
14:26 cryptix says: yea i can. sorry for being late.. i somehow messed up writing down the wrong time
14:26 cblgh says: nw 😃
14:26 rosano says: timezones are complicated… but thanks for being here, be welcome 😃
14:27 Juha Autero says: nanomankey: Does addressbar show that you have granted extra permissions on website?
14:27 cblgh says: boost ON
14:27 amatecha says: oh wow I figured out how to set name and use chat. woot
14:28 cblgh says: (mix gave me permission to 1.25x it once it got close to the 7 min work fwiw 😃
14:28 rosano says: dj alex
14:31 cblgh says: 💿😎
14:31 cblgh says: https://github.com/mixmix/ssb-crut-demo
14:31 cblgh says: if anyone wants to rewatch it it's here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=URIUbupxxU4
14:31 cblgh says: ['hoody', 'juha', 'mauve', 'fellow jitsi', 'cinn', 'mix', 'rosano', 'cblgh', 'gwil', 'geoffrey', 'interfect', 'nanomonkey', 'cryptix']
14:35 hoody says: getting super flaky net here at y homeboys house
14:35 hoody says: heading back to home and trying again
14:36 Mauve says: lol, I can't share screen from Agregore yet since I haven't implemented the UI for it. 😂
14:36 rosano says: #browsergoals
14:41 cblgh says: i guess this
14:41 https://www.home-assistant.io/ :^)
14:41 rosano says: https://www.home-assistant.io
14:42 Mauve says: Just confirming with the person I'm meeting though
14:44 cblgh says: https://godotengine.org/
14:44 cblgh says: https://github.com/RangerMauve/hypergodot
14:45 nanomonkey says: Juha, there is a couple of libraries in Python for opening and writing to excel files. This might help you out.
14:45 nanomonkey says: Pandas can do it directly and has lots of support.
14:46 cblgh says: (also known as dat previously : )
14:46 cblgh says: https://hypercore-protocol.org/
14:46 amatecha says: oohhh (didn’t know dat was “rebranded”!)
14:47 Juha Autero says: I'm experienced Python programmer. What I'm trying to learn is javascript frameworks.
14:47 rosano says: "as little as possible to make stuff just work" all the things
14:50 cblgh says: big brain energy
14:51 Mauve says: https://github.com/RangerMauve/hyper-gateway
14:51 Mauve says: https://github.com/RangerMauve/hypercore-fetch
15:00 cblgh says: https://github.com/hyperswarm/hyperswarm
15:00 cblgh says: https://hyperdraft.rosano.ca
15:00 cblgh says: https://github.com/sveltejs/svelte
15:02 cblgh says: https://www.cypress.io/
15:04 Mauve says: K, gotta go. TY folks!
15:06 cblgh says: gwil u can go ahead of me if you want 😃
15:06 gwil says: I'll take you up on that
15:09 gwil says: https://earthstar-letterbox.netlify.app/join/earthstar:///?workspace=+plaza.prm27p8eg65c&pub=https://earthstar-demo-pub-6b.fly.dev&pub=https://earthstar-demo-pub-v6-a.glitch.me&v=1
15:13 cblgh says: (i love the pocket terminology that gwil is putting into action here)
15:13 cblgh says: if u remember (from cinn): to participate u gotta make an identity, and then you click on "join plaza" or whatever at the bottom!
15:14 rosano says: local-first!
15:16 cblgh says: 👏👏👏
15:16 rosano says: ❤️
15:18 hoody says: back on track. hallo cryptix
15:19 cblgh says: wb!
15:20 gwil says: https://discord.gg/RGsvu9a9 <-- earthstar discord
15:20 cblgh says: remaining potential presentations [ 'cblgh', 'nanomonkey', 'cryptix']
15:20 gwil says: cinnamon's docS are NUTS
15:22 rosano says: https://lieu.cblgh.org
15:23 Juha Autero says: Accidentally closed tab.
15:26 rosano says: ooooh lala
15:26 hoody says: any preferred thing to do to make your site lieu friendly?
15:27 gwil says: yeah, is there a way for it to handle browser-rendered apps / pipe data in?
15:28 cblgh says: p:first-of-type
15:28 gwil says: A whole new industry of dark web SEO
15:29 hoody says: heh heh
15:29 hoody says: how about a button you could display
15:29 hoody says: oldskool, part of webring / use lieu here
15:30 cblgh says: oh ya, like ready made?
15:32 hoody says: yup, to help people find this thing
15:32 hoody says: neocities friendly stuff, simple
15:32 hoody says: https://vmx.cx/cgi-bin/blog/index.cgi/category/Noise
15:32 hoody says: might be handy soehow
15:32 hoody says: somehow
15:32 gwil says: thanks everyone, I've got to run!
15:33 hoody says: cheers gwil
15:33 cblgh says: am i the only one that can't see it?
15:33 cryptix says: nope
15:33 amatecha says: i see nothing lol
15:33 Juha Autero says: me neither
15:34 cblgh says: now we're good
15:34 Juha Autero says: now i can see
15:45 cblgh says: varasanos og
15:45 cblgh says: https://www.varasanos.com/PizzaRecipe.htm
15:45 cblgh says: this guy is so serious, check out his site to learn everything about making pizza
15:45 cblgh says: related: just found out about this markup language for recipes today https://cooklang.org/
15:45 cblgh says: high yield recipe
15:45 cblgh says: https://clojurescript.org/
15:45 cblgh says: https://valueflo.ws/
15:45 cblgh says: https://bob.mikorizal.org/users/bhaugen
15:45 cblgh says: (bob's fedi)
15:45 cblgh says: https://github.com/ssb-ngi-pointer/ssb-db2
15:47 hoody says: it's snowing here, got some cocoa and cryptix explaining stuff on the headphones, this is cool
15:49 cblgh says: ohh wow
15:49 cblgh says: just arctic circle things
15:49 cblgh says: https://github.com/nanomonkey/scratch
15:49 cblgh says: https://github.com/nanomonkey/ssb%5Fclj%5Frepl
15:52 hoody says: ssbCRUD
15:52 hoody says: i think many people are interested in running ssb as distributed key-val store
15:52 cryptix says: +1
15:54 nanomonkey says: What ssb client are folks using these days?
15:54 cblgh says: still patchwork x)
15:54 hoody says: is there a zero data manifesto somewhere?
15:54 hoody says: patchwork
15:55 rosano says: @hoody some principles at https://0data.app
15:55 hoody says: cheers rosano
15:57 amatecha says: \o/
15:59 cryptix says: also nano, feel free to mention me with these questions
15:59 nanomonkey says: will do
15:59 cryptix says: also sure cel would be down to answer - also req criquets: like gwil said, somethomes these threads just vanish
15:59 rosano says: https://chat.rosano.ca/t/zero-data-swap-3-maker-meet-october-27-2021/44
15:59 rosano says: https://0data.app
16:00 hoody says: super cool, thanks for doing this
16:00 hoody says: cu!

I have thirty-three years today and feel inspired by Matt Mullenweg's "birthday posts" to start an annual reflection. As an alternative to end-of-year recaps where tons of people write and publish simultaneously, I think it would be interesting to collectively spread out these musings over the course of a year to 'balance the load', create more serendipity, and give friends opportunities to connect and be thoughtful.

To my fortune, almost every year I notice a feeling of being 'at the edge of myself'—not having anticipated to be where I am, not knowing what the future holds—and yet looking forward to jumping head first into tomorrow. As much as it feels challenging sometimes, I continue to be grateful for having a chance to pursue this path and wouldn't trade it for anything. But what's special about this year?

One thread is a feeling of more openness to people and possibilities. In the last year, I've shed a lot of psychological baggage so that I can travel lighter and have more space (for you, and us). Doing therapy regularly has helped me understand myself better and be more conscious of my internal mechanisms. I feel more mellow, relaxed, chill. I feel more capable of engaging with people I disagree with, ready to build social bridges.

It has historically been hard for me to connect with my body, given how much time I spend thinking, planning, structuring, whether in the mind, at the computer, or while doing almost anything else, and this is on top of a societal pressure that tends to view people as 'walking brains'. Recently, I've taken Pat Metheny's musical advice about 'practising until it's more natural to do it than not do it' and applied it to deep breathing. It's no longer a ceremony to mentally engage with but something that I train my muscles to remember—I find myself doing it at scattered moments throughout the day, a few seconds here and there, and it makes my body feel more accessible, less ethereal.

Musically, I was surprised to find myself playing and singing guitar in front of people. It was small but this was an incredibly significant performance for me, as I managed to enjoy being a musician for the first time in years. I feel unlocked to explore music in a totally different way, inchoate, without being too concerned with Mr. Music Institution's disapproving finger wag.

This was the year I started calling myself a writer. I probably wrote and published more text in the last year than in my entire life. Writing has clearly become for me the way I process my experience: it's through documenting my thoughts that I understand what I think, and it's the medium that feels most malleable and expressive. I enjoy finding interesting ways to phrase things, sharing stories, crystallizing a perspective, feeding my inner language nerd… I've always avoided writing on a set schedule for fear of drafting something superficially, but I have so many motivating prompts that I would like to give regular publishing a try, at least for a while.

The final change I would draw attention to is that after years, maybe decades, of going alone on most things, I'm finally taking steps towards going together. It's still at the beginning stages but I'm managing two forums for group discussion, hosting multiple monthly events, and organizing a salon on apps with my first co-host. It was hard to imagine myself breaking out of individualist patterns, but I can start to see some cracks now.

All this feels like being in the midst of abundant possibility: the past year of constantly planting seeds has yielded new fruits. The list of things that came into existence includes my funding system, Zero Data, friendship with Fission, Emoji Log, Joybox, The Café, Ephemerata, Easy Indie App, and various Interintellect salons. I still feel fertile with creative potential. I'm meeting more new people than usual, making new friends. I always wanted to have a 'show' interviewing people, and this might emerge soon as a podcast. I'm looking forward to travelling again, returning to Brazil someday. Even with few certainties, I think everything's going to be fine.

Thanks for reading and being here. I hope this was a nice surprise for you. Today was pretty sunny, so I'm reflecting some rays your way.

All birthday posts: 33, 34

Interintellects Vidhika Bansal and Rosano invite you to reflect on the pivotal role technology plays in our lives, the trade-offs of its everpresence, and finding balance in the digital world.

Are Apps Making Us Better Or Worse?

Nowadays, so many goods, services, and experiences are just a tap or click away.

Need a ride to the airport? There’s an app for that. Want dinner delivered to your doorstep? There’s an app for that. Looking for someone to go on a date with, or maybe even “the one”? There’s an app for that too. (You get the idea.)

As apps and other digital experiences continue to become increasingly present in our lives, it becomes hard to deny their influence — both good and bad — on how, and maybe even who, we are.

We know technology has changed us and our interactions with others, but in what ways? What societal patterns existed before software ate the world? What do they look like now? What might we want them to look like?

✨

Some questions we might explore in this salon:

• Are the various digital experiences we interact with getting better or worse?
• Have we become more or less connected than we were before? How so?
• How does hyperabundance change our relationships with one another?
• In what ways has our use of technology evolved during the pandemic?
• Where and how might we create healthy connections digitally?
• How can we build a greater consciousness for how interfaces affect us?

✨

Suggested pre-salon reading + watching:

Screens doubled as babysitters during lockdown. What now? (The Guardian)

Appocalypse: Can you imagine a world without apps? (WWDC 2017 Snippet on Youtube)

Are neighborhood watch apps making us safer? (Quartz)

One surprising way using a smartphone strengthens your brain (Inverse)

Does technology cut us off from other people? (Berkeley’s Greater Good Magazine)

Further reading:

Neil Postman: Amusing Ourselves to Death

Alex Danco: The Audio Revolution

✨

Additional notes

Image attribution: Photo by Hugh Han on Unsplash

If you have any difficulty participating due to financial reasons, send us a message and we’ll buy your ticket.

Hope to see you there!

Summary

Our conversation was wide-ranging, and perhaps too broad: at times it felt hard to sink our teeth into such a large topic that is so all-encompassing; maybe better to focus on a specific domain like dating apps. Satisfying however to exchange ideas and hear everyone's perspective—we're both glad to have sparked the conversation.

Blame the design

It's common for people to blame themselves when technology doesn't work ("I didn't understand the interface, it must be that I'm not very smart; I'm not good at computers; I should have known better how to use the software."). This conceals the power and privilege designers and others involved product development have to create environments where we can thrive or struggle. How can we understand design as something omnipresent, or as a language with which we can all become more familiar? How can we see the water we're all swimming (swiping) in?

Conflicting experiences

Witnessing passing of life ceremonies via Zoom provokes many questions: How would the dying feel to have cameras filming their last breaths? How does choosing to record impact feelings of psychological safety and closure? How does it feel when the same app can function as a means of 'equal representation' on a group call, as well as an enabler of misinformation?

Connectivity has the advantage of putting us in contact with more people, but: How present are we? How do we set boundaries and control notifications? How do we handle any feeling that digital experiences are less 'real' or 'tangible' than their analog counterparts? Are they less real?

Societal pressures

Many people feel the need to check their phone when alone or while standing in an elevator as a way of signalling that they're normal, as phones are sometimes used as a means of avoiding awkwardness or small talk or even human interaction. Why is it strange or exceptional to do nothing? What if it was normal to stop and smell the flowers?

Accessibility

People can have different experiences of the same interface. We’re all temporarily abled: making things accessible improves the experience for everyone. Curbs help people in wheelchairs, but also parents with strollers, someone with luggage, deliveries via trolley. Labels on icons can remind sighted people of what a button does. Designing an interface to be used with one hand can help someone with a cast, or a parent carrying a child in their arms.

Emojis are not accessible for everyone, and following best practices can help make text more readable.

To connect or not

Humans are social, but many people are often just waiting for an invitation. Headphones are an example of a social cue that some people use to communicate wanting to be left alone: is there a moment where it makes sense to interrupt and connect? Being at networking events or having a public Calendly is like signalling that you are open to meeting people.

What is real?

Having time to edit yourself can give you a platform to express more precisely, which might be harder in real-time conversation. Writing as a medium can be a way to look at oneself in the mirror and refine so that it matches what’s inside.

'Reading the room' is more challenging virtually because we can't see everyone's reactions at the same time. Physical space makes it easier to see how someone ‘moves through the world’, to see them in context. Digital makes it harder to glean non-verbal cues as easily as in meatspace. IRL can be a sort of "blue check".

Make noise when something’s not right

Companies may not officially offer support via social media, but they may still pay attention to feedback and aggregate it. Be vocal if something isn’t working as expected.

Rituals

Streaks can be something to aspire to and quantify how much you’ve put your values into action, they can help build self-trust. Rituals are a signal to yourself of what your values are, as things are easy to say and not cheap to do: compare saying "I like to exercise" with "I lifted three times a week for the last six months."

Ideas and strategies

Imagine a dating app with progressive disclosure, where you see more about someone the more you engage meaningfully. Familiarity breeds liking.

Getting a new phone provides a rare opportunity to start with a clean slate, and make choices for which apps are really needed. On your existing phone, you might delete apps not used within a certain period to lighten cognitive load. Perhaps go all the way to installing for specific moments and deleting them after to make intention super deliberate.

Through awareness, we gain control. If we know something isn't working for us, we can play with the constraints: hashtags emerged from popular usage. "Use the medium."

Welcome to the eighteenth edition of Ephemerata, a weekly-ish digest of links, ideas, learnings, and sounds that I think are worth sharing.

I’m doing this to stimulate discussion around what I find interesting, and also to share things before they disappear into the void of my journal.

Thanks to Reef for contributing to my Open Collective last week.

EVENTS ARE WORK

This year has marked the beginning of a shift in my approach: from doing virtually everything solo towards more collectivity and collaboration; the transition has barely begun and is still quite slow as I rewire myself to avoid what has become natural and automatic after over a decade’s practice. I have been thinking and learning about community for longer, but started taking concrete steps around May 9th with the creation of a forum and this newsletter, places with potential to become larger than me.

An important part of this shift has been to bring people together in the form of events, so I looked around me to see where I could contribute. remoteStorage is one of the primary technologies I use in my apps, so I began hosting monthly hangouts. Zero Data seems to be flying away from my nest and turning into a community project, so I started to facilitate some swap meets. I also enjoy getting to know Interintellect, which is a community of people that come together in self-organized group conversations (salons) about eclectic topics, and so I have strived to regularly host my own salons.

Although I have some prior experience with running events, I somehow didn’t anticipate how overwhelmed and fatigued I would eventually feel by doing so many of these. I remember thinking to myself: “it’s just conversations about stuff I’m immersed in, all I have to do is show up and do my thing, no big deal.” To give a sense of the work, from before to after: pre-event involves coordination with others, documenting and framing with text that others can understand, letting interested people know, making announcements at specific times before the event, calming any mental anguish about zero people possibly attending; the event itself involves mentally preparing and blocking out time in the day, being present and ideally taking notes on the conversation, remembering to hit the record button if that’s a thing, hopefully add something insightful to the discussion; post-event involves thanking and outreach, summarizing the notes, editing the recording, publishing in multiple relevant places and sharing that. What I thought of as one hour of spontaneous conversation implies about two days of preparation and two days of recapitulation, and as this happens about three times a month, it feels like three out of four weeks in each month are write-offs, with time and energy only for random unrelated things that need to get done and not much for making apps or advancing on projects.

In reflecting on how to remedy this imbalance, I think it makes sense (for now) to just keep doing the events. One form of stress comes from always feeling like I’m ‘supposed’ to be doing my ‘real work’ on projects, which went from receiving ‘All Available Daylight Hours’ to ‘Not Even One Iota’ for consecutive weeks—as someone used to having freedom over how I spend my time, this was hard to grapple with. But I thought recently: maybe it’s fine for my ‘primary commitment’ of app-making to be supplanted by something else for a while. Maybe this makes getting other people involved an imperative to progress. After years of working so hard on the same thing, perhaps it would be good to do something different for a while.

A friend rightly reminded me how new this is: a couple of months ago I wanted to be more social and collective, and now I’m putting it into action; it’s worth taking time to acknowledge this progress, maybe even celebrate. I’ve certainly been enjoying meeting new people and creating spaces where new things can be said. The skills and experience are both useful, but I’d still prefer to delegate so much more, so please reach out if you’d like to get involved in any of this: I could use a hand.

P.S. Mad respect to @boris for trying to do this kind of thing weekly with Fission Tech Talks.

A DAY OF ENVY

I spent most of my free time yesterday watching ContraPoints’ two-hour oeuvre on envy. This would have been plenty of food for thought for one day, but it was actually preparation for Maybe Gray’s Envy and Evil salon. Here are some of my favourite ideas:

[Humans often transform envy into contempt, making it seem flattering or socially acceptable.]

[Envy can signal what you want.]

[Social media makes us focus on the end result: ‘I want what they have’. It’s a fictitious possibility, but you can at least approach the other to understand what it takes.]

[Envy implies a lack of understanding of the self or the other.]

❤️

If you’re enjoying this, consider contributing to my Open Collective. Virtually everything I create is public, accessible for free, and open-source. Your support helps me keep adding to the commons and making it available for everyone.

SIX DEGREES OF WIKIPEDIA

This fun little utility finds the shortest paths between any two articles, for example: between Hey and Cheese.

MUSIC

All the following items can be accessed as a one-click playlist via Joybox without accounts or sign up—just open and play.

Metheny, Music Master

It was comforting and enlightening to hear this interview between Pat Metheny and Rick Beato, discussing the career and discography of one of the world’s greatest jazz guitarists, with frequent plunges into music theory concepts demonstrated live. I was surprised to find out that he used to take ten pages of notes after every concert.

[You can go to college for four years to study harmony, or rhythm, but not melody.]

[Improvise using the structure of Happy Birthday as a way to approach thematic development.]

[I never play any two notes at the same volume.]

Bites

Over the last two weeks, I’ve repeatedly listened to Novelo from Joyce Moreno’s Hard Bossa (1999) (featured in #012). The modern jazz waltz feel stands out to me now, and I’m absorbing the harmonies and intricate voice-leading.

I had two favourites from Amon Tobin’s How Do You Live (2021): the titular track, noisy with a fat bass, badass drumming, and kaleidoscopic timbres; and This Living Hand, with a sort of scribbling or tickling turned into a rhythm. (via Brian Ginsburg)

Dorothy Ashby’s Afro-Harping (1968) reminds me of Alice Coltrane’s music, but maybe more chill. (via we fucking love music)

More music in the previous edition.

(I heart music)

I always love receiving music. Send me recommendations anytime, anywhere!

That’s all folks!

Feel free to reply and share any reflections you might have, or just say hello. Have a great week 🙂

If you enjoyed this, please consider sharing on Twitter or WhatsApp or Email.

This year has marked the beginning of a shift in my approach: from doing virtually everything solo towards more collectivity and collaboration; the transition has barely begun and is still quite slow as I rewire myself to avoid what has become natural and automatic after over a decade's practice. I have been thinking and learning about community for longer, but started taking concrete steps around May 9th with the creation of a forum and this newsletter, places with potential to become larger than me.

An important part of this shift has been to bring people together in the form of events, so I looked around me to see where I could contribute. remoteStorage is one of the primary technologies I use in my apps, so I began hosting monthly hangouts. Zero Data seems to be flying away from my nest and turning into a community project, so I started to facilitate some swap meets. I also enjoy getting to know Interintellect, which is a community of people that come together in self-organized group conversations (salons) about eclectic topics, and so I have strived to regularly host my own salons.

Although I have some prior experience with running events, I somehow didn't anticipate how overwhelmed and fatigued I would eventually feel by doing so many of these. I remember thinking to myself: "it's just conversations about stuff I'm immersed in, all I have to do is show up and do my thing, no big deal." To give a sense of the work, from before to after: pre-event involves coordination with others, documenting and framing with text that others can understand, letting interested people know, making announcements at specific times before the event, calming any mental anguish about zero people possibly attending; the event itself involves mentally preparing and blocking out time in the day, being present and ideally taking notes on the conversation, remembering to hit the record button if that's a thing, hopefully add something insightful to the discussion; post-event involves thanking and outreach, summarizing the notes, editing the recording, publishing in multiple relevant places and sharing that. What I thought of as one hour of spontaneous conversation implies about two days of preparation and two days of recapitulation, and as this happens about three times a month, it feels like three out of four weeks in each month are write-offs, with time and energy only for random unrelated things that need to get done and not much for making apps or advancing on projects.

In reflecting on how to remedy this imbalance, I think it makes sense (for now) to just keep doing the events. One form of stress comes from always feeling like I'm 'supposed' to be doing my 'real work' on projects, which went from receiving 'All Available Daylight Hours' to 'Not Even One Iota' for consecutive weeks—as someone used to having freedom over how I spend my time, this was hard to grapple with. But I thought recently: maybe it's fine for my 'primary commitment' of app-making to be supplanted by something else for a while. Maybe this makes getting other people involved an imperative to progress. After years of working so hard on the same thing, perhaps it would be good to do something different for a while.

A friend rightly reminded me how new this is: a couple of months ago I wanted to be more social and collective, and now I'm putting it into action; it's worth taking time to acknowledge this progress, maybe even celebrate. I've certainly been enjoying meeting new people and creating spaces where new things can be said. The skills and experience are both useful, but I'd still prefer to delegate so much more, so please reach out if you'd like to get involved in any of this: I could use a hand.

P.S. Mad respect to @boris for trying to do this kind of thing weekly with Fission Tech Talks.

Originally published in Ephemerata #018.

• Gordon Brander works on a tool for imagination, and recently wrote about composability with other tools.
• Rosano works on various Zero Data apps like Hyperdraft and Launchlet.

Reading Inspiration

Composability with other tools:

With one-off API integrations, every app must be connected with every other app in both directions. The number of integrations required for interoperability is equal to the maximal number of edges in a directed graph, or n * (n-1). Adding one more app, for a total of 6, means going from 20 to 30 integrations. 10 apps is 90 integrations! […] Imagine any of these apps needs to change its API. Now every single other app in the network needs to change its integration code. Everyone in the network has to coordinate, because everyone in the network has to implement everything.

The protocol acts as a hub in the network, cutting the number of connections necessary for full interoperability from n * (n - 1), to just n. The number of integrations scales 1:1 with the number of apps. […] none of these apps have to know anything about each other. All they need to know is the protocol. This makes the set of possible workflows between apps an open set. […] Files make interoperability the default […] Files allow interoperability to emerge retroactively. New apps can come along and implement the file formats of other popular apps, uplifting their file format into a de facto protocol. This has happened many times, from .doc, to .rtf, to .psd. Competing products are able to get off the ground by interoperating with incumbents. New workflows can be created permissionlessly.

Protocols produce creative combinatorial explosions […] When you have a universal API for composition each additional tool increases the number of possible workflow combinations by n * (n - 1). […] That’s our directional graph equation again, but this time the network effect is on our side. The more tools, the more possibilities. […] If a tool supports composition with other tools, it supports open-ended evolution. At that point, all of the other ways in which it might be terrible become incidental, because an evolutionary system will always be more expressive than one that isn’t. Nothing else can widen the potential of creative tools as rapidly as composability with other tools. It's not even close.

The future needs files – Scott Jenson:

The power of files comes from them being powerful nouns. They are temporary holding blocks that are used as a form of exchange between applications. A range of apps can edit a single file in a single location. On mobile, the primary way to really use files is to “Share” between apps. This demotes files from a powerful abstract noun into a lackluster narrow verb. […] For example, I can import a text file into the Notes app but it’s really nothing more than a glorified copy/paste, not an editing of an object in place. This makes a cloud storage service like DropBox nearly useless as I’m not editing “the thing” but a copy of the thing. I need to save it back out to Dropbox if I want anyone else to see my changes. That’s vastly underutilizing the power of the abstraction that comes from files.

This isn’t some feeble political statement to liberate my data from a company. I want files to liberate my data from my own apps and create an ML explosion of activity! Files are at some level a hack, I get that, there are limits but they are an extremely useful and flexible hack. Like the QWERTY keyboard, they are “good enough” for most tasks. Files encapsulate a ‘chunk’ of your work and allow that chunk to be seen, moved, acted on, and accessed by multiple people and more importantly external 3rd party processes.

LN 002: Universal data portability:

What if you could move data items, with views provided by their hosting applications, around system and application views? What if we could bring together a series of things that all relate, even if they are of different types, and are from different apps or windows? What if you could browse your things in one fluid interface, without regard for their differing data types?

When you pull an item into some other place, it is still rendered by its hosting application. Hosting applications provide the view components for rendering data items in different situations or sizes. It can be thought of much like a widget in today’s operating systems: the system defines what the data item is and what size it should take up, then it relies on the data item’s hosting application to provide the view component that renders it.

See also the previous swap.

Summary

We discussed what makes files composable and extensible, how to be supportive of files in ecosystems where they aren't present (such as mobile), what changes when using files via Zero Data protocols, and more. Participants included Alexander Cobleigh, Boris Mann, Doug Reeder, Gordon Brander, Jess Martin, Noel De Martin, Rosano.

Recording

The half the video failed to record, and rendering for the remainder was glitchy, so this is essentially an audio podcast.

Chat

The first half of the chat was lost due to a call drop. These times reflect a start time of 16:00.

16:48 cblgh says: ( haha oh dang, sorry for dropping out x) )
16:48 Noel says: ( I think everyone did )
16:49 Rosano says: ( if anyone has the old chat can they save it? )
16:49 cblgh says: ( "tiddlers" thoooooo )
16:49 Jess says: ( we all lost it 😦((( )
16:50 Gordon says: nooooooo
16:50 Gordon says: TiddlyWiki is so compelling
16:50 Gordon says: ( https://subconscious.substack.com/p/composability-with-other-tools)
16:53 Jess says: it's the cause of Brooks Law
16:53 Jess says: as well
16:53 Jess says: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brooks's_law
16:53 Jess says: "Communication overhead increases as the number of people increases. Due to combinatorial explosion, the number of different communication channels increases rapidly with the number of people.[3] Everyone working on the same task needs to keep in sync, so as more people are added they spend more time trying to find out what everyone else is doing."
16:53 Jess says: we're focusing on the workflow! 😛
16:53 Jess says: the UX
16:53 Jess says: the action
16:53 Jess says: sets up an expectation that it will work
16:53 Jess says: atJSON
16:53 Jess says: ( 😛 )
16:54 Gordon says: ( can y'all share a link to this? )
16:54 cblgh says: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/HTML%5FDrag%5Fand%5FDrop%5FAPI
16:54 Boris says: https://twitter.com/bmann/status/1443246811607560193?s=20
16:55 Gordon says: ( love it )
16:56 Boris says: And then the actual reference docs for TW https://tiddlywiki.com/dev/#TiddlyWiki Drag and Drop Interoperability
16:56 Boris says: OK, it's already a bag of JSON. Title and Text and arbitrary custom fields var titleString = "This is the string that appears when the block is dragged to a text input"; var tiddlerData = [{title: "Tiddler One", text: "This is one of the payload tiddlers"}, {title: "Tiddler Two", text: "This is another of the payload tiddlers", "custom-field": "A custom field value"}];
16:58 cblgh says: it's interesting to think about the "education of users" from the perspective of storytelling; do you do the exposition thing and dump it all on people in the beginning ("hello, welcome!" screen), or do your characters (whatever that is in an app? a feature? its affordances?) pull people in gradually to the understanding
16:58 cblgh says: ( lol cmd-w is lethal in notetaking apps in browsers (it doesn't delete the last word!!) )
16:58 Jess says: ooooooooohhh I like this direction
16:58 Jess says: ( we're working heavily with QR codes at Croquet )
16:58 Gordon says: ( 100 )
16:59 Jess says: and to think of their phone as a container!
16:59 Jess says: or my phone as the key...
16:59 Jess says: ( or something )
16:59 Gordon says: ( yes! )
16:59 Jess says: ( the metaphor )
16:59 Rosano says: ( @cblgh i avoid the hello welcome but fail to do onboarding… something fundamental to think about, i like the story metaphor )
16:59 Gordon says: ( It makes intuitive sense. Phones are very personal. )
17:01 Jess says: 2FA
17:01 Jess says: in general
17:01 Jess says: ( magic links, so true )
17:01 Noel says: ( We were talking about gen Z before, I think a lot of them don't even use email, they just have social logins (like login with Facebook) )
17:01 Doug says: This particular hardware didn't catch on, but this video shows where we'd like to be: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2oLfKqpUJT4
17:02 Jess says: http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/squarezooko
17:02 cblgh says: great article on squaring zooko's triangle for a particular set of use cases
https://www.inkandswitch.com/backchannel/
17:02 Boris says: doesn't square it at all
17:02 Boris says: it uses pet names
17:02 Boris says: ( not globally unique )
17:03 cblgh says: ( the relationship is though )
17:03 Boris says: ( yep! )
17:04 Jess says: ( I definitely will, because I want to work on more hardware stuff once we solve this software stuff 😃 )
17:04 Boris says: ( @Rosano -- please make sure to copy / paste / export this chat at end of call )
17:05 Rosano says: ( @boris just copied now, hope to copy later, the first chat may be gone )
17:06 Jess says: ( amazing UX )
17:07 Rosano says: https://youtu.be/cpNk6fkwS2I?t=15
17:07 Rosano says: ( ethereal blue dots )
17:07 Doug says: ( That youtube video is private )
17:07 cblgh says: kinda related project i put together for sharing cabal keys across computers in physical space "whisperlinks" https://github.com/cblgh/paperslip "share hard-to-transmit snippets with easy-to-pronounce names using dht magic"
17:08 Boris says: ( Oh yeah, the video is private )
17:09 Gordon says: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celestial%5FEmporium%5Fof%5FBenevolent%5FKnowledge
17:10 cblgh says: oops gotta go, thanks for the chat everyone!
17:10 cblgh says: ( (sorry i didnt participate that much, but 23:00 here '😃 )
17:10 Rosano says: ( see ya alex! thanks for coming, good night )
17:10 Gordon says: ( thanks everyone! )
17:11 Jess says: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robustness%5Fprinciple "Be conservative in what you do, be liberal in what you accept from others."
17:11 Jess says: and text can be assumed to be first line...
17:11 Jess says: ( sorry, title can be assumed to be first line of text )
17:12 Gordon says: ( Files, copy/paste, drag-drop the ur-interop features )
17:13 Jess says: ( opencollective??? )
17:13 Gordon says: ( I Would Simply Have Expede Solve Sync )
17:13 Jess says: ( I'm free 😉 )
17:13 Gordon says: ( I'm game )
17:14 Boris says: ( passwordless file-less onboarding something something )
17:14 Jess says: ( "shared language of onboarding in passport-less, data-less systems" )
17:14 Gordon says: ( +1 doorless is awesome )
17:15 Jess says: ( MAYA: most advanced, yet acceptable )
17:15 Noel says: ( doorless does not contradict onboarding, you can put an onboarding in place of a blank canvas )
17:15 Jess says: oooooh the natto.dev interactive tutorial is AMAZING btw
17:15 Noel says: ( that's sort of what I did with Media Kraken )
17:15 Rosano says: ( @noel but that takes work )
17:15 Jess says: ( https://natto.dev/tutorial/tip-calculator)

Welcome to the seventeenth edition of Ephemerata, a weekly-ish digest of links, ideas, learnings, and sounds that I think are worth sharing.

I’m doing this to stimulate discussion around what I find interesting, and also to share things before they disappear into the void of my journal.

If you enjoy this, please consider passing it on via Twitter or WhatsApp or Email.

SALON TAKEAWAYS

The #BuildingSocialBridges salon yesterday was effervescent. I feel happy with how deep we were able to go, and grateful that the participants were so generous in sharing ideas. I encourage anyone who couldn’t make it to read the notes, as each person brought some special wisdom to the conversation. Here are some of my favourite ideas:

“[Creating connections is the core of being human—it’s so natural for children.]” — Alessandro

“[Prefer shared language over common ground.]” — Jeeva

“[Divided people may share smaller beliefs. People with similar conclusions may have surprisingly different values. A world where everyone agrees has no room for evolution. Unpack the belief into values and decisions to find common ground.]” — Jessica

“[Secular people do have faith (in the conversation, in the day getting better, in the world doing well, in human potential), so it’s not a big step to jump to spiritual.]” — Tristan

MOWGLI’S MONEY

Brett Scott compares economic self-sufficiency with interdependency using Tarzan and Mowgli as metaphors (via @delta_chat@twitter.com):

[The Tarzan suite analyses from the fully-formed individual onward: the nodes make up the network. The Mowgli suite starts from interdependence and a child that needs to be cared for: the network makes the node.]

[The idea of passing a random stranger on the street did not exist in the past, as survival implied being part of tightly-knit groups.]

[Nation states are only about 5000 years old and have dissolved the boundaries between smaller collectives to create ‘the public’, which we are vaguely connected to, but do not know.]

[The image of ‘prehistoric wilderness man’ we consider today is a caricature. Primitive life was not ‘solo men creating shelter and hunting’ but intensely group-oriented collaboration, as can be seen in photos of indigenous tribes.]

[The myth of self-sufficiency assumes that interacting with others and trading is optional, as opposed to a mandatory means of survival.]

MAKING COMPUTERS FLEXIBLE

Alexander Obenauer’s Why is our thinking on computers so restrained? describes the inflexible aspects of apps, interfaces, files, and digital taxonomy. These are thoughts about how human-computer interaction could be more natural, and how to personalize the experience, from someone who is apparently building their own operating system.

❤️

If you’re enjoying this, consider contributing to my Open Collective. Virtually everything I create is public, accessible for free, and open-source. Your support helps me keep adding to the commons and making it available for everyone.

THE PURPOSE OF FRIENDSHIP

The School of Life produced a video framing friendship according to four different purposes: networking, reassurance, fun, and thinking. I find it useful as a way to notice when relationships don’t enrich us or fit into these purposes, to prompt finding more clarity about the connection. (via Vidhika)

‘BOY’ IS TROUBLE

Beau of the Fifth column talks about why the seemingly innocuous word ‘boy’ is avoided in the southern United States, and posts a breathtaking followup for someone asking advice on how to handle it.

THE SWEETER THE BERRY, THE OLDER THE HAND

I learned of a French expression ‘sucrer les fraises’, literally “sugar or sweeten the strawberries”, which refers to the tremor of an elderly person’s hands. Why? Because in order to enjoy strawberries, one needs to take a bowl of sugar and shake it gently from side to side, coating evenly to perfection before eating. (via Elisa)

MUSIC

All the following items can be accessed as a one-click playlist via Joybox without accounts or sign up—just open and play.

BIENAVENTURANZA

Chancha Via Circuito’s Bienaventuranza (2018) is an old favourite reverberating inside me the over last few days. I have never forgotten my first impression from hearing this years ago: the feeling of a wide-open space gradually expanding, physical heaviness (as if this were a solid object) created from sparse texture. This digital cumbia from Argentina has a certain rawness from traditional instruments and especially the voice, combined with natural ambience, and electronic sounds. (via Roberta)

Bites

Sam Gendel’s When I Am Laid In Earf from Fresh Bread (2021) pairs baroque harmony and voice-leading with a computer-generated voice on autotune. Hella eerie.

Nate Wood’s It’s Enough (2021 single) from the fOUR project is one person playing drums, bass, and synth in 5 meter, while singing, plus “recorded live in 1 pass with no overdubs, click track or pre-recorded backing tracks”. What else??

Maede Shafiie leads this group of five Iranian women playing tombak with hypnotic hand coordination.

More music in last week’s edition.

(I heart music)

I always love receiving music. Send me recommendations anytime, anywhere!

That’s all folks!

Feel free to reply and share any reflections you might have, or just say hello. Have a great week 🙂

Welcome to the sixteenth edition of Ephemerata, a weekly-ish digest of links, ideas, learnings, and sounds that I think are worth sharing.

I’m doing this to stimulate discussion around what I find interesting, and also to share things before they disappear into the void of my journal.

BULIDING SOCIAL BRIDGES

On Saturday, September 18th, I’m hosting my second Interintellect salon, Building Social Bridges and Healing a Divided World, which will be a group discussion about cultivating connection across divides. I think it’s useful to discuss this at the moment and would like to learn from other people’s experiences. If you can’t make it and have tips, learning materials, good examples, please share. Let’s learn together :).

By coincidence, I recently heard Buster Benson talking about his book, The Art of Productive Disagreement:

[Being civil or skirting around hard topics isn’t enough.]

[Disagreement is usually more about values than facts.]

[Make predictions and see what happens. Now there’s nothing to argue about, everyone learns something, and it creates a ritual to reconnect.]

THOUGHTS WHILE DANCING DURING TURMOIL

Converse with the music.

All music teaches.

Even without controlling externalities, you can be absorbed in your experience of being alive, you can take care of yourself, you can connect with your body. In that world, we are free.

❤️

If you’re enjoying this, consider contributing to my Open Collective. Virtually everything I create is public, accessible for free, and open-source. Your support helps me keep adding to the commons and making it available for everyone.

STARTING NEW APPS

I recently recorded Scaffold an app from scratch: a live coding video where an existing app is used as the basis for a new one. You can see the steps I go through each time I have a new project and get an idea of the different aspects involved. This is hopefully the last ‘long video’ and followed by small live coding videos on specific topics.

REMOTESTORAGE HANGOUT

If you’re curious about the remoteStorage technology used in all of my apps, come to the monthly hangout this Tuesday. Basti will share an upcoming ‘read later’ feature in his bookmarking app Webmarks.

SEPTEMBER MEANS BACK TO… THE OFFICE?

Enjoy this cute and funny role reversal between kids and parents during ‘back to work’ season. (via Jessica)

MUSIC

All the following items can be accessed as a one-click playlist via Joybox without accounts or sign up—just open and play.

Ethereal space jazz

Sam Gendel and Sam Wilkes’ Music for Saxofone and Bass Guitar (2018) is full of strange and wonderfully creative sounds, beatboxing, and melody-less improvising, all of which were recorded live with something like loop pedals. I really dug the mouth percussion and head-banging stank face grooves on THEEM AND VARIATIONS; as well as the beat from dental fricatives on GREETINGS TO IDRIS. The inconspicuously-named TRACK ONE has this remarkable throat falsetto riff and manages to build a movement-inducing rhythm that simultaneously feels sparse and full-bodied, drizzled with a solo of quartal explorations on thirteenth chords.

Albums

Jorge Ben’s Força Bruta (1970) mixes complex harmonies with Brazilian dance rhythms, orchestra with folk instruments, and is generally a good time. (via we fucking love music)

This compilation of music sung by Mildred Bailey (1930s) features some lovely stride jazz piano. My first time hearing this singer. (via Brian Ginsburg)

Tracks

Hania Rani recorded a live set of music which makes me want to play the piano again. At various points she plays while touching the strings to create percussive sounds. The set merges electronic and acoustic, and she also sings on some tracks. It’s always special to see people pushing the boundaries of live music-making. (via @ghostlevel@merveilles.town)

More

Check out last week’s edition for more music.

(I heart music)

I always love receiving music. Send me recommendations anytime, anywhere!

That’s all folks!

Feel free to reply and share any reflections you might have, or just say hello. Have a great week 🙂

If you enjoyed this, please consider sharing on Twitter or WhatsApp or Email.

A salon discussing pathways to overcome division.

Building Social Bridges and Healing a Divided World

What are some ways to deal with misinformation and filter bubbles? Is this phenomenon particular to our heavily politicized present? When ideologies differ, how can we find common ground? How does technology play into these dynamics?

Let’s talk about who’s creating social bridges, strategies for moving forward without sacrificing our well-being, staying centered and secure in unstable environments, and more… I would like to share my personal experiences and learn from yours.

If you are hungry for more, or not able to attend, check out Vidhika’s salon later in the day: I Get By With A Little Help From My Friends.

If you have any difficulty participating due to financial reasons, send me a message and I’ll buy your ticket.

Image attribution

White bridge surrounded by trees by Wai Siew

Summary

This bubbly discussion incorporated many perspectives and was mostly self-directed by the group—I planned next to nothing; the participants were very open, sensitive, vulnerable, and generous.

Below are some of my notes. I've written this quickly out of excitement to share what we created, so I may have misunderstood, misquoted, misattributed… If there's anything that should or could be different, please reach out.

Alessandro

[We are all bridge builders.]
…
[The first step to hatred is dehumanization.]
…
[We need to stay close because we're made of many layers—the first layer is not the only one.]
…
[Children are a universal role model. In Brazil it's common for them to say at the playground "Hi, would you like to be my friend?" even before asking their names. Hard to imagine adults approaching a stranger saying "Hey, would you like to talk?". Creating connections is the core of being human—it's so natural for children.]

Haider

[Dangerous views doesn't imply a bad person.]
…
"We're on the same boat*" (Vehicle may vary)
…
[Distancing yourself to avoid friction inhibits the possibility of deepening the relationship.]
…
[Both religious and secular outlooks shares the layer of 'trying to understand the truth'.]

Jeeva

[Prefer shared language over common ground.]
…
[Connect first and help them grow later; don't focus on fixing them.]
…
[The farther away something is, the more abstract and 'over there' it is.]
…
[Dehumanization is not a binary: it starts with inconspicuous, crude language.]

Jessica

[Communities were originally formed around mutual need, people taking care of each other, and a shared sense of well-being. Treat others as if we are interdependent in a healthy way.]
…
[People need to show up in a community with the mindset of 'How do I give?'. If not, nobody's needs are fulfilled. Make the first giving move.]
…
[To take care, you need to know someone well, and it's hard to know someone without having fondness and extending love.]
…
[The promise of the Internet was 'finding your people'. With access to a larger pool of people to meet your needs, one relies less on the local community. Need, vulnerability, and loneliness are technologies that make us reach out. Tech allows us to hide vulnerability that we need a certain type of connection.]
…
[Forcing people to agree is counterproductive, as people get defensive when they feel someone trying to change them.]
…
[Divided people may share smaller beliefs. People with similar conclusions may have surprisingly different values. A world where everyone agrees has no room for evolution. Unpack the belief into values and decisions to find common ground.]

Lyn

[Everything needs to level up in consciousness so that we can talk about the big meta issues of our time.]
…
[How can we re-citizen the world?]
…
[Inner work precedes interrelational work.]
…
[Instead of agreement, focus on the next step.]
…
[Working on oneself does not mean that one will be selfish.]

Omar

[Let's lock ourselves together and go on a road trip. As friends, we can use this kind of constraint to help break down what divides us.]
…
A lot of times we're not making progress because we're arguing about how to solve something, but it goes nowhere because we're not on the same page on what the goals or ideal scenario is. It's a lot easier to start there to find common ground, like agreeing on what a just society looks like before talking about what policies help us get there.

Rosano

[It's important to consider how an environment that provokes outrage leads us to be affected by charged words and focusing on someone's 'first layer'.]
…
[Naming the thing can lead us to try the opposite. When there's distance, try proximity. If dehumanize, re-humanize.]
…
[We can build trust through proximity and continuity. If we avoid friction and only talk when there's a disagreement, it's harder to converse.]
…
[Trust is less about 'correctness' and more about 'this person is here for me'.]

Tristan

[The only thing you can truly expect is that they will change.]
…
[In divisive situations, making the choice to build a bridge is the hardest part.]
…
[Secular people do have faith (in the conversation, in the day getting better, in the world doing well, in human potential), so it's not a big step to jump to spiritual.]
…
[The informal culture of calling a stranger brother, sister, cousin, friend implies we are already family/friends, and this is true genetically.]
…
[Even with a dangerous viewpoint, work backwards from "Hey, cousin."]
…
[Presence matters more than physical proximity; two people in a closet can be tuned out and 'not there'.]

Resources

• Sara Silverman crowdfunding medical bills for someone who was rude to her. (via Haider)
• C. Thi Nguyen differentiates between filter bubbles and echo chambers and talks about breaking people out of cults and conspiracy theories. (via Jessica)
• Tim Urban's series A Story of Us is a deep dive into how society has become so polarized. (via Omar)
• Beau of the Fifth Column avoiding sensationalism through soft language. (via Rosano)
• Buster Benson wrote a book on productive disagreement. (via Rosano)
• Adam Grant shares tips on breaking through your own mental blocks to take the first difficult step. (via Tristan)

Stay tuned

I share upcoming events and my favourite internet finds every week in Ephemerata.

Welcome to the fifteenth edition of Ephemerata, a weekly-ish digest of links, ideas, learnings, and sounds that I think are worth sharing.

I’m doing this to stimulate discussion around what I find interesting, and also to share things before they disappear into the void of my journal.