Last week I wrote about AI and food blogging. After I wrote that, I got to thinking about my own blog. Above you see my daily traffic, with a big spike happening at the beginning of December. I looked at what visitors were looking at on my blog then: I could see someone looking at a bunch of links beginning with “A”, then beginning with “B”, then “C”, etc. It’s not something a user would do, but it is something a bot would do. I am assuming it is somehow AI related.
It made me wonder why I am still blogging if people are just going to bypass my blog and read it from AI. In some ways I don’t mind: if someone finds my content useful via AI versus my own blog, then it doesn’t matter to me. In other ways I do mind: I keep up a weekly discipline of posting at least 2x/week as much to keep the blog a living thing, but if AI is going to kill off my traffic, then what is the point of maintaining this discipline? Likewise, if I am getting traffic due to AI, then maybe it doesn’t matter to keep posting, since my site will still be getting traffic. It’s a pickle, I think.
I think I will still post because I choose and want to post, but the days of posting to help maintain interest in the blog may be over. Something to consider as I go into the new year.
Food bloggers are seeing a drop in traffic as home cooks turn to AI, according to Bloomberg:
Across the internet, writers say their vetted recipes are hidden by the flood. Pinterest feeds are stuffed with AI-generated images of food that the attached instructions won’t achieve; Google’s AI Overviews surface error-filled cooking steps that siphon away clicks from professionals. Meanwhile, Facebook content farms use AI-generated images of supposedly delicious but impossible dishes to the top of people’s feeds, in an attempt to turn any clicks into ad revenue.
How bad can it be? To give just one example (from Fortune):
For Carrie Forrest, who runs Clean Eating Kitchen, AI has been devastating: 80% of her traffic — and her revenue — has disappeared in two years. Although the views started dropping when OpenAI’s ChatGPT was released, it wasn’t until Google launched AI Mode in search that her traffic collapsed, she said. Since then, she’s gone from employing about ten people to letting everyone go. “I’m going to have to find something else to do.”
My thoughts on this:
There already was several problems in the food blogging area, like too many people trying to make a go of it by writing about cooking. Not to mention that there was a problem with plagiarism within the world of food blogging. Now there is a new plagiarism problem, with AI essentially copying recipes and putting them forward as another source of cooking information.
AI plagiarism is not limited to food blogging. I’ve seen the same problem within the IT domain, with vapid sites posting “solutions” to technical problems that are a waste of time.
For people and organization that generate content hoping to get people to read it, AI will be squeezing people from both sides. Human generated content with be squeezed out by AI generated content. And with things like Google Zero, search engines will use AI to summarize that content, so that the person searching for information will not go to the next step of clicking through a link to get to another site.
Like the person who runs the site Clean Eating Kitchen, I suspect many smaller sites will dry up as a source of content. I think you will then have these aggregators (either Google or large AI generated content sites) plus other quality sites that can still compete, be they cooking.nytimes.com or marthastewart.com or even specialized sites like alisoneroman.com. This is not unlike Travel or Hotel sites that can still maintain a presence even though search engines like Google will scrape prices and present them.
Eventually, like all things in IT, there will be a continuing swing towards centralization, until the classic problems of centralization occurs. Then you will have niche sites breaking out again and things will decentralize. Until then, the rise of AI both on the front end (Google) and the back end (AI generated sites) will force out these midtier sites like Clean Eating Kitchen.
I am not immune to this problem. I see this site being scraped on the regular, presumably by AI. The good news for me is I write this site as much for me as for anyone else. I am happy if I can post things that help people. However, if some AI site presents the information and it helps people, I don’t care that they didn’t get it directly from me. I still benefit from writing these posts. If I were paying my bills with this site, it would be a problem. But this site is just a hobby for me.
(Image from Pixabay, which appears to be AI generated. Pixabay used to be a good source of imagery, but it has been overrun by AI generated images. I found this by looking for “ai generated cooking” images.)
Recently I’ve been trying to ask myself these questions whenever I write paragraphs for a new piece:
– For each paragraph, if I leave only the first sentence, does the collection of paragraphs still make sense?
– For each other sentence in the paragraph, does it help support the first sentence?
– Does each sentence do one thing in the paragraph?
– Are the sentences varied enough to make it interesting to read?
– Can I take words out of each sentence and still have a good sentence?
– Can I take out sentences of the paragraph and still have a good paragraph?
– Do the paragraphs hang together?
– Does the first paragraph make me want to read the next paragraph?
– If they only read the first paragraph, is that enough?
I came up with these questions because I wanted to make my writing better. It doesn’t matter what I am writing: an email, a press release, a blog post, you name it. Whatever it is, if I apply those questions, the collection of paragraphs gets better.
These questions are related to rules for writing paragraphs in many pieces you will find on the Internet. I thought I would share my version of that. I hope it helps!
WordPress blogs are just part of the count; there’s also tumblrs, web sites, and social media accounts too. Some of them are active. Others are projects I’ve started and either completed or hit a dead end.
I find tumblrs are especially good for projects, which is why I started doing small creative projects with them. Some blogs are meant to be ongoing, but some times it’s nice to pick a topic or area you want to go deeper on for at least a little while before ending it. Plus, tumblrs have a lot of different themes, which makes it easier to create a special microsite. You can make microsites using other technology too, but I think tumblr is a good fit for me in that regard.
I likely have some other blogs and sites I forgot about. I am sure there’s some Blogger sites I’ve missed. But that page accounts for most of the ones I have had an interest in.
Well, sometimes an accident can lead to good things. The accident today was mistakenly replacing the theme on this blog, instead of my new blog. When I realized the error, I thought: no problem, I’ll just reapply my old Coraline theme. I thought wrong: the Coraline theme no longer appears on wordpress.com.
Turns out I did fine a theme that was somewhat close: Colinear. At first I was not happy with the change. But I managed to get it close enough back to the old theme I am ok with it. Colinear also has features that Coraline does not have, like the ability to be looser with images inserted in posts. (Before I always had the specify a maximum width of 500. No more!) So some good with the bad.
I hope most people don’t care or notice too much. It will still have the same type of content, regardless of font changes and other design differences. I hope you will continue to like the blog.
Recently I’ve been thinking about the old days of blogging. A few things happened to put me in that frame of mind. First I was reminded of two old blogs I used to love: Sunshine+Design and Color Me Katie. Both of them ended in 2013. I wondered why they suddenly stopped, so I poked around a bit and noticed that Katie moved to posting on flickr and later on Instagram. I suspect that’s how many old bloggers moved away from blogging: migrating from original social media sites like Blogger and WordPress to newer social media like flickr and Instagram etc. They moved on and their blogging days came to an end.
Like Kevin, I am an old school blogger who somehow managed to keep at it into 2025. I use other social media, like Instagram and Bluesky and I’ve even recently started some tumblrs which I will talk about at some time. I’ve started some new blogs too. But I still keep blogging here. Blogs are a medium like anything else: you use them as a way of putting things out in the world. I suspect I will continue to post things on this site and other blogging sites until my end too. It’s good technology, good media.
In the meantime, R.I.P., Kevin. And rest in peace old bloggers and blogs everywhere.
P.S.S. I noticed an account I follow on Instagram, @evgrieve, also has an ongoing blog that started in 2007! For fans of the East Village in NYC — my favorite part of that city — it is recommended.
If you are trying to search for an answer to something and after much effort find an answer, write a blog post about it. Chances are many others are having the same difficulty, and they may not have the tenacity to keep looking the way you did. By writing about it, you increase the chances other people will get their answer via your post.
The other good reason to do this is that you might forget what you did. That’s fine unless later you want to recreate what you did. That blog post will save you.
In writing about my old posterous blog, I started thinking about how I loved to post via email. I thought I would like to do that again. Maybe not for this blog but another blog. A blog not so much about links but about thoughts and ideas.
So I’m going to give this a little test and see how it goes.
PS going to get started with blm849.wordpress.com for now.
From 2008 to 2013, there was a great service called posterous that would allow you to easily blog from your mobile device. You could simply email your blog posts from your phone, and many a late night I would lie down with my Blackberry and blog to berniemichalik.posterous.com. (There are many ways to deal with insomnia: this was mine.)
All those posterous blogs are gone now, but at least I was able to export mine. And from time to time I would post excerpts from it here on this blog under the tag, oldposterous. That was ok, but I wanted a better solution.
My solution was to post the entire posterous blog on AWS. You can find it here at berniemichalik.com/posterous. It goes from newest to oldest post. Not all of them are great, but some are.
This blog, smartpeopleiknow, is mainly a link blog, an approach I adopted a long time ago from people like Jason Kottke. What I liked about that posterous blog was it was more a journal/ideas blog. I might start such a journal/ideas blog again. In the meantime, I can go back and see what I was thinking from 2009-2012, thanks to posterous.
Thanks for read that blog, and as always, thanks for reading this one.
I write entirely to find out what I’m thinking, what I’m looking at, what I see and what it means. What I want and what I fear. – Why I Write (essay originally published in the New York Times Book Review in 1976, here)
I think it is a good reason for all of us to write, regardless of our level of skill. I think I am going to be adopting that more, here and offline. I would hope the same for you, even if it is a matter of making notes in a composition notebook or a scribbler.
Writing as thinking. Not only deep thoughts, or correct thoughts, but thoughts in general.
Sadly, though, it reminded me of a reel I have seen in various forms on Instagram. Like many reels, that particular reel was less about passing on good advice and more about gaining attention to the creator of the reel.
That’s the thing I do like about blog posts and I don’t like about reels. You could come across a blog post, get the information you need, and never know or care about the person who made it. When you come across most reels (and I assume tiktoks), you might get information you need, but they seem more about the maker than the advice.
I realize this is a matter of preference and not a matter of right and wrong. I prefer just getting the information, while others prefer knowing the person who is giving the advice. Given how Tiktok and Reels are overtaking user generated content, I am likely on the losing side.
I’ll keep sharing helpful things here: that’s been the purpose of this blog since the late 2000s. I’ll also try to 99%**of the time not make it not about me. 🙂
(** did I say 99%? Ok, maybe it’s closer to 90%…😄)
After missing last month’s newsletter due to being in the hospital with life threatening injuries, I thought I might just skip on writing my weird newsletter this year. But then I found some good things to share so I thought: let’s celebrate the end of January 2024 with at least one more.
As far as January’s go, it’s been a relatively mild one, other than one week of polar vortex weather. Indeed, there’s been much mildness all around.
Pandemic-ally speaking, it’s also been a bit of a mildness in January in terms of COVID, as you can see from the Ontario wastewater signal:
Before Christmas 2023 there was a lot of talk of the new covid variant JN1 and how it could overwhelm hospitals like those in Ontario, but if it did, I suspect that is subsiding now. If anything, we are now seeing states like California and Oregon break with CDC guidelines and tell people you don’t have to isolate so much any more. As I said last year, 2023 should be a transition year for COVID. It will always be with us, like colds and flu, but we will make less and less of an issue of it by and large.
As for inflation, it’s also looking pretty mild, as you can see from this graph from Reuters:
A remarkable change from the peak of the pandemic. We have been living through some wild years. We could use some more mildness like this and a return to the way it was before the pandemic.
This is not to say everything is going back to pre-pandemic days. Take work. While there has been some people returning to the offices, I am not certain staff will ever fully return. For one thing, workers are more productive working for home. For another, cities and landlords are starting to accept it. New York is in the lead here I believe, with their Office Conversion Accelerator Team. There’s already a pack of offices with conversions underway. I expect more cities to follow NYC’s lead.
A new trend at work is the annual January layoffs. Tech companies like Google and Microsoft went through another round of year beginning job cuts, though it wasn’t limited to those two companies. And layoffs weren’t limited to tech, as anyone in the media can tell you. It was a brutal January for that industry. And then you had inexplicable moves like Conde Nast folding Pitchfork into GQ. Weird.
Relatedly, this piece on the history of the website Jezebel is the story of media from 2008 as told through this one property, imho.
As for that other form of media, social media, there’s really only two platforms that seem to matter anymore: TikTok and Substack. (Sorry, not sorry, Elon.) Here’s two Tiktok stories: one on the sleepy girl mocktail and one on cleantok and performative hygiene. Ugh. As for Substack, this and that report on Substack’s Nazi problem. Good lord. An overall sad state of affairs when it comes to social platforms.
I had some links to share regarding Taylor Swift and Barbie, but honestly you can easily search for that with your favorite search engine. Heck, you don’t have to search for it: go to any major website and they will have a story on them. Three or four stories, even.
I greatly enjoyed watching the Netflix series The Crown during the last few years. Here’s something ranking every episode of the series. A nice way for fans like myself to relive it.
Last, here is an image of one of my favorite restaurants of all time, Prune, closed during the pandemic. I love the image of it below, and if you love it too you can buy it, here.
As always, thanks for reading this. See you in a month, I hope.
Is April the cruelest month? It can be in Canada. This month we’ve had summer like temperatures followed by light snow and freezing weather. It’s kinda what we expect here.
Here’s 90+ things I thought interesting that I really believe you might as well. Something for you to read on a rainy/windy/sunny/who knows April Sunday.
Pandemic: Yes, I am still going on about the pandemic. Hey, whatever public health activity is going on where you live, COVID is still making the rounds. People are still getting sick and dying. There’s a new variant going around: it’s called arcturus and so far it’s just in India. But who knows what could happen with it.
If you still want good data on covid cases, the New York Times has it. Here is a grim reminder of just how badly New York was hit by COVID. No wonder they still track it carefully.
In my last newsletter, I talked about feeling a weird nostalgia for the early parts of the pandemic. I felt that again watching this old clip of the Roots and the cast of Hamilton on Jimmy Fallon performing “Helpless”. I wonder what people will think years from now when they see it?
Elsewhere in the US, guns continue to be a major problem. Here’s the story of one of the worst guns in particular: the A-15. That’s a good piece on a horrible device.
Healthcare: there were a number of pieces on healthcare in Canada at the beginning of 2023. It could be because the provinces were in negotiation with the Federal government for more money. In the end, at least some provinces signed a health deal. I expect all will come around and sign.
Ideas: A good source of ideas is Ursula Franklin’s lectures on the Real world of technology. Austin Kleon was reading it and he reminded me of how good it was.
Famous People: Some major axe grinding in this piece on Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie, and Jennifer Aniston. I think they will all be fine, in their own weird way, whatever skeletons are in their closet.
And on that fun note, I’ll close off this newsletter and the month of April. As always, thanks for reading this and rambling along with me. I hope you found it worthwhile. Happy Spring. Now the good weather comes.
Well since then, I’ve surpass my goal of 1,000,000 hits (now at 1,031,207 hits). I wasn’t sure if I could achieve it when I posted that in December of 2020, but just over 10 months later, I managed to make that milestone. I wrote about it, here: Some reflections on reaching one million views on my blog today.
I never did start a separate newsletter on places like Substack, though many others did, I am glad to say. All my newsletter writing within this blog can be found here.
I continue to sit down every Saturday morning and review interesting things I’ve found on the Internet and saved in Pocket. I still take 3-4 hours to write about these things and schedule them to be posted throughout the week. I am sure there is a better way to do this, but if so, it escapes me.
I still enjoy this writing time, too. I have the same routine of getting up on Saturday morning and grabbing some breakfast and a coffee before I craft my posts. Perhaps the only minor change is that I used to take images from Unsplash.com to illustrate things, now they come mainly from pixabay.
Sometimes I find I have more things to say and I could stay at my desk all day, banging out posts. Other times it can feel like a job, and I ask myself: why am I doing this? Mostly though I find it a good hobby and a creative way to think about things and express them in this unique format.
Will I continue to write here? I think so. Maybe some day I will see that no one is reading my posts and I will stop. (That’s kinda happened with my cooking blog.) I used to even fret when I would publish something here and only 3 or 4 people would read it. But recently I have checked my stats and it is gratifying to see posts that get a few reads every day or so have 300, 400, 500 or more reads over the years. It makes me think my writing has some benefit.
To all of you who have read my blog posts and interacted with them in some positive way: thank you! It’s always appreciated. I would like to include you in the group of smart people I know, even if we haven’t met.
I was sad to see that Joanne Goddard, the creator of the blog Cup of Jo, had decided to separate from her husband, Alex. She wrote about it, here: Some Personal News.
I’ve been a big fan of her blog since before she even met Alex around this time in 2007. Over the last decade and a half you can see the arc of their love affair from The Very First Emails Alex and she Sent to Each Other (We Were Nervous!), to stories of their First Date to having kids to…well, now. She and her team have written about many things, but that story, that arc, has always been part of the blog. And now it’s over.
It’s odd to live out loud in public. I get why some people do it, but I think it can be extra painful when things go badly. I think people have learned that after years of social media. Even now for people who are out there, it’s more a persona that is on display than their real self. You need to keep your real self tucked away, I think.
Like her, Paul Simon is another person who has lived out loud in public. On his album Hearts on Bones, he writes about the start of his love affair with Carrie Fisher; on his next album Graceland, he writes about the end. On the song Hearts and Bones, he uses the phrase “arc of a love affair” and on the song Graceland he writes about how “everyone can see you’re blown apart”. That resonates for many of us who’ve been through it.
I have gained much from following her and her blog over the years. I am sure she may feel blown apart, now that the arc of her love affair is ending. I hope soon enough she feels more better, more positive, as time passes.
Blogging was once a big part of social media. A big part of telling our stories. We’ve moved on in many ways, from the social media we use to the way we use it. Regardless, we will continue to tell stories, for ourselves and for others. And the best of stories will remain, whether they are happy or sad.
I was reviewing my logs and journals for 2022 just now. I was happily reminded of the good times I had as well as the difficult moments I had to deal with last year. I’m glad I took the time to record all that.
If you can, I recommend you do the same. Reading about your good times can make you feel good about your life. And reading about the difficulties you had to deal with can make you appreciate how well you deal with things.
Writing about good times is fairly easy. Writing about difficult times is not. To log my difficult moments, I phrase them in the way of praise. So instead of writing something like:
Absolute disaster at work this week. I hate my project!
I’ll write:
kudos for dealing well with the difficulties at work this week by persevering and staying calm
I find phrasing it that way helps to read about it later. (This is my approach: you may be fine with going with the first approach.) It also reminds my brain that I can deal with similar difficulties in the future.
Be prolific if you can. Note simple observations. Consider all your senses. Write down many good memories and good feelings you had throughout the year. It’s easy to forget about them, but like snapshots, just reading them will bring back vividly thoughts and emotions you want to recall years from now.
Log them using the media best suited for you. You might covet one of those One Line a Day journals. You might like scribbling in a plain notebook. Some people might default to their smartphone and social media to log things. (I find Instagram is good with that….Twitter…not so much.)
I depend on a little program I wrote called easylog that I use to record things. It stores the information both in a local XLSX spreadsheet and a Google spreadsheet. Of course there are countless ways you can log or journal, but that suits me. It takes me a few minutes every day…no time at all, really.
Good luck. I wish you fond memories of 2023.
P.S. This post was inspired by posts from bloggers I admire:
Austin Kleon in particular is a master at logging things. You might not want to do it to the extent he does (at first), so start with just a line or two. You’ll be glad in 6 months, a year, two years from now when you get to re-read them.
I was almost inspired to write my own wonderful things in 2022 in a blog post, but I am trying to focus my social media content to things that benefit people vs things about myself. My goal is to have a ratio closer to 80:20 or even 90:10 (posts benefitting people: posts about myself). Let’s see.
Is sharing on the web still worth it? I don’t know.
I used to think it was. When I wrote this two years ago, On blogging/writing online in 2020 (how I write now), I believed it was. I used to like sitting down each Saturday and writing my blog. It felt worthwhile. I also had a goal then: I wanted to get to a million views. That goal has been met and then some.
I am not sure if I have any more goals or things to achieve with this blog. Perhaps I can look to blog less but keep my monthly numbers in the current range of 1600-2500/month. Or perhaps I should be happy for a much smaller number like 1000/month. It’s unclear to me what will feel worthwhile anymore.
It’s hard to know what will be worthwhile to my readers, too. Last year the posts most read here were:
a link to Suresh Doss based on some work I did at the beginning of the pandemic
None of them were my favorite things I ever wrote. The Zara post I once dashed off in 15-20 minutes. I’m glad thousands of viewers thought them useful enough to pay a visit, though. Someone must have found something good.
It’s not just blogging either. I like to share useful things on other social media like twitter and Instagram, but even there I wonder what is the point. Does it really matter? Is it the best use of my time? I don’t know.
Perhaps I need to focus on sharing just things I think will really benefit smart people I know. Otherwise I may just give this a rest.
Another year over. A semi-pandemic year, in a sense. Covid is still with us, but we did not (so far) get slammed with a bad new variant like we did last year with Omicron. Instead the pandemic is lesser than it was, but greater than the flu in terms of the sickness and death it brings. We still get vaccinated, though less than before. Schools are attended (though affected), restaurants are dined in, parties and special events are attended.
Thanks for reading this and anything else you read on this blog in 2022. I appreciate it. I managed to blog about roughly 3000 things on the internet this year. I hope you found some of them useful.
Google is declining in value as a search engine. You can search Google Going Downhill to see numerous pieces showing this. Even Google recognizes this: search for Google ChatGPT to see that they are concerned about how much better a user experience is with ChatGPT versus Google.
It’s not just that Google has declined by itself. What has also contributed to its declining value is the number of sites that have gotten good at SEO. I’ve pretty much given up on searching for some topics: all I get is bad Pinterest boards. Likewise hotels and restaurant searches are dominated by TripAdvisor and Yelp. You can add sites like Stack Overflow to that list. All in all, sites of low value (to me) make Google search results worse.
Locally, I think BlogTO is one of those low value sites. It really hit me this week when I was looking up a story on the demise of Betty’s on King. This recent piece in BlogTO was good. But it’s review of Betty’s? Just a placeholder, really: one sentence summarizing the place. And it’s not just Betty’s. I was doing some research on restaurants and became interested in Parquet on Harbord. Here’s BlogTO’s review of it: again, it’s one line and a poor photo. Meanwhile here’s Toronto Life’s review of it: lots of photos, in depth reporting on the place and the people who own it, context on the restaurant scene on Harbord…you name it.
Now here’s the thing: if you Google places in Toronto, BlogTO’s “writeups” will always appear on the first search page…often ahead of better reviews and even the place’s own website. If you’re mindful of this problem, you may ignore BlogTO and look around. But I am guessing that most people click on BlogTO, find their write up, and then see they have a link to the place’s website and click through. Or not.
That’s one reason why I suspect BlogTO does this: they will get clicks even for these next to useless web pages. I suspect the other reason is to do away with competition. I always wondered why Eater closed up in Toronto when it is still going strong in places like Montreal, not to mention the Carolina’s and other cities much stronger. The stated reason is here. But I suspect it is hard to compete with sites like BlogTO that will settle for a basic photo and a one line description that can be done in 15 minutes, all while coming ahead of you in Google searches.
Not all of BlogTO is bad. Some of their pieces are researched and well written, and I appreciate them. But they also flood the web with barely there pages to dominate searches for Toronto on sites like Google. And that makes it worse for everyone but them.
P.S. Here’s a tip to save you time clicking through on BlogTO pages. If you are on their page and it has a headline like “This restaurant is known for its croque monsieur”, hover your mouse over the URL. You will see the name of the place at the end of the URL. From there you can decide if you want to click through.
Yowza! It’s been a crazy month, this month, between surges in diseases, Twitter turning into a dumpster fire, crypto imploding, inflation hanging on, the war in Ukraine intensifying with seemingly more attacks on civilians, the US GOP becoming more Nazi curious….you name it. Let’s take a look.
In response, people are still wearing masks, though not many. Some people are carrying their own CO2 monitors to tell them when internal air quality is risky. Other people are even making their own. Fortunately new vaccines are rolling out, and you can still get COVID tests for free at some places, although that may be going away. Get that flu shot too, don’t end up being a flu statistic.
Will things gradually improve? I believe they will, but who knows. Some people thought worse variants would come along, but so far so good.
Social media: after years of something of a status quo, social media has entered a meltdown/transformation phase. This has been lead by Elon Musk, who has taken over Twitter. Initially people were wondering: will it matter? Turns out it mattered a lot. He started by firing lots of people. Then he told those left to either be “hardcore” and work under insane work conditions or quit. Not surprisingly, many quit. Other people quitting? Celebrity users. And most importantly, advertisers like GM. It doesn’t help that Musk has loaded up the company with a lot of debt. It’s going to get worse before it gets better, if it even can get better.
With Twitter in chaos, what can users do? Some people like me are considering moving on to other platforms, like Hive and Post and Mastodon. However, the alternatives have not really taken off yet, and in some cases, they are not keen for people like journalists to take their business there. (Maybe they should have read these mastodon tips.) Who knows how it all shakes out.
Other Cool stuff: I’ve recently got an Apple Watch and it is excellent for anyone worried about their heart. Here’s something on how it detects arrhythmia. I recommend the Apple Watch just as a health device. In terms of other devices, if you use a Kindle, I recommend Libby. This is also a cool plant device (shown below).
Inflation: Inflation is like a tenacious beast, hanging on. One place in particular that people are experiencing it is in food prices. Lots has been said about the cost of food these days. Companies like Loblaw have done quite well in turn. There has been some attempt by them to respond to this, despite these moves, I expect there will be more pressure on them in the months ahead. For one thing, the Walmart giant is waking up. Maybe more people will join me and get their groceries there. I’m a happy customer. Let’s see.
Here’s a month end cornucopia of things I found interesting and worth reading but don’t really fit into any specific category. (I would have posted it yesterday, but I had that very important 12 foot skeleton post to submit. :))
As I’ve said before, I like posting these because I will be curious to see how they read in the next 5-10 years. I hope you find it worth reading now, though. And thank you!
AI and art: Artists and non-artists continut to make art and play around with AI. Microsoft is even going to incorporate some of the tools into their software. Where this goes, I am not sure. But here’s something on an artist in Amsterdam using it. Not everyone is keen on it: the Getty is banning it.
Pandemic/Inflation: we continue to make our way through the pandemic as COVID remains a threat. Even though we also continue to try and live with it, the disease has brought big pandemic life changes, Fortunately there are more booster coming out. Also a number of people I know are using CO2 monitors to measure CO2 in indoor spaces. There is still some mask wearing.
In Canada there’s been some complaints about the cost of the arriveCAN system. It was expensive, for sure. This piece breaks down the costs. Meanwhile, some jokers convinced some in the media it could be built for next to nothing at a Hackathon. This just tells me the media needs to get more tech savvy to such boasts.
Meanwhile in Toronto we had an election with poor turnout and mostly incumbents voted back in, including the mayor. People in the city are worried about the fact that the city is cashed strapped and the mayor isn’t going going to do anything about it other than cut services like the Toronto Public Library. Grim. The Mayor was even mocked in this art installation called austerityTO.
Totally unrelated but not grim: the Canadian legend Mr. Dressup is getting a documentary! Nice.
Work: employers continue to struggle with remote work. The Times argues: Remote Work Is Here to Stay. Lean In Employers.. The flip side of that is we get many stories of employers tracking workers. It’s a strange new working world. Speaking of that, here’s a piece arguing for using AI to supercharge workers. As a long time automation specialist, I agree.
Signs of the times: A weird chess scandal broke out recently. I thought these pieces in the WSJ here and here did a good job on assessing it. As did this piece in the Atlantic.
Meanwhile, social media continue to dominate some people’s lives, based on this: Want to Get Noticed by a Celebrity? Snag Their Username on Social Media. Speaking of social media, Facebook/Meta is tanking and Elon Musk took over Twitter. Oh well. Blogging is still going strong! As are you if you are reading this: thanks very much!
Here’s a month end cornucopia of things I found interesting and worth reading but don’t really fit into any specific category. Among other things, I like posting these because I will be curious to see how they read in the next 5-10 years. I hope you find it worth reading now, though. 🙂
China: China has been making noise about invading Taiwan. A recent visit by Nancy Pelosi especially helped stir that pot. Foreign Policy had some good pieces on it here and here. China has been threatening Taiwan with drones, although it will take much more than drones to accomplish it.
The U.S.: While Biden and Trump are likely to be fighting to be president in 2024, others are looking to content. Politico looks at how Nikki Haley raises money. And Josh Barro dismisses Gavin Newsom . AOC ponders if she will ever be president. Some day. Maybe. Finally, here’s a piece on the DeSantis Martha’s Vineyard stunt. Odious. Speaking of odious, Ken Starr died. Politico properly assesses his poor legacy.
Canada: Here in Canada the Conservative party has a new leader. Let’s see how that goes. I’d like to pause for a moment to highlight the interim leader, Candice Bergen. She forced the previous leader out of Stornoway so she could move in. Then she retires. Nice. Have to remember that the next time the Tories complain others not being fiscally conservative. More on that here and here.
Here’s a month end cornucopia of things I found interesting and worth reading but don’t really fit into any specific category. I hope you find it worth reading, too.
Do you know if you live in one of one of the 49 Coolest Neighbourhoods in the World Right Now? You may be if your area appears on that list. Nothing for Toronto, though some for Montreal and Vancouver.
a list of random items I’ve been stashing away while working from home in this time of social distancing and the pandemic. Initially my goal was to create a newsletter, and perhaps I still will create one. Most of the newsletters I get, though, read like blog posts. That’s fine. But then why do I need to create a newsletter, when I can just post here. Plus, it will save you another thing to deal with in your inbox. Read when you have nothing else to read.
That was my goal. But pretty soon (as early as June 2020) these monthly posts transformed mostly into what was happening pandemic wise. In that month I noted it was…
…a weird time in the pandemic: in parts of the world, the worst is behind them (e.g. parts of Europe)
“The worst is behind them”. How little did I know! In fact, as the months passed, things grinded on with wave after wave of infections. But there was also progress, as I highlighted a year later in June of 2021 :
Canadians continue to ramp up on getting vaccinated. 30% of the population has been fully vaxxed, including yours truly. Well done!
And now it’s been a year later and most Canadians have not only been vaccinated but boosted. Some — like me — double boosted! And many of us — me again! — got COVID anyway. Got COVID and lived and stayed out of hospitals. Not great but good nonetheless.
But it is not over. COVID-19 is still out there mutating and people are still getting sick and in some cases dying. It hasn’t gone away, only our extraordinary approach to it has. I don’t know what will happen in the fall. No one knows. Many have beliefs. Some are wondering if and when will COVID-19 be endemic? We will just have to do our best and see.
With that, I think it is time to retire this “newsletter”. Truth is, I don’t have much news to share on a monthly basis that you don’t already know. I’m never go to get rich or gain a big following that way. It’s fine. And not having a monthly deadline is a relief.
Unless the pandemic was to be medically and socially disruptive, it will stay done. What I do plan to do is just randomly writing my ramblings posts on general topics. We will see. In the meantime, a list of all my newsletters is here. If nothing else, it’s a somewhat interesting plague journal.
Plenty of things have happened in this period. The worst of people (e.g. Putin, Trump) did their worst and left unpunished. The better people (Biden) did their best, only to be unappreciated. Economies recovered, but inflation sprung up. With luck and strong action, in a year from now the war in the Ukraine and worldwide inflation will be positively resolved. One hopes.
Besides newsletters, the other fad of the pandemic was cryptocurrencies, NFTs, Web3 and all that nonsense. Now with the coming of crypto winter, we may hear less of that. There was also Wordle. Some of you are still playing Wordle, though it seems less so. (if you are, click here to help your score).
We will go on. Thanks to all of you who have read these pandemic ramblings over these many months. If you want to continue to keep up to date on what is happening with Covid, I recommend this newsletter from Eric Topol called Ground Truths. As for me, look here for my (non-pandemic) ramblings and other posts. Take care. Stay well.
Last month, I thought I needed to switch up this monthly missive of a quasi newsletter. Make it a bit more rambling, a bit less worldly and world weary. I decided to push down the pandemic stuff and look at some other things first. I hope you like it.
In Canada one of the big things last month was the streak that Mattea Roach had on Jeopardy. I swear everyone in Canada was proud of her. In fact, it was funny to read the news in Nova Scotia and Ontario, because both of them wanted to claim her for their own. I get it! She’s great!
She caught the attention of not only Canada, but the US too. Even the NY Times did a piece on her. Not surprising: she is newsworthy.
I mean let’s face it, if being rich meant being happy, then Elon Musk would be the happiest person ever. Instead, he is on social media all the time making a fool of himself. Not just due to his trying to buy twitter, but his opinions in general. If you want to read more about what he is/was up to at this time, you can read this or this. I think the less we hear from him, the better.
Speaking of rich, the whole NFT/ crypto/thingamabobs did not do well this month, with articles on their big meltdown all over the place. This says NFT sales are flatlining , but ‘flatlining’ is too kind a word. Finally, I think the Beaverton captured it perfectly . I love the Beaverton: a perfect blend of Canadian humour and perspective. A good counterpoint to all that financial madness.
The pandemic is in a state of transition too. Here in Toronto we have ended our pandemic emergency declaration after 777 days. Wow. That’s a long time and big number. Another big number is the number of Covid deaths in Canada, 40,000, and in the US, 1,000,000. For those who have lost loved ones, the fact that Canada managed the pandemic better than the US is cold comfort. It’s also astounding to think about, numbers wise. I can only imagine how much worse it would have been without vaccines.
I’m also curious to see what happens as people let down their guard. Lockdowns are over everywhere. Concerts and travelling are ramped up. People are still wearing masks, but less and less so from what I can see.
What’s next? Well, hospitals are in transition, if I read this piece correctly in The Atlantic . Also viruses on hiatus during the pandemic are coming back which is not great. Smart people like Bill Gates and others are thinking about how to prevent the next pandemic. I hope we can. We will need lots of effort, smart people and tools. Although I don’t think the metaverse is going to be one of those tools, despite what this piece says. (Wanted to throw a bone to the metaverse here….we used to hear about it all the time. Now, barely at all. :))
There’s been other things happening too, like the Roe vs Wade situation in the US, not to mention the horrible shootings there. Sadly, no transition for the better in either case. And the war in Ukraine still goes on, though sadly it has become less newsworthy.
Inflation has been bad and newsworthy, but I believe it is going to be transitioning for the better. It has been tough on people, though, leading to articles like this: How to put delicious meals on the table as inflation drives up costs. Inflation is good for people with large fixed debt, but bad for people barely getting by. Let’s hope it gets under control soon.
It’s spring, somewhat, here in Ontario. That means one day you can be out walking in the sunshine, admired all the blossoms, only to have a snowfall dump on you the next day. It’s a rollercoaster of a month. You could almost say that April rambles. Much like this newsletter. Here it is, once again! May you associate it more with sunshine than snowfall.
What should you do? Remember, you are more or less on your own now in the pandemic. I’d recommend sticking with masks and social distancing still. If you do still get COVID then here are two pieces on managing it yourself at home: this and this.
One last thing. I go downtown sometimes and see many places closed up. Like the many deaths that have occurred, there is a blindness to it, it seems. I find it throws me off, that we have gone through this terrible event and we are still dealing with it and yet there is a rush to act like it never happened and move on. It’s weird.
Ontario: In Ontario where I live, the province is gearing up for an election. The government is doing what it can to prepare to win the election, including releasing this budget and hoping it can win enough people over by things like eliminating some highway tolls. Let’s see. Meanwhile for those of you concerned about COVID in this province, here is the Ontario COVID dashboard to keep track of.
Ukraine: I don’t have to tell people that life in Ukraine continues to be grim. There are constant stories about it everywhere. Here is a snapshot that shows what life under the occupation by Russia is like.
Meanwhile Ukrainians fight. I support them and want them to be free and independent from Russia. There is nothing good about the situation, just degrees of bad. That’s why I find it is sad and remarkable with how many people in the West are war happy and get excited about shipping more and more weapons to Ukrainians. It may be a necessary evil, but it is an evil in the light of a greater evil.
As an aside, here’s what is happening to one of the few allies Russia has left: Belarus. It’s a place I am keeping an eye on. I suspect the last thing Putin wants is for stuff to go poorly there: he has enough trouble his hands (trouble he is solely responsible for).
USA: There is a weird thing happening on the right wing in the US with regards to moral panic. My belief is that it is a strong reaction on the right to the push on the left against transphobia and other such initiatives. Even Disney got swept up in all this talk about “grooming” and generally abusing kids. You can see part of it here and here . I have a theory that this is partly a blending of moral panic/bigotry and the rise of the Internet. In the days of early trolling there was this bizarre character that was used to accuse people and groups of being pedophiles. (Pedophile being the worst thing you could accuse someone of.) I suspect that right wing push, combined with Internet culture, has led to those accusations being used widely. Gotta love when the sewers of the Internet overflow into the general culture. (Not!)
The right in the US is also in some cases trying to restrict the use of abortion pills. These are all skirmishes on the broader culture war occurring down south, in places like Florida with its battle against “indoctrination” with things like this and this. All events to set up the governor of Florida as being the next Trump. That’s what culture wars stoked by politicians are about.
Speaking of Trump, the first family of corruption continue to make news with stories like this and this .
I had some other ramblings about the world, but frankly it is all too grim. Let’s change gears.
Elon Musk: yeah, no. The man is festering in attention as it is. You can get nonsense elsewhere.
Not fun but useful: do you have trouble finding a notary? It can be hard. If you need one, consider this. I also thought this piece on starling murmurations was great.
Finally, I think I need to switch this newsletter up soon. It has become too worldly, too worldweary. I appreciate you reading it: thanks for that. But you deserve better ramblings. I’ll try to do that. Meanwhile, enjoy Spring!
Spring is here. And with Spring, thoughts turn to getting outdoors. I understand the feeling. People want to enjoy themselves after a tough winter. But hey, if you have a few minutes, I hope you can take the time to read this, my latest newsletter.
Pandemic: Well Omicron rushed out as fast as it rushed in, at least in my part of the world. Just in time to mark the 2nd anniversary of the pandemic. It’s been so dramatic that people are willing to declare the pandemic is over. There’s been constant talk of returning to normal. But what does Normal even mean? I’m not sure, and I don’t think anyone else is either. As this post states, How Did This Many Deaths Become Normal? . There’s nothing normal to return to. Ask Hong Kong. They are dealing with a ‘preventable disaster’. They wish they could return to normal.
Speaking of the Ontario Government, I was disappointed that the Minister of Health decided to stop posting COVID stats on twitter. Fortunately they can be found on a web page. So I wrote a python program called covid.py to scrape the data and output it. I then post it on twitter myself. (You can find the code here.)
Work: As for work life, people have been going into the office. If this will be you and you forget how to dress, then this (on dress jackets) or this (on no suit business attire) may help. It would be nice if the office you went back to looked as green and lush as this. Or they were as open to personalizing your space as Corbusier wanted.
Ukraine: things seem to be reaching new phase in the Russian-Ukrainian war. Apparently peace talks are progressing. We shall see. I am sad to see such needless suffering has been brought on by the Russian government. It is bittersweet that the Ukrainians have held out this far, thanks to their own fighting and the aid of NATO nations. Let’s hope for an end to it soon.
In other news: I was in London last week and I saw the British Museum is getting into NFTs. Sigh. According to this, it’s not just them. (London was great btw. We had a week of sunshine and warm temperatures. It was a perfect vacation.)
Streaming is becoming a bigger and bigger deal. So what are these streaming platforms considering doing more of? Ads. Streaming also had its moment at the Oscars recently, as this piece shows. (What about Oscars and the Slap, Bernie? We don’t talk about the slap no no.)
Inflation is still a concern these days. One way companies are dealing with it is by shrinking the products you buy. Many products are too big, so this could be something of a good thing. Inflation is still a bad thing.
Electric vehicles continue to make progress. A new (to me) competitor for the Tesla is the Polestar . I like how their ads are mainly saying they are not Elon Musk’s company. Tesla’s shareholders should take note.
Thanks again for reading this newsletter. I hope someday it will be filled with things having nothing to do with sickness or conflict. It’s good to be hopeful. See you next month.
Well, happy (?) end of February to you. February has always been the toughest month for me in Canada. It’s too dark, too cold, and both Christmas and Spring seem far away. Perhaps this newsletter can distract you and I from the challenges of this time. Or remind you of them. Sigh.
Pandemic: Omicron came in with a roar and is now rushing back out again. Good. It was very contagious, which means most of us had it but then it was done. I hope that’s true.
Russia: As I write this, Russia is in the process of invading Ukraine. In the short term this is catastrophic for the latter, but the pain of this will soon increase for the former. No one gets to invade a country and not pay the price. Putin may not think so, and perhaps he will quickly overrun the country and put in a puppet government that does all the dirty work. All the scenarios are hard to consider.
America: America continues it’s weird drift away from what it could be. States continue to gerrymander and their Supreme court continues to veer right so hard that even the Chief Justice, John Roberts, has lost control.
Joe Rogan: Everyone has been talking about this guy recently. I don’t have much to say about him. Certainly not much that is good. I certainly am not happy about how he has supported and help propagate COVID-19 misinformation right-wing myths. Not many others are happy about him either. For more on him, such as his other Spotify controversies, you can read this.
Trucker protests: Well after almost a month of shenanigans at the capital of Canada and elsewhere, the “trucker” protest has retreated. It took Trudeau using The Emergencies Act, partially due to some prompting from his critics. Thankfully he quickly withdrew it. Like Joe Rogan, I don’t have anything positive to say about it either. This sums up the delusion of the protesters: The American Anti-Vax Fantasy of Canada’s “Freedom Convoy”.
This is the third calendar year of being in this pandemic: 2020, 2021 and now 2022. True, the duration is technically less than 3 years (March 2020-January 2022) but heck it feels like three years to me. Likely it does for you too. I can assure reading this newsletter will go by quickly in comparison.
Pandemic: The last month has seen Omicron variant slamming into the world with full force, including yours truly. After managing to avoid Covid-19 in all its variant forms, me and the people in my bubble (save my son) managed to get it within a day of each other. Fortunately we were all vaxxed and in some cases boosted. Likely because of that, we all felt sick and weak but nothing remotely requiring a visit to a hospital, never mind a stay. It sucked, and I missed some work in order to rest up (and frankly in the early days I slept most of the day while my body worked overtime to squash those bugs). We are now as healthy as we were before.
And it wasn’t just us. It seemed almost everyone had it. Partially because of all this sickness, we started to see impacts of it everywhere, such as the grocery stores. It seems like grocery stores running out of food, but this piece has what’s really going on. The stores are empty in many parts. But I suspect this will not be for long.
Meanwhile, speaking of the unvaccinated and the anti-vaxxers, in much of the West the walls are closing in on them. Let’s hope that leads to less and less unvaccinated people. Sadly, there is still a big convoy going to Ottawa to protest vaccine mandates. Idiots.
A milder form of protest is in the form of people whose livelihood depends on crowds. Restaurants for sure, but also the arts. It was stated here that arbitrary shutdowns show that most Canadian leaders hold little value in artists. It may seem unfair, especially in light of sporting events going on. But to say that crowded venues are harmless is wrong, in my opinion.
Business: the pandemic continues to impact business and the working world in many ways. Besides food shortages, we also have demand driven inflation. Here’s a horribly wrong take on how to deal with it: What a Socialist Response to Inflation Should Look Like. While I am sympathetic to the impact inflation has on low income workers, price controls will not effectively deal with it. Income supports and other programs would be far more effective.
Crypto: it seems like there is an explosion of discussion with regards to digital finance. While there are many aspects to it, it seems to have centered around the term “crypto”. Here’s a good piece on it from Josh Barro: Why I hate cryptocurrency. Here’s an attempt at a fair assessment Crypto: the good the bad and the ugly. I still think it is mostly bad. Even in areas where it is supposed to be helpful, it isn’t. Case in point: NFT art sales are booming. Just without some artists’ permission. I find the whole topic depressing to think about.
Finally and positively: In general, it is easy to get downbeat in the midst of winter during this seemingly endless pandemic. But it is truly incredible how quickly we have developed a vaccine and rolled it out (and continue to roll it out) around the world. Most people have worked hard to do the right thing and try and end this situation. It is too easy to focus on the bad parts like the antivaxxers and antimaskers, when at least in Canada the vast majority are provaxx and promask and supportive of good initiatives. Let’s focus on that for a moment. Meanwhile do what you can to stay well and help your community to do the same.
P. S. I took a drawing challenge this month: draw every day and post it on Instagram. I failed, but I failed in a “shoot for the stars, land on the moon” way. I didn’t manage to draw 31 images, but I managed to draw much more than I had been in ages. I was glad for that. Here’s one of those sketches: white conte on black paper.
When I lived on Castlefield Avenue I would often see the sky like this walking home late at night. It’s a good image and memory for me. Thanks to my friend and old colleague Karen Maxwell for the challenge.
Happy New Year’s Eve to you! Raise a glass of cheer for another year of pandemic nonsense down the drain. Last month I said: it’s hard to believe we are in the pandemic, like it was about to be finished soon. Now what we got in December was almost a throwback to the beginning of the pandemic! Painful. I hope the reading of this newsletter brings something other than pain.
Pandemic: Last month I wondered what the Omicron variant would bring. Now I know: it brought us an incredible amount of sickness. Cases have shot through the roof and it seems like COVID, once preventable with reasonable measures taken, is less so. Worse, even with vaccines people are still getting ill. The one piece of good news so far is hospitalization seems to be manageable.
But people have also been making an effort. People are getting test like crazy, and not surprisingly, this has led to test backlogs. The challenge here is sometimes the backlogs are due to overwhelming demand and sometimes it is due to underwhelming supply. People are assuming the problem is the latter, but even the most efficient supply chain can get overwhelmed by too much demand. That said, some places (Nova Scotia) are really good at distributing tests, while other places (Ontario) not so much.
Before omicron, the number of hot takes on COVID had seem to die down. Now they have fired back up again. Uncertainty provides fuel for all these spicy opinions. My boring take is that people should continue to mask up, avoid crowds, and get fully vaccinated as soon as they can. Heck wash your hands for 20 seconds still…it can’t hurt.
I get that people are sick of the pandemic. We all are! But pretending it isn’t happening is ridiculous. Unfortunately we have organizations like the NBA limping along because money, I suppose. I mean here are the Raptors with 10 of their players out due to COVID. So we have these ridiculous events with 10,000 people in the stands to watch pickup basketball. No wonder we are stuck. I understand restaurants trying to get people into them: it’s do or die for many of them. The rich NBA? I have less understanding.
Non-Pandemic: In the US, lots of people writing off Joe Biden due to Joe Manchin putting a pin in his Build Back Better legislation. My take is: we shall see. It’s certainly benefited Manchin in the short term. But the cliche that a week in politics is a long time is a cliche for a reason. Biden has time. He’s already achieved a lot, but it is hard to feel that. This article attempts to understand that and is worth a look.
Speaking of technology, there’s lots of talk lately about web3. Frankly I am highly skeptical of it. It seems like a bunch of overhyped schemes to make money. If I had to recommend one thing to read on it, it would be this.
The other thing people were talking about technology-wise were the multiple outages at AWS and the log4j vunerability. The former I was surprised by: the latter not so much. People do not realize how exposed we all are to the soft underbelly of open source: the log4j problems were a good reminder/wake up call.
Entertainment wise, I continue to avoid going to movie theatres, concerts or anything with crowds. I made an exception for television/streaming. While I rarely watch TV, there were a few things I did watch this December, including Don’t Look Up and Get Back. I thought the former was a hot mess. and this piece aligns with my views. As for Get Back, there was a lot I liked about it, including how it changed my opinions of the band. Although a huge Paul McCartney fan, my opinion dropped of him after watching it. Same with George Harrison. My opinion of John and Ringo rose, as did my opinion of Yoko. I still love them all, but I was surprised to see my opinion still change despite all these years of being a big fan.
I also watched some of American Crime Story on the Clinton Scandals. Bill Clinton does not come out well in it, however sympathetic you are to him. The women generally come across as human and multidimensional, which I liked. If you are into such drama, I recommend it.
Other things I enjoyed and continue to enjoy is the twitter account Canadian Paintings. Whoever curates it does a superb job. There is such a wide range of art displayed and it is often topical. I love it every time the account posts.
Cooking-wise, my new favorite instagram account and web site is Salt & Lavender. Good RICH food. The account does not shy away from high fat ingredients and frankly, I love that. If you need to treat yourself, visit their website.
The other food person I follow is Carolina Gelen on IG. A very entertaining account with good recipes. She is a superb communicator.
Well that’s it for the newsletter. Remember, last year in January we were still waiting for the vaccine: we have made tremendous progress since then! We still haven’t put the pandemic behind us (I am a terrible predictor!) but I think we can soon. Hang in there!
Speaking of hanging in, if you got this far, thank you! I appreciate it! I hope you have a good and safe New Year’s Eve, and despite the challenges, you manage to have a good year next year. You deserve it. We all do.
I started this blog on April 2007. After four years, it had reached 500,000 views. A decade later, it has reached a new milestone: a million views!
In the first four years, blogging was hot. I even had my blog featured on one of the blog roles on the New York Times. (It was a fluke, but it meant I got 500 views a day: now I average around 50 views.) In the last decade, blogging has been superseded many times by other online media, from twitter to TikToks. I use some of them, but I keep beavering away here too.
I have been steadily blogging for ten years, never knowing if I would reach this peak. Now that I have, I don’t know what I will do. Will I still blog every weekend and have them distributed throughout the week? Or will I just go with a random schedule? Will I move this off of WordPress and go to another platform and more effectively monetize the few popular posts I have? I don’t know. Something will change.
Meanwhile, I expect I will continue to blog. I like it. Maybe my next goal is 5000 posts. Or 250,000 visitors. We will see!
As always, thanks for reading this. I’ve been lucky to have thousands of people like you reading my posts a million times. That’s great, and greatly appreciated.
P.S. I’ve written a fair bit of blog posts about blogging. You can read them, here.
The following quote from an Axios piece struck me as odd:
The creator economy was supposed to democratize media, but it turns out that a small portion of creators still reap the most revenue for their work across multiple platforms.
I wonder how they came up with their assumptions. The creator economy has been going on since blogging and other Web 2.0 technologies, and while it has given creators equal access to platforms, it has never spread the wealth. Ever. There is a reason why books like The Long Tail were successful: they accurately described how things worked. Platforms come and go, from Blogger to Twitch, and no doubt more will come in the future. Everyone will have equal access to them. Likewise, a few will reap the lion’s share and the rest will get crumbs. That’s how it works.
When Tumblr and Posterous came out over a decade ago, I started using them a fair bit. Sadly Posterous died. Tumblr kept going, but I stopped using it. It’s not that Tumblr is a bad technology platform: it’s just that I didn’t have a need for it. But now I do.
I wanted a platform to do knowledge transfer of IT concepts for my daughter who is also currently in IT. I could email them directly, but they are not personal and others might benefit from them too. I could use WordPress or even just a straight up website. I decided to mix it up a bit and use an old Tumble log I’ve had since 2009 called BLMonIT . It has a great old school theme that looks like an old Mac OS background. It originally was meant for sharing IT knowledge. It has been hardly used. It was just the thing I needed.
I’m going to be posting IT knowledge and opinion there, I hope. If you find it might benefit you, head over to BLMonIT.tumblr.com.
Well well well, it’s the last month of 2020, and my last not-really-a-newsletter newsletter! I appreciate you taking a moment to read my latest not-a-newsletter of highlights and ramblings since the one in November.
I’m not sure if I will continue these here and in this format in the new year. Let’s see. Something for me to consider as the year closes. But for now, here’s things I’ve been thinking on since the last one:
Pandemic: It’s hard not to think about the pandemic. Since November, the pandemic has only gotten worse in many places. My town and province is no exception. Cases are up, deaths are up, efforts to flatten the curve seem to be going nowhere. My son’s school was shut down then the rest of the schools were shut down. As for leadership, it seems very reactive these days. A good analysis of that is here: With the pandemic surging, we need more leadership and less urging – The Globe and Mail. Also this piece: Why Doug Ford is stumbling during COVID-19’s second wave? Too often governments thought they could somehow manage the disease and open the economy. They couldn’t.
One of the reason deal with COVID has been so frustrating is well captured in this image:
Governments everywhere keep fiddling with the dial as if to find the right setting, and then find there is none. (Image from xkcd: Covid Precaution Level)
Some places have managed better than others, but even there it has not been perfect. Not long after this came out, Living in Nova Scotia’s Covid-Free World – The New York Times, they had an outbreak in cases. Nova Scotia is still doing very well, but it is hard to stay perfect. (I’m looking at you New Zealand.)
The US: This newsletter is not just about the pandemic. It’s also time to send out a big Bronx cheer to the current president of the United States. I often argued that he was not the worst president in American history. I am wavering in that belief. Just the number of unnecessary deaths resulting from his inaction make him truly terrible. As we lift up the rock and uncover more about him, I think he will only seem worse. Meanwhile, here’s a good piece on his ending: Trump’s Final Days of Rage and Denial – The New York Times.
The economy: One thing we are doing to hear a lot about is the deficits and debts now. This is not the time to do that. There is still much needs to be done for the world to recover. Not only that, but interest rates for some nations are essentially negative. See this for details: China Borrows at Negative Rates for the First Time – WSJ
One group in Canada you might hear banging on about the debt is the Fraser Institute. So here’s a reminder from PressProgress: pay no attention to anything the Fraser Institute says. Even if you are a right winger, at least find some source that doesn’t manipulate the facts.
Newsletters: they have become old hat now. So much so I think I will not comment on them any more. I would like to highlight one last one, though. David Lebovitz has moved to Substack. Here is his.. He also has a great blog. He’s been an excellent user of social media for some time (not to mention a fine cook and author). Go check him out. Meanwhile, for anyone tired of turning bananas into banana bread, check out this: Banana and Chocolate Chip Upside Down Cake (Lowfat) – David Lebovitz
In 2020, blogging is back. At least blogging as newsletters. Think Substack and all the people flocking to there. Blogging on WordPress (or Blogger or Tumblr or other blogging platforms) is not as hot but still going strong.
That’s good. I am a fan of more writing and better writing, whether it comes in blog form or newsletter form. Bring it on.
I’ll likely to continue writing here until I get 1,000,000 hits (currently at 976,745 hits) but given the limited readership, that may never happen. I’ll keep writing, regardless. We all need goals, and the million hits is one of mine.
Currently I sit down every Saturday morning and review interesting things I’ve found on the Internet and saved in Pocket. I have over 1000 things still in Pocket, not to mention a spreadsheet of old links that were noteworthy. There’s always something of interest to write about. Plus the Internet never stops being interesting.
I usually take 3-4 hours to write about these things. Then I schedule them to be posted throughout the week. My thinking is that this is more likely to bring a wider readership to them. My SEO skills are limited, but this is my thinking.
I enjoy this writing time. I grab some breakfast and a coffee and craft the posts. I grab images from Unsplash.com to illustrate the posts. It’s a hobby and something I enjoy doing. I love doing it. I’m an amateur writer and thinker.
I try and mix up the posts for readers. Something on Monday to help you get your week started. Something fun on Friday. Something to make your weekend better on Saturday. Perhaps a more thoughtful post on Sunday.
As always I think: would someone reading this get any benefit? Much of my posts are advice, but in areas I am interested in. I want to share things of interest to me but that will also interest others.
Once a month I go back over posts from other years. Today I will go back over the December posts. It’s fascinating to see what was interesting to me in other years.
Whenever I am lost for what my audience is, I think: would someone in my family want to read this? Or one or more of my friends? Once I have that one reader, I can write to them. Many of my posts are letters to people that may not realize it.
Since the pandemic, I have started a newsletter within the blog. I haven’t broken it out into its separate media. Just like I never moved to Tumblr or Medium or took up podcasts. This blog is sufficient for what I want to communicate and record.
I have a few other blogs on WordPress: one on cooking that I enjoy writing from time to time. A few others that are experimental. I use Instagram still because it is easy, but photography is a very separate and different media.
I’ll continue to write here, writing for smart people I know. I’ve been doing it since before the World Wide Web. Why stop now?
As always, for those who have read this far:
An appropriate thank you card for this era.
(Coffee Photo by Laura Chouette on Unsplash. The other image is also from Unsplash but I could not find who to attribute it to)
Hi there! It’s time for my monthly newsletter-but-not of highlights and ramblings. As always, thanks for stopping by and reading this.
It’s been an intense period of time since October. Starting with the pandemic…
Pandemic – bad: we have terrible new statistics coming out of many places, including Canada. Months ago people were talking about the second wave, and now it seems to be crashing over us in so many places. I am fearful it is going to take a dreadful toll on us this winter. I think so much has collapsed and as I feared in the last newsletter, people are just dropping the ball. Here in Canada I see a number of provincial leaders just floundering and since healthcare is their jurisdiction, I am not hopeful things will get better soon. And it’s not just Canada: many other countries seem to be either flailing or bringing in stricter measures. I think sooner than later many places will head back to lockdown.
And it’s not just Canadian politicians. I think people have become more social and the natural outcome of this is more spreading of the virus, more people getting sick, and more people dying.
Pandemic – good: the silver lining is the news of the vaccines coming out. It can’t happen soon enough, though obviously it is going to be well into 2021 before we get them. Let’s hope there is enough will and discipline to crack down on socialization and other contributors to the spread of COVID-19 until they are widely delivered.
There’s been much good said about how the Atlantic Provinces have been handling the pandemic. But it has come at a cost. For example my home of Cape Breton has no air travel in or out of Sydney airport: Air Canada flights cancelled between Sydney, Halifax | CBC News. There is no rail either: that was cancelled long ago. Sad.
Personally, I have not done much differently since March. I went to two indoor restaurants with plenty of social distancing in the summer, and I have had two indoor gatherings with two other people outside my tiny bubble of four, but that’s it. What I have found is I am just am accepting things as normal now. I don’t have any special projects or activities on the go the way I was earlier in the pandemic. But I am not putting things on hold either: I find I am looking forward to things that I can afford to look forward to.
The USA : the other big news of the last month is the defeat of Donald Trump by Joe Biden. Whatever shortcomings President Biden will have, they will be nothing in comparison to the shortcomings of President Trump. I argued some time ago that Trump was not the worst US President ever. I think Buchanan still might be. But I think Trump might be the second worse now, given the number of preventable deaths due to COVID if he had acted sooner. Like I said, I think Buchanan is still the worst, but with the deaths, corruption, lying, nepotism, and so many other faults, Trump is the second worst. At least he is no longer President, come January. All the world will benefit from this.
Restaurants: restaurants still continue to have a tough time of it, and come winter in Canada, I don’t know how many we will lose. Likely a lot. So I am always on the lookout for any sliver of hope out there. One I found was this innovative way to provide food.
Newsletters: Not sure if I am going to keep highlighting them. But for now I will mention that if you want a really good newsletter on the law, and I think you do, I highly recommend The Popehat Report. The author, Ken White, goes by the name of Popehat on twitter. I learn something new an in depth every time I read it.
Speaking of newsletters, the Substack service seems to be on a roll when it comes to signing up big names to provide newsletter services. I suspect this will build for awhile as a gold rush of sorts occurs. Lots of people will think they will be able to cash in. But as always the Long Tail effect will occur, and just a small number of people will really benefit from the monetization of newsletter.
Climate Change: Between the pandemic and the US election, it has been easy to forget there is still a climate crisis occurring. There are so many examples of it, but this struck me: Phoenix to break record for most 100-degree days in calendar year – The Washington Post. Eventually many parts of the world will be uninhabitable as time passes and Climate Change worsens.
Cool science: gravitational waves were first discovered in 2015. Since then, scientists have captured 50 events pertaining to gravitational waves. Here’s what that means: What 50 Gravitational-wave Events Reveal about the Universe – Scientific AmericanI love that this new tool is already letting us learn so much more about our universe.
Cool tech: I have been a fan of Raspberry Pis for a long time. They continue to come out with new and improved versions of the technology. Case in point, this: Raspberry Pi 400 – Complete Kit – BuyaPi.ca. It could be a great way to get someone interested in computers.
Plants: I’ve written number of pieces on plants; you can find themhere. I used to be terrible with them. But one good thing about the pandemic is that I am home all the time. This helps me keep a better eye on my green friends. Partially as a result of that, they are thriving. If you have problems with plants, I recommend that you read this: How to stop killing your houseplants – Vox
Finally: I realize the pandemic is getting you down. Your not alone. But there are vaccines coming, so find ways to deal with it until then.
Welcome to Autumn: a season so nice they named it twice (Autumn/Fall). Thanks again for reading one of my kinda/sorta/not really newsletters containing things on my mind since the last one in September. Let’s jump in:
The Pandemic – bad: well the pandemic seems to be going pear shaped all over the world. Places that have kept their numbers down have suddenly dropped the ball and have seen their numbers increase. There are a few exceptions, like New Zealand and the Atlantic provinces in Canada. But they are few and far between and likely in isolated places, I believe. As for Canada overall, I think this is a very good analysis of where we currently are with the pandemic: Opinion: With winter coming and the virus spreading, a feeling of dread is setting in – The Globe and Mail. I am afraid it will get worse.
The Pandemic – good: Not everything is gloom and doom, though. Some fun and joyous things have happened. For instance, the night of a thousand wines. One of the fun things that happened in the pandemic is the night Susan Orlean got drunk and then took to twitter. The results were
unintentionally hilarious. You can read about them, here. (She feels no shame, so I do not feel bad sharing this. Hey, it happens.)
Dealing with discomfort: I wrote this three years ago, on how to think about living with discomfort. I think it holds up and is worth reading if you are suffering.
New Newsletters: Last time I hadn’t thought of any newsletters worth mentioning. Not this time. First up is this one from Laura Calder. It’s monthly and is packed with lots of good things to read. Highly recommended. For people who like a thoughtful political newsletter, there is this one, from Siri Agrell: Loss Leader.
The U.S.: well, not long now before the U.S. election. Thank god. Here’s hoping for a change in the leadership. Both America and the world needs it. But remember, whatever bad things you think about Trump, he is STILL not the worst president ever. This guy is.
Meanwhile I celebrated by 37th year at IBM this October 3rd. For someone who was surprised to not have to go on the “pogey” after a year, it’s been a long and rewarding trip. I wrote a long piece about it 10 years ago. (One thing I like about my blog is going back in time.)
Google Assistant: I have become a fan of Google Assistants over the last while. I now have three devices for this: a Google mini, my Sonos speaker, and this Lenovo Smart Clock (which I wrote about). I have found it has made my life better. I use it to play music, get the time, get the weather. The one in the kitchen is especially great because I can do so much just by talking to the mini. I highly recommend them.
Cooking: I wrote this a while ago about how to make French fries. If you love french fries, you should read it. It will change your life (or at least have you making fries more :)). And it is also the season for sheet pan cooking. Here’s some good advice I found on that, here.
Exercise tips: if you are like me, you need to exercise. Here’s some tips!
Hey! Thanks again for reading this, my latest not-a-newsletter of highlights and ramblings since the one in August. I had a long list of things to post here, but I cannot seem to find them. Augh. Oh well.
Newsletters: a few newsletters ago they were all shiny and new. Now they have these become old hat. Almost. It seems like more and more people are jumping on the bandwagon. I’ve realized reading them now that they are a harder thing to write than most people think. The people most successful seem to have a voice and a formula/structure. If you have a formula or structure, your newsletter will hold up even on week publishing days. If you do not, it’s likely harder to maintain a base level of consistency. From what I have witnessed.
Favorite newsletters: No new ones since my last newsletter.
Pandemic update: in Canada we seem to be heading back down to the bad times, after making such good progress. I am not surprised. I think people are breaking down and thinking “oh what’s a little socializing going to do?” and the next thing you know we are back where we were months ago.
As well, schools are back: this will have an effect somehow. We will know in a few weeks.
Meanwhile I am trying to be as normal as I can and trying to get out when I can, knowing that I might not be able to in a few weeks if things spiral out of control.
Restaurants: I am not sure what will happen with restaurants if there is another form of lockdown. Many have closed, and I have to believe that the ones that haven’t are barely getting by. If this goes on for an extended period of time, I can’t imagine there being that many restaurants as we know them being around.
Other venues: other than restaurants, I wonder about other venues where people gather in large numbers. Most theatres are not doing well, and Hollywood’s hope of bringing in people with films like TENET do not seemed to have worked. As well, more studios are putting off films that should have been out awhile ago. I think they are delaying in hopes of something that will not happen.
I almost went to see TENET. I am a big fan of Nolan’s film and how he plays with time. But I can wait and see this at home.
Cooking: While I am trying to get out more to restaurants, I am still doing a lot of cooking at home. To be honest, it is often tiring. To reduce the workload, I am trying to cook more one pot meals. One pot meals result in less clean up afterwards. Plus they tend to be less labour. If you find you are cleaning up too much, try one pot meals. I found this book really good for one pot meals. I also go to Budget Bytes and type in “one pot” in the search menu and get quite a few that way.
I’ve also found I eat more repetitively. I will go days eating the same breakfast and lunch. It just save time thinking about it.
Autumn/the New Year: As far as I am concerned, the day after Labour Day is the start of the New Year and the start of Autumn. I know fans of Summer hate that idea. Fans of Summer want you to know that Summer ends the 21st of September, not Labour Day. It’s true, it does. And it’s true, there are some very warm days in September. But I love Autumn and I am glad to pack Summer away and get on with it.
I love Autumn because I associate it with the new and transition. The start of school. The start of harvest and wonderful colour. Of mild weather. I love Autumn because I associate it with good change. Autumn is dynamic. Autumn is where we start again, move ahead, make progress. It’s the best season. A season so good we gave it two names.
Finally..
John Turner passed away this weekend. RIP. I still think this is one of the best photos of Canadian politicians ever. I sometimes wonder if Quentin Tarantino ever saw it.
Well, thanks for reading. Take care of yourself. Give yourself some slack. We are living in historic times, and that is usually difficult.
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