Numeric Citizen Introspection Newsletter #21

🇺🇦 🇨🇦 🇺🇦 🇨🇦 🇺🇦 A special message to Ukrainians. 🇺🇦 🇨🇦 🇺🇦 🇨🇦 🇺🇦

Last month, I gave 200 CAN$ of my money to Red Cross. I will give as much to someone in Rumania who helps her local community cope with the refugees coming from Ukraine.

HIGHLIGHTS

Post highlights for the month of April are coming from my Numeric Citizen Blog, my microblog.

Taking a break of many things

I took some vacation in April, where I took a break from many things. It was a tremendous slow week.

Where Should The iPad Go From Here?

Regarding the iPad, There are not that many low-hanging fruits anymore. Better external display support is probably one. Other people are imagining what iPadOS 16 could be, and I found a few interesting ideas.

Questioning the iPad as a tool for everyone

I wrote a long link post about the iPad: Where does the iPad go from here? The question then became: Is the iPad really for everyone?

Remembering My Story of Owning a Macintosh SE — 1987-1990

The Macintosh SE played an important role during my pre-university years. Find out how.

Wondering About Returning to Podcasting

With a closed and dedicated office room at home, would that be enough to enable a return to podcasting? I still have my podcast listed on iTunes or the Podcasts application. Look for “Numeric Citizen Podcast”.

I bought an Apple Studio Display last month (read about my experience with it), the reviews are in, and the webcam sucks. A firmware update was expected to fix the issue, but it appears it won’t be the case after all. Too bad. Ninety percent of the time, the webcam is just fine, in perfect condition with plenty of light.

A while ago, I wrote this about the iPad Magic Keyboard: “The iPad Magic Keyboard: The Magic Pivot of the iPad” on Medium.

One more thing: Apple made some money in the last quarter finishing on March 30th. Great charts from MacStories.net.

APPLE TIDBITS

1️⃣ Why is an Apple Thunderbolt 4 cable so expansive? Here’s the answer in this YouTube video.

2️⃣ It’s troubling that searching for some text within a single device like the Mac can produce unpredictable results, but searching the web seems to get a better outcome. Is Apple Spotlight broken? Since when? Will Apple fix it in macOS 13? Frustrating.

3️⃣ I would pay for a tour within Apple’s headquarters. I would pay even more to bring back my deceased father, a professional architect and see it himself. Great YouTube video about this architectural marvel.

4️⃣ This article shows Apple’s constant regression in the user interface graphic design of macOS. Big Sur is probably the lowest quality on the scale of all macOS iterations over the years. I wonder when the next “big visual update” will come. I’m not holding my breath. Speaking of bad user interface design, here’s another excellent article, this time about the use of ellipses (…) all over the place.

5️⃣ Imagine an Apple App Store for Apple Watch faces — so cool proof of concept. I wish Apple would create one like this.

6️⃣ An upcoming update to iOS presents a Visa logo on the Apple Card, which could indicate a larger rollout in the future. Maybe in Canada? Like the iPhone Upgrade Program, I don’t see that happening outside of the US.

MUST SEE PHOTOGRAPHY STUFF

Someone asked a good question on Reddit: Has phone photography killed anyone else’s camera usage? Yes.

While walking on the street with my camera, here’s something I’d like to do: may I take a picture of you? Here’s an approach to do so. I’m not good at photographing humans, though.

According to this controversial post on Reddit, the only revolutions that came with DLSR are RAW images and digital storage. I didn’t search for part 2 of the series.

The first mirror-less and shutter-less camera? This thing is a beast. Not perfect and expansive: the Nikon Z9. I find it surprising to see Nikon launching such a high-end camera as there is a contraction of demand for non-smartphone cameras.

I’m a big fan of Unsplash, even though they were bought by Getty Images. I recently found out about a similar service named Pexels. Very similar to Unsplash both in its content and design. Pexels is a lot less known, though. If you don’t like where Unsplash has been going in recent years, consider looking at Pexels.

Fascinating photos of human-made trash are now available on Mars. 😞

Don't forget to look at my Glass page for my latest photos. I’ve been more active on Glass than on my Smugmug account.

CLIMATE CHANGE & CRISIS

Impressive advances were highlighted by Apple and its suppliers in fighting to reduce its carbon footprint. More details here on the Environment mini-website. Reminder: my passion for Apple has roots in its stance on climate change fighting. Read all about my passion for Apple in this article.

See what is happening when permafrost is slowly melting in Siberia. Kaboom!

Speaking of Siberia: forests there are burning at twice the pace this year compared to last year. Why? One of the reasons is that the army is usually called to help extinguish those fires. This year, the Russian army is fighting in Ukraine. You cannot have it all. What a bunch of motherfuckers.

Think globally, act locally. The type of principle behind these new housing projects put growing our food under one roof.

PRIVACY PROTECTION

Should we trust government agencies with cybersecurity? No. Not at all. FBI is no exception. I worked for a local government for nearly twenty years, and I know what’s behind some curtains.

A fascinating and worrisome story about a spyware, or “stalkerware” application built to spy on a smartphone user. The application is built using frameworks and back-end infrastructures full of security holes. As you might expect, this spyware is mostly available for Android devices because, you know, sideloading applications is easy. There are no or fewer gatekeepers to bypass in that case.

For surveillance, Apple is a gold mine. Apple is probably giving more information to law enforcement than they tell publicly. Facebook is probably giving much more than Apple and Google much more than Facebook. In any case, I don’t want to pay Apple to be an instrument for government agencies or surveillance firms.

NOTABLE QUOTES

“When two men always agree, one of them is unnecessary” — One of my colleague at the office

“Dependence on Russia for energy is now understood to be self-destructive but was convenient and economical at the time. Dependence on China for manufacturing will be understood as self-destructive but is convenient and economical today.” — Horace Dediu

“A photo is a time fragment that won’t come back” — Martine Franck

“User-friendly on the outside, developer-hostile on the inside.” — Philip Elmer‑DeWitt

SOME LEFTOVERS

1️⃣ What are the most popular applications on the Russian App Store these days? VPN clients. Somehow, I find this comforting that some people in Russia are intelligent enough to try to see what’s behind the iron curtain imposed by the Russian government. Will it make a difference? The jury is still out.

2️⃣ Barrack Obama thinks Putin has changed. Putin is getting old. Dementia can take many forms.

3️⃣ Illustrating the war in Ukraine with evolving maps and iconography. Fascinating. As the war evolves, the need to communicate and explain the situation has to evolve accordingly, too.

4️⃣ The truth may be paywalled, but you won’t find it on the Truth social network funded by Trump and its followers (don’t expect me to put the link to their shit, though). The simple fact that this application is hosted on App Store makes me angry with Apple.

5️⃣ How to solve the Rubik’s cube for beginners? I used to do it in 1 minute 13 seconds when I was young.

6️⃣ According to this article, focusing on higher density media and learning to canalize our attention to the best value for our time investment seems a wise decision. But, people no longer read, apparently.

7️⃣ In a recent edition of the Friday Notes series, I wrote about setting up my new home office. It’s been an ongoing tweaking process since the beginning. I’m slowly getting where I want it to be. Here’s the current status below. I’m missing curtains and an armchair for reading. The sound is not bad either.

WHAT’S NEXT

The supply chain disruption: while Apple is shipping a boatload of iPhone, everyone seems to be waiting for everything.

The Russian army is committing war crimes every day in Ukraine. This website will show you many types of war crimes and the related articles or rules of the Hague Convention or the Geneva Convention being broken. Put the sound on while visiting this website for maximum effect. Chilling feelings guaranteed. Finally, don’t miss the photos section. Very educative.

Vanmoof launched new bikes, the S5 and A5. Not cheap. Better design. Still not available in Canada.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_lt1YcxWg8&feature=youtu.be

Now that we know for sure that the Apple Studio display webcam is fundamentally flawed, no software fix will ever change that; the long-awaited Opal C1 camera could be a solution? At 300 US$, it’s an expansive solution and certainly not a revolution. I’ll pass. For now. A review is below.

That one is funny. Where is my bag? Here it is. A fascinating story featuring PowerPoint, AirTags and a very astute but frustrated air traveller searching for his lost bag.

One last thing: Elon Musk buys Twitter for 44 Billion US$. Yep. Then what? An edit button? More than 280 characters tweets? Or did Musk just bought a pulpit? Employees aren't happy. Will this change my relationship with Twitter? Not in the near future. Let’s see what’s going to happen first.

This concludes the Numeric Citizen Introspection Newsletter #21 for April of 2022. See you next month for the next edition!

Building this edition of the newsletter took approximately three hours of work. If you enjoy my newsletter, show me your support through PayPal or become a paid member here. Thanks a lot for your support. Sign up here 🙏🏻

If you don’t want to support my work, it’s ok too, but only if you support Ukraine in their fight against Putin and its rather weak and criminal army. 💪🏻