2025-04-28 01:51:24
George Carlin said “People are wonderful. I love individuals. I hate groups of people.”
I enjoy what people have to say. I hate hearing what bots have to say. And the problem on many platforms is that it’s near impossible to tell the difference.
I used to have comments enabled on this site but since the rise of Twitter, useful comments from actual people declined quickly and useless comments from spammers trying to create backlinks found their place.
Twitter and Facebook and Instagram were once a linear feed of people you knew. They were replaced with algorithms that threw unknown people and advertisers randomly into your face.
Connecting with real people, creating and expanding a community, was replaced by engagement-seeking sycophants and mass manipulation. The more divisive one can be, the more engagement they can farm. The more engagement they can farm, the more “valuable” they are.
One of the more benign but frustrating trends I’ve seen is asking “what does it mean” on content, in spurring others to lift up their comment, perhaps driving people to their profile, and increasing engagement in their other content. A video of a bear eating a fruit: “What fruit is the animal eating?” “What kind of animal is that?” They ask questions that are extremely obvious and are often already answered in the caption of the video.
As Simon Willison reports, AI is ramping up the increasing uselessness of internet content by pretending to be real people with real anecdotes. “The idea that my opinion on an issue could have been influenced by a fake personal anecdote invented by a research bot is abhorrent to me.”
I’d add that the idea of my opinion on an issue could be influenced by a friend who has been influenced by a fake personal anecdote invented by a bot is abhorrent to me and is one of the reasons I’m extremely frustrated by the swaths of disinformation perpetrated by bots, foreign and domestic governments, AI, and disingenuous actors.
It is for this reason that I feel like comment sections were a mistake. Newspapers shouldn’t have them. News media shouldn’t be quoting random tweets. Blogs should be more restrictive in who can comment. Social media platforms shouldn’t let content from people you haven’t explicitly subscribed to become part of your feed—and that includes retweets/reposts.
In my attempts to maintain some sanity, I consciously have to tell myself how the verity of comment sections should be ignored and never engaged with. I turn off reposts on any platform that has them. I use platforms that have a linear feed with no injected content (currently, Mastodon and Bluesky). I haven’t accepted comments on my site in years and will avoid comment sections on other people’s sites.
Individual people are wonderful. I’m just a little more antsy when it comes to anything that is indiscernible from manufactured content.
2025-04-26 03:05:21
“The most subversive thing you can do right now is blog.”
That was a thought I had and considered just posting that line. As I tend to do, I analyze it.
“Most? Really? There are most certainly other things that are more subversive. We’re just talking about blogging here.”
I over-analyzed it. It’s true, though. I quickly talked myself out of the blog post idea.
Then I saw a blog post which had a similar sentiment. I should’ve marked it down to give credit where credit is due but it’s lost to the ether now. The blog post was enough to revisit my thought.†
Right now, blogging within ones own space feels like having a garden or buying from independent store owners and producers. They feel like net positive activities. They feel like we’re not just trying to funnel money and attention into large corporations hellbent on world domination.
Perhaps this leads to what (anecdotally) happened in the mid-2000s: a boon of independent creators, tending their own gardens, and the butterfly effects of more independent projects and products in the world—that hopefully don’t lead into new world-crushing monopolies.
That would be nice.
† Post facto, I found that quote in an open browser window on my phone: “Blogging is small-p political again, today. It’s come back round. It’s a statement to put your words in a place where they are not subject to someone else’s algorithm telling you what success looks like; when you blog, your words are not a vote for the values of someone else’s platform.”
2025-04-22 08:16:59
Growing up, my mom didn’t have much money. As such, pursuing hobbies meant making due with what she could afford.
Hockey gear was second hand and a few seasons out of date. My bike was a rust gold 3-speed that was neither the racing or BMX bike that I desired. I had skis that were a cross between racing and traditional, and not really good at either, all the while wearing jogging pants and an acid-wash jean jacket in competitions.
Hobbies can be expensive and my mom did a fantastic job of providing opportunities and supporting me with limited means. I don’t fault her in the slightest.
As an adult who now has the financial means, it’s quite possible I have over-compensated.
I spend days researching things to purchase. I scour the best-of-the-best lists. I watch YouTube videos. What are the best features to have? What do the pros use? In some ways, we’re spoiled by the availability of information. Pre-internet, I’d be picking up Consumer Reports magazine.
I end up having mixed feelings about it. Am I spending more money than I need to on something just because everybody else thinks it’s the best? Or am I truly spending money on quality that will last a lifetime? Am I spending money just to feed the capitalist system or am I buying something that will actually make my life better?
I bought an expensive espresso machine back in 2017. I can make a latte in about one minute, from grind to pull to froth to pour. Nearly eight years later, it’s still running solid.
It’s easy to think that a pourover or french press setup would’ve been dirt cheap in comparison and given me the same level of appreciation for coffee. And yet, that expensive machine provides a lot of joy every time I use it. I fully intend to have it for life.
For the most part, I’ve been happy with my things and when I’ve had a bit of buyer’s remorse, it’s usually because I bought something where I didn’t put in the research and felt like it would be good enough.
On the opposite end of the monetary scale, I’ve been getting into cooking more. (Well, more than a box of pasta and a jar of sauce.) Having the best tools in the kitchen has made cooking more fun. I like the weight of my pots and pans. I like the spoon rest. I like the salt box.
Diderot might warn me not to over-consume. I notice when my spending on things starts to go up. The salt box was an unnecessary purchase. The plastic container I was using before was working just fine. “But it wasn’t wood and black ceramic to match my decor,” I whine.
As the world seems to be taking a bee-line to a recession, I’m slowly divesting myself of a number of possessions that I no longer need, resorting to “buy nothing” groups to avoid contributing to landfills and perhaps help others avoid the Diderot effect.
It’s hard for me not to feel at least somewhat overwhelmed at the need for humanity to slow down on consumption but see a world hellbent on using up every last cell of energy on this planet for things we don’t need.
While they say “things” won’t make you happy, there is the short term burst of joy before hedonistic adaptation settles in. I’ll try to be mindful of that before I go on my next Diderot-inspired spending spree.
2025-04-01 23:20:06
A number of year ago, I watched Jiro Dreams of Sushi. Here is a man that has devoted his life to creating the best sushi in the world. I admire someone so dedicated to the task. Jiro sought out the best fish and the best rice and refined his process. New employees spend years working on just a single aspect of the sushi-making process.
Maybe with some clichéd inevitability—and not unlike so many other people that have watched the documentary—I’ve thought about how this relates to my own craft of web development.
What does it mean to master the craft of web development? Can something that changes so frequently ever be mastered? Can mastery be attained when we’re changing jobs every one, two, three years? Can mastery be attained when we’re rewriting codebases every few years?
Perhaps mastery is when the result serves its audience in the best possible way.
Of course, that goes down a rabbit hole of whom the audience is and what best means. Does McDonald’s serve its audience in the best possible way? Would anybody say they’ve mastered the art of food or service?
The imagery of a master of craft is that of a lone creator, toiling away for years, perfecting every facet of their creative output.
As a web developer, I imagine having an intimate knowledge of each of the layers of development: HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. To understand each one also means understanding how much or how little of each one is required.
Where sushi—more specifically, nigiri—has its rice and fish, there’s also the rice seasoning, the soy sauce, and the wasabi. Perhaps a yuzu kosho to enhance the bite? Or aburi-style?
It’s one thing to build something with HTML. It’s another to know how to effectively add CSS and JavaScript without overdoing it. A master should also understand the user experience. How do we interact with the page?
Any part of development that improves the end result leads to mastery. The end result is what people “consume”. It is the product. It is the experience.
Using a framework or switching frameworks or using a bunch of tooling doesn’t in and of itself lead to either of these. They might help you build more quickly but that doesn’t mean mastery if what you’ve built frustrates the people that use the product.
Therefore, when it comes to web development, mastery comes from understanding how people use your product and the different contexts in which they do, whether that’s desktop, tablet, mobile, finger, keyboard, mouse, screen reader, day, night, over fast or slow speeds. Are they a first time visitor or do they frequent your site?
If we were to follow Jiro’s and his apprentices’ journeys and imagine web development the same way then would we ask of our junior developers to spend the first year of their career only on HTML. No CSS. No JavaScript. No frameworks. Only HTML. Only once HTML has been mastered do we move onto CSS. And only once that has been mastered do we move onto JavaScript.
And yet, going back to the point of how quickly our industry changes, spending a year on CSS would require another year to master the new stuff that came out requiring another year to master the new stuff that came out and so on. Not very practical when, at the end of the day, we need to build things that people use and we need to get paid. Bills don’t just pay themselves.
Perhaps, as Hamid says, “iterating, tending, evolving, and continuously improving—results in a collection of work that embodies their creators’ intentions and aspirations for care.”
Running a personal site can be a way to practice mastery. It allows me to focus on individual facets, improving my knowledge and skill to achieve mastery. With an ever-changing technology landscape, there is plenty of opportunity to continue that journey and build on top of the skills that we have, creating new techniques.
I think of the web that we had in the naughts when our curiosity and explorations seemed to create an explosion of new techniques and approaches shared to the world at large.
I would enjoy seeing a return to more people curating their own garden, mastering their craft, and sharing it outside of the capitalist hellscape that is modern social media.
I originally wrote most of this post back in 2020, including the Jiro reference. I was reminded of this draft while reading Hamid’s thoughts on craft.
I am also reminded of John Allsopp’s Dao of Web Design that is a week away from a quarter century old.
I also read Greg Storey’s post on nostalgia and careers and my takeaway was perhaps a return to new creative explorations can lead us into new possibilities.
2025-03-25 01:47:14
It’s been a long, cold winter.
Most winters have included some travel that have allowed me to escape the winter doldrums. It’s not that I specifically tried to escape but it was always a nice break. The winter of 2021 was the first time where, due to lockdowns, I really noticed the effects of sticking around all winter. It gets a bit claustrophobic.
This particular winter, I had thought I might plan a trip somewhere warm, looking at places like Brazil or Australia. Life happened instead and I’ve been mostly managing a teenager dealing with school, work, driving lessons, and sewing lessons—chauffeuring him from place to place. It’s his last year of high school and I am enjoying this extra time with him before he is likely to move out in the fall for college.
For spring break, we took a trip to Paris and even the brief couple days of 15° weather upon arrival was enough to lighten my mood—and my clothing, choosing to sport shorts for the comparatively balmy weather. (Considering all the Europeans still wearing their long jackets, my Canadian-ness stood out.) The temperature dropped below 10° for the rest of the trip but remained above freezing and that too was enough to feel excited in anticipation of summer warmth to come. My fashion-conscious kid preferred the cooler weather to be able to layer properly. While I bask in the summer, that kid is definitely a spring/fall kind of kid.
I feel the ice is slowly melting.
Ottawa is making sure to not let us forget about winter, though. Just this morning, we were gifted with a few centimetres of snow and possible another dozen or so may find its way our way by week’s end.
With quips of becoming the 51st state, on-again-off-again tariffs, and other unexpected world events, I’m grateful that the weather is perhaps the worst of my complaints. (Although, getting an infection and losing my hearing in my right ear is something I could complain about but even that feels like a mild inconvenience for the time being. Hopefully my hearing returns in a week or so.)
In the meantime, I’ll continue with my routines. Sunny days will return and I will say, it’s all right.
2025-03-24 11:37:19
I have many memories from when I was a child of road trips with my mom. We lived in Calgary and would head off in whatever direction. Maybe to Drumheller, where I’d indulge in my love of dinosaurs and gawk at hoodoos. Or towards Banff, into the Rocky Mountains.
My mom said I always made a fantastic road trip companion as I usually fell asleep along the way. When I wasn’t sleeping, I was doing invisible ink activity books or listening to music. Lots of music. Road trips were filled with music.
Due to my parents divorce and him being nearly a decade older than me, I didn’t grow up with my brother. While I didn’t really get to know my brother, I did learn of his love of music. He made mixtapes that we’d listen to.
Many of the songs have been hardwired into my brain. I Don't Like Mondays. Senses Working Overtime. Yes’s Roundabout, in particular, often echoed the very drives we were on.
“Call it morning driving through the sound and in and out the valley. In and around the lake, mountains come out of the sky and they stand there.”
I haven’t been back to Calgary since we moved when I was 13. It would be nice to revisit and see the mountains come out of the sky again…
