Kind: Articles
Traditional long form content: a post with an explicit title and body.
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Firsts and Lasts
I was listening to the bats flying silently above me while I watched the Perseids, the other month. When was the last time I was actually capable of hearing their echolocation? I simply can't remember, because it didn't feel significant at the time.
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Meetup Magic
As I come to the end of a week in Mexico with ~400 of my the smartest, friendliest, open-source-loving geeks I could wish to know, I come to realise that Automattic's meetups are just... magical.
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We'll Pay You to Go (so we're confident in who stays...)
This week, Automattic made a very generous offer to employees who didn't feel aligned with the company and its leader: to pay them to leave. 8.4% of the company took it, and it's been a heartbreaking time, but we'll build back stronger, I'm sure.
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Digital Dustbusting
I've been doing a bit of tidying-up of the mess that is my personal Internet hosting. I've made a lot of progress, but the rest is probably going to have to wait until later in the year.
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What if Emails were Multilingual?
Wouldn't it be nice if there were a standard for multilingual emails? Oh wait, there is! Let's see how it works, and whether it's (ever going to be) ready for mainstream use...
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WP Engine's Three Problems
Matt Mullenweg kicked off a battle of words between Automattic and the WordPress Foundation and hosting company WP Engine. Without weighing in on the legal aspects (IANAL), I've written up my thoughts.
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D20 with Advantage
D&D players spend a lot of time rolling D20s. Sometimes they 'roll with advantage' - that is, roll two dice and take the largest. Last night I dreamed I derived the probability matrix for such rolls, and it got me thinking... could you construct a single die that rolls 'D20 with Advantage'?
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Idea: Meeting Spoofer
Coworkers keep scheduling meetings in periods you've blocked-off for no-meetings, head-down focus time? Maybe you should try scheduling fake meetings in those slots instead and see if they respect those any better! (But perhaps there's a bigger cultural issue you oughta look at instead.)
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Roll Your Own Antispam
The Web contact form of a nonprofit I founded started attracting a huge volume of spam, and conventional tools weren't helping. But a little analysis allowed us to block almost all of it without compromising on accessibility, privacy, or the false-positive rate.
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2024 in Videogames
With my busy schedule, I appreciate a video game that I can pick-up-and-drop at will and a prefer depth rather than quantity of content. This year, I've played and can recommend three games in particular - Horizon: Forbidden West, Thank Goodness You're Here!, and Tactical Breach Wizards.
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So... I'm A Podcast
As you might have already noticed, I started a podcast. Let's take a look (or listen!) into how and why I adapted my WordPress installation to double as a podcast host, and discuss what kind of content you're likely to find on it...
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Even More 1999!
Regular commenter Spencer wrote an SVG filter to improve my "1999 Mode", and it's excellent. But it got me thinking about how it doesn't exactly replicate the feel of my 90s Web pages, which featured extensive dithering.
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Easy Socialising
This weekend a bunch of old Abnibbers - folks I spent much of my time with 20 years ago - plus their children and dogs came over to visit, and I was delighted with how relatively-effortless it was to hang out with them despite not seeing some of them in-person for multiple years.
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Draw Me a Comment!
Instead of typing a comment for me to read, you can now draw one! Please don't make me regret this, Internet (🍆).
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Permanent Record
I spent my school years being told that things would go on my permanent record. But it looks like that's not so-permanent as I was lead to believe.