195: Sloppy Focus

MastodonThings kick off with about ten minutes of very useful nail clipper talk.

Up next, lots of good listener Follow-Up on the origins of CSS color names, how to pause a TikTok with your meat fingers, plus revealing some scalable methods for finding free money from the government.

Next, comes some FU on Lifestreams that somehow kind of becomes the basis for the rest of the episode.

How can we track the stuff that's valuable to us—but also provide the specificity and context needed to annotate that data in a way that makes it *actionable*?

Then, of course, you wonder about the privacy implications of living in a panopticon. Sure isn't working out too great for the Uyghurs. *Won't somebody please think of the children?*

The digital divide is real, but you may not realize how real until you watch someone else use a computer. Secret gestures, powerful browser plug-ins, and even general internet hygiene are still anything but evenly distributed.

Finally, John shows Merlin how to fix his notifications even as he continues to refuse a very generous job offer.

(*Recorded Thursday, November 3, 2022*)

Trade-offs, risks, and feature requests relating to the next generation of panopticons.

This episode of Reconcilable Differences is sponsored by:
Squarespace: Make your next move. Enter offer code DIFFS at checkout to get 10% off your first purchase.
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Links and Show Notes:

Things kick off with about ten minutes of very useful nail clipper talk.

Up next, lots of good listener Follow-Up on the origins of CSS color names, how to pause a TikTok with your meat fingers, plus revealing some scalable methods for finding free money from the government.

Next, comes some FU on Lifestreams that somehow kind of becomes the basis for the rest of the episode.

How can we track the stuff that's valuable to us—but also provide the specificity and context needed to annotate that data in a way that makes it actionable?

Then, of course, you wonder about the privacy implications of living in a panopticon. Sure isn't working out too great for the Uyghurs. Won't somebody please think of the children?

The digital divide is real, but you may not realize how real until you watch someone else use a computer. Secret gestures, powerful browser plug-ins, and even general internet hygiene are still anything but evenly distributed.

Finally, John shows Merlin how to fix his notifications even as he continues to refuse a very generous job offer.

(Recorded Thursday, November 3, 2022)

Credits

Audio Editor: Jim Metzendorf

Admin Assistance: Kerry Provenzano

Music: Merlin Mann
The Suits: Stephen Hackett, Myke Hurley

Get an ad-free version of the show, plus a monthly extended episode. The Roderick on the Line episode where Merlin talks about his haircut Alex Sexton's talk about X11 colors - YouTube Annotations in NCSA Mosaic Screenshot of NCSA Mosaic on X11 Unclaimed property meta-search: missingmoney.com Lifestream - Wikipedia Yale Lifestreams homepage RecDiffs episode #169 (November 13, 2021) where we discussed Lifestreams Timestamp link to RecDiffs #169 where we discussed Lifestreams (at 53 minutes 22 seconds) ATP episode 66 (May 21, 2014) where John talks about Lifestreams Timestamp link to ATP #66 where John talks about Lifestreams (at 1 hour 52 seconds) Rewind.ai "How much does Rewind cost?" The ATP episode #507 where John talks about Rewind.ai Black Mirror episode - The Entire History of You San Junipero - Netflix What Next: TBD - "Big Brother, Big Tech, and China"

COVID may be an inflection point in the relationship between the surveillance state and the surveilled.

RescueTime Mac app IINA media player for the Mac 1987 IBM PS/2 Computer Family Classic Intro - YouTube IBM PCjr - Wikipedia The Rape of Europa (2006) - Reference View - IMDb

The story of Nazi Germany's plundering of Europe's great works of art during World War II and Allied efforts to minimize the damage.

del.icio.us Pinboard Mozilla - Wikipedia Firefox - Wikipedia Greasemonkey - Wikipedia Think of the children - Wikipedia How to undo/redo on an iPhone - PhoneArena