Internet 1994
Cool article on what the internet looked like in 1994.
That is about the time I started dialing into the internet, I guess. Maybe I was somewhat earlier. Using an old IBM desktop and a 9600 baud modem.
Indexed
The Indexed blog by Jessica Hagy just just freaking great!
I mean, this can only be created by a beautiful mind:
Ray Bradbury and the coin operated typewriter
I can not resist sharing this Boing Boing article about Ray Bradbury and how he wrote on a coin-operated typewriter.
Podcast enshittification
The iHeart radio podcast company creates podcast enshittification with A.J. Jacobs very nice podcast The Puzzler. Of the 14 minutes a podcast lasts, 5 minutes are filled with ads, that is 35%.
Yes, Tim Ferriss, arguably the best podcaster out there, preambles and postambles his podcasts with 5 minutes of ads; also annoying, but at least his podcasts are between 1 and 2 hours long!
Opting out of Instagram AI
As European users, we can opt out of Instagram and Facebook using our posts for AI training. I’ve exercised this control, as I am the product of Facebook and Instagram, but I strive to limit their use of me as such.
Opting out on Instagram looks deliberately cumbersome. However, from Facebook, which is also owned by Meta, I received an email with very simple instructions.
Now, I am curious if they can prove they are not using my data for AI.
RSS update
Earlier I wrote that today there are excellent search engines as an alternative to Google search. To repeat the argument against Google search use: with Google search, in addition to being an Internet user, you are also part of the commercial product a product of Google, with all the consequences for reliability of results.
Another way to consume content from the Internet is through RSS feeds. Google doesn’t like that either, because with that, they can’t show you ads either. I switched to Newsblur after using locally installed QuietRSS for a while. I was missing the shared nature of the web, so I switched back to a tool with a web interface. Newsblur is good and has a fair price, but there are excellent other alternatives out there.
More better than Google
About two weeks ago, I wrote that I haven’t used Google for quite some time now, and I am missing nothing. Incidentally, Seth Godin writes this week how he uses Perplexity as an alternative to Google. Perplexity was not on my list; I haven’t researched Perplexity thoroughly yet, but I trust Seth’s words.
Searching for the good search engine
There is no good reason why you should still rely on Google search for your search engine. Read this excellent article on Google’s practices, and Big Tech chills run down your spine. There are ample good alternative search engines these days that do have integrity:
Bing (though also Big Tech and historically suspect)
And there are more.
Lately, I’ve been using Ecosia and DuckDuckGo pretty much side by side, and I don’t feel like I’m missing anything about Google.
Internet image triptychs
Finally integrated my triptychs program into this site. Follow this link.
Or in an iframe, as below here:
Links
Auto’s interesseren me niet zo maar deze Hongqi is wel geweldig lelijk.
Caters Beach februari 2023, wil ik naartoe terug.
Japan