We use this at work to diagram complex business logic and how it connects to specific places in our codebases. It’s also been very helpful when onboarding new team members to explain how various processes work and fit together. I haven’t used its mind-mapping or wireframing features yet, but for diagramming, I haven’t seen anything I like better.

NOTE: This isn’t a sponsored post or affiliated promotion—just a software/service I like and wanted to recommend.

Being born in the 1985, there’s not a whole lot of PC or home video game systems that are past my time, but both Atari (1972) and Intellivision (1979) definitely fit the bill. My first video game system was the NES, which was already getting long in the tooth by the time I was old enough to use it.

In my recent post on why I think these AI gadgets are useless, I stated that I didn’t expect Humane or Rabbit to stick around for very long (in a footnote), but I didn’t think it would happen this fast.

From my post (not the linked article):

They are capitalizing on the AI trend to get funding from gullible investors, some sales from early adopters/tech enthusiasts, and will abandon these products as hastily as they were shipped.

I essentially argued that these products seem more like a “pump and dump” to capitalize on the explosion of AI popularity in the media, and these recent reports only lend credence to that theory.

Is this really something people have trouble with? Needing help to “figure out what to do next” on their computer? A lot of these AI features we are constantly seeing in the media sound like solutions in search for a problem.

I think the most compelling uses of AI are mostly “invisible” features (that are privacy-conscious, ie. data accessible by your devices only, and not the parent company) that improve existing services. Things like suggested map routes, better search and file organization, improved voice control and accessiblity, etc. But invisible features aren’t as marketable as big in-your-face features that I suspect are going to be more annoying than they will be useful.

I’d be willing to bet these “features” will mostly help Microsoft (and other companies who are jumping on this bandwagon) to serve you even-more-targeted ads. More cynically, it sounds like a great way for your government (or future government—people forget about this one) to spy on you even more than they already do.

UPDATE 5/22: The feature is called “Windows Recall” and this article on TechRadar echoes my privacy concerns.

Rent prices go up every year, pricing people out of their own cities and towns. Those who don’t own a home already have little hope of buying any time soon (maybe ever). And this is not limited to just the nicer areas of the state, it also applies to bad/high crime neighborhoods as well.

The situation is untenable, but regarding the new city (if it happens), I have a hard time believing it’s not just going to end up being limited to the rich (ie. the ones who are suffering the least from the housing crisis).

I’m not sure which version of this is referring to, but I don’t think it matters when good open-source spiritual successors (to the original) like Audacious already exist.

Some people like to “own” their music libraries, but for me, downloading MP3s in the past was simply the best way to listen to whatever music I wanted, when I wanted. Today, music streaming services fill that need for me (without feeling dirty about ripping off artists).

The gist of the article:

The study analysed data from two million individuals aged 15 to 99 in 168 countries, including Latin America, Asia, and Africa and found internet access and use was consistently associated with positive wellbeing.

But it’s wasn’t all good:

The researchers found that 4.9% of associations linking internet use and community well-being were negative, with most of those observed among young women aged 15-24yrs.

I’d be willing to bet that has something to do with social media specifically and not “internet usage” in general.

I mean, Meta is one of the most user-hostile, privacy-disrepecting, immoral companies in the world… I wonder why enterprise companies wouldn’t trust them with their sensitive data?

“Enterprise is where the real money’s at. They won’t know it’s just Facebook because our name is Meta now. Dumb fucks.”

—Someone at Meta, probably.

For further reading about the degradation in quality of Google search results, see The Man Who Killed Google Search by Ed Zitron.

This is a tweet (how do you verb X?) from a week ago regarding Xbox shutting down a bunch of their own game studios.

As a software engineer who would be absolutely devastated if I were laid off, it’s hard for me to care about how this decision “hurts” the executive (Phil Spencer) who:

• Created this situation by acquiring the studios and overseeing staffing that led to the shutdowns.
• Has an (estimated) annual salary of $10 million, which is relevant because being laid off directly affects these people’s income.
• Is not facing any consequences for his own mistakes and lack of results (at least not any anywhere near what he’s meting out).
• Is punishing (his own) people who were actually doing their jobs.

If someone steals your food, the last thing you want to hear about is how bad that person feels that you’re hungry. I don’t see how Mike Ybarra thought this tone-deaf tweet would go over well with anyone. It does not hurt Phil “as much as anyone else”—I guarantee you it does not.

If Phil Spencer really felt bad he would resign.

UPDATE: Take a look at this visualization of crowd sizes. The number of people that lost their jobs is somewhere between the 1,000 and 3,000 photo (but closer to the 3k). We’re sensitized to big numbers because of the global scale of the internet, so it’s an eye-opener to see just how many people things like this affect.

The newsletter links to my recently published article on JavaScript with the following blurb:

The author notes JavaScript got a “big ‘boost’” with ES6, and commends the continuous improvements made since. Perhaps unsurprisingly, an associated lively discussion on Hacker News highlighted some lingering overall disdain.

Noland Arbaugh is brave individual for volunteering to basically be a guinea pig for a new type of technology that—if successful—will likely change many people’s lives for the better as it matures.

A number of threads have retracted from Arbaugh’s brain, Neuralink said in a blog post Wednesday.

I don’t fully understand it, but it seems these “threads” are involved with the communication between the brain and the device. Sounds scary. Apart from this issue, it sounds like it really has been improving his life.

I can’t say for sure because I haven’t been in his shoes, but as it stands now, I wouldn’t trust anything put into my brain that has anything to do with Elon Musk (apart from what’s already forced into it from all the news he generates).

There was a certain war fought in the United States when a segment of the population had trouble letting go of slave labor. We survived that. If we have to move manufacturing home and end up paying more for our phones as a result, we’ll live. Shareholders won’t be happy though.