Make Something Wonderful | a book from the Steve Jobs Archive

Coming to digital platforms on April 11.
A curated collection of Steve’s speeches, interviews and correspondence, Make Something Wonderful offers an unparalleled window into how one of the world’s most creative entrepreneurs approached his life and work. In the pages of this book, Steve shares his perspective on his childhood, on launching and being pushed out of Apple, on his time with Pixar and NeXT, and on his ultimate return to the company that started it all.

Can’t wait for this. I guess this is a way to get as close to him as possible?

I’m fascinated by the fact that very notorious people in the tech space depends on so simple workflows or simple tools like Apple’s Notes or Reminders to do their work. I reproduce something found on Kottke “Ask Me Anything”:

What do you use for a mobile note taking app (does it sync with your computer)? — Alan H

I am very low-tech when it comes to note taking. I use the default iOS/MacOS Notes app for most things, including keeping track of my media diet. It’s simple, works pretty well, can handle to-do lists, and syncs seamlessly with all of my devices.

I should pay attention to this and maybe think about it when I’m looking at new tools or new ways of doing my things.🤨

I’ve invested so much of my time into Craft, since I left Notion. I never really left Notion, actually, but my usage of this app dramatically dropped. Only a few very limited use cases were left under the Notion umbrella. Today, I tried something in Notion for a project at work. I’m blown away to see how Craft is so far behind compared to Notion for things like databases, integration via APIs and general flexibility.

Sure, Notion has been around for much longer. Yet, I secretly wish I could use the best of both worlds: the elegance of Craft built on top of the robust Notion foundation. I’m actively looking at use cases that I could do in Notion to keep it alive somewhere in my workflow.

Hey, just a reminder that this invite is still open if you are curious about Wavelength, a secure and simple messaging service. We’re currently 26 nice people in there! Come on and join! You can leave at any given time!

Apple, please do a real but simple password manager. I join my voice to many, like John Gruber and Cabel Sasser. I even suggested Ricky Mondello who’s working on the Safari team and very much involved in the password management side, to consider doing such a password manager outside of Safari on the Mac or Settings on the iPhone.

Is Apple refraining from doing so because they see the future as passwordless, thanks to passkeys? Probably but it is a long road to get there, so what do we do in the meantime? As Gruber said, password management is probably as important as tips about using your iPhone, which has its own app on the home screen.

The maker behind ToolBox Pro has passed away, as reported here and there. It’s very sad. I recently re-installed this utility on my devices for a shortcut project I started working on. There are some features in ToolBox Pro that I could use, but now I’m not so sure. What will happen to this app? Is this developer account be terminated and when? Or maybe someone is going to take over?

2010 - “Before printing this email, think environment”. 2023 - “Before using ChatGPT, just think.”

After reading Gruber’s article about Wavelength, I decided to try it. I’m not sure I require another messaging solution. Besides using Apple’s iMessage and Telegram to get news from Ukraine, the rest of my messaging app usage is anecdotic. So, what are my thoughts about this? The initial few moments with Wavelength are not what I call an honest onboarding experience. Well, I already shared my surprise at having to enter my phone number at the very first step of the application onboarding. Continue reading →

Testing the latest Micro.blog beta with picture upload. This is a screenshot of the current list of threads on Wavelength (invite link). 😎

For those who are (very) curious about Wavelength. This in an invite link to join a private group. It is called “Microbloggers”. You’re welcome.

Why a dedicated music app for Apple Music Classical? When we first learned that Apple would launch a different app for Apple Music Classical, I was surprised and wondered why not add a big tile in its current Apple Music app. Apple explains this in more detail here about the reason:

Classical music is different. It has longer and more detailed titles, multiple artists for each work, and hundreds of recordings of well-known pieces. The Apple Music Classical app is designed to support the complex data structure of classical music.

I get it. It makes sense. Now, here is another question: could there be a need to create more “genre-dedicated” apps offering different browsing and listening experiences? How much could an app be different for electronic music? How about creating an app dedicated to music videos? All of these apps could tap the Apple Music back end. This needs more time to think about.

Oh, no iPad app, at launch, really?

Time to update all my devices. There are many.🙃 I’m always impressed by how effective Apple can be to keep the beat going on and on for releasing so much new software all at once. If you’ve been in software development, you probably already know this is a major undertaking, each, and single time. Kudos to Apple.

Notion releases buttons. The world goes wild🤯. Seriously, I came a cross this announcement on YouTube this morning and god I never thought buttons could be that useful in such a tool. I’m not holding my breath for such a thing in Craft, but yeah, I’m already thinking about a pretext to bring back Notion into my workflow just for the kick of using this🙃.

It’s time for an update to my content creation workflow (on Numeric Citizen I/O). In the coming days (or in a week or two), I’ll add something new to help others find new ways to do simple tasks. Comments and questions are always welcomed. 😊👨🏻‍💻

This morning, I had a heated (and respectful) debate about ChatGPT, what artificial intelligence is, what defines human intelligence, and why I believe we may be on a dangerous slope. We’re far from done with all of this. We need to define a new word to describe what is produced by ChatGPT-like bots. I think the problem stems from the fact that the “brute force” approach used by such tools makes it look intelligent for the mortal who doesn’t understand anything about computers. There is a clear distinction in my mind between what humans can produce and what ChatGPT can produce. The background behind the process is as much important to me as the actual results. Otherwise, we are doomed.

Senior Apple executives have apparently gotten a peek at the headset every year since 2018, but these demonstrations were discreet looks at the project’s progress rather than showcases of the complete device. Situated at the Steve Jobs Theater, the latest preview was reportedly a far more significant event, being “polished, glitzy, and exciting.” Source: Apple Reportedly Demoed Mixed-Reality Headset to Executives in the Steve Jobs Theater Last Week - MacRumors

If Gurman’s report is anywhere near the reality of what actually happened at the Steve Jobs Theater, why do I think they seem to look to galvanize the troop and get convinced they need to move forward anyway? In other words: throw spaghetti to the wall and see if it sticks. Doesn’t look good to me.

Two years ago, I had this wish list for Micro.blog. As much as I love Micro.blog, my list shows that a lot still needs to happen.

This week I got two unexpected gifts from my readers (fans?). One reader on my Ghost-hoested blog paid a one-year subscription, a 25$ gift! Another sent me 40$ to my PayPal account because he likes my YouTube videos about Craft so much. These are in addition to this Italian who sent my money a few months ago.😊

I don’t do what I do for the contributions, otherwise, I would have stopped a long time ago. Yet, these people make a difference and send good vibes to creators and writers like me.

So, dear past (and future?) contributors: thank you.

Earlier in March, Alisabeth Hayden, from Washington state in the US, was separated from her AirPods – Apple’s pricey micro headphones – while disembarking from a plane in San Francisco. She swiftly realized that they appeared to have been stolen. Source: This woman left her AirPods on a plane. She tracked them to an airport worker’s home | CNN

Sad story for sure. I remember my wife forgetting her iPad in the pouch in front of her seat after leaving the place many years ago. She never got it back after contacting the airliner personnel. It was before “Find my friends”. Who knows what happened to this iPad, but this story tells me that it probably ended up in someone else hands.

If you are curious about the migration process from WordPress.com to Ghost (the SaaS version), you can read all the details about it right here. There is another part of the process regarding the DNS management that will be published soon. So stay tuned.