The Ephemeral Scrapbook — 2026.03.08

👤 Personal {#creativity, #inspiration}

1️⃣ I'm a bit late in sharing the latest edition of this newsletter. This weekend, I was particularly busy with various projects, including a video for an upcoming Micro.blog feature and a new web app that will play a key role in producing future editions of this newsletter. I can't remember the last time I was so excited about working tirelessly on many projects at once.

🗺️ Discoveries {#apps, #ai}

1️⃣ Discovered a new mind mapping app called “Notemap”, and it looks pretty capable. It's 30$ one-time purchase during the beta. 2️⃣ I discovered an Anthropic blog post about how to switch from one AI provider to Claude using a custom prompt. It's not perfect. If I leave ChatGPT behind, it won't import all my past conversations. But no worries, even on the free plan, I will be able to keep them for reference. As you might already guess, I'm switching to Anthropic-only mode. I won't subscribe to ChatGPT from now on.

👨🏻‍💻 Writing {#learningexperience, #LLM}

1️⃣ The article "Why Kids Hate Writing" by Michael He discusses how the external pressures of standardized education and a lack of personal engagement in writing contribute to children's dislike of writing, emphasizing the importance of writing for oneself, reading for curiosity, and valuing the editing process. I don't have a particularly positive memory of my days at school when it comes to learning French, but I have a better one in English. 2️⃣ We don't get to see the writing policy or comments about LLM use for writing on people's blogs. Here is one. 3️⃣ Don't forget to take a look at last month's digest, a summary of my blog writing last month.

🌄 Photography {#nikon, #glass, #pixelfed}

1️⃣ I recently started looking to buy a zoom for my Nikon Zf camera. During my last trip to Egypt, at times I wished I had a more flexible lens than my prime lens, a 40 mm F2, which is great for street photography, but when going outside the city, for example, to see the pyramids, it could have been a great use. I'm rooting for a 24-120 mm F4, which was well-received and has great reviews. You can see many photos taken with this lens on Glass. Here is a great one. 2️⃣ Glass has a new branding. I think something was lost with this new logo. Riccardo Mori seems to agree. I hope this branding change is not the beginning of some form of enshittification. 3️⃣ I realize that I'm posting very rarely on Pixelfed, but when I do, I select what I consider lesser quality images, reserving my best work for my Glass account. Here’s a recent one that I like but I don't think it's good enough to be on Glass.

On social media for sharing images in “I Stopped Looking at Social Media, my Photography Boomed”: “Social media's algorithmic design is psychologically manipulative by design — it is a slot machine, not a photo gallery”

🍎 Apple & Tech {#apple, #security}

1️⃣ Apple fared really badly in SixColors’ latest report cards for 2025. Ouch. I don't see how this will change this year. 2️⃣ Apple made a lot of hardware announcements recently, and the stars of them all are: the M5 Max chip and the MacBook Neo. The latter is quite an interesting exercise in striking the right compromise. Apple has a potential commercial hit on its hands. My wife might get one very soon for her light computing needs, which her aging iPad Pro can't comfortably handle. 3️⃣ Apple recently added three new executive profiles to its leadership page for Jennifer Newstead, Molly Anderson, and Steve Lemay. I’m optimistic about these changes, especially for design. 4️⃣ Microsoft Gave FBI Keys To Unlock Encrypted Data, Exposing Major Privacy Flaw. How do you feel about this? I personally don't like it for many reasons. One is that I don't trust the government to handle cases with care. Second, if you read the news of what is going on in the US right now, I wouldn't be surprised to learn that very high-ranking personnel are trying to get access to someone's data based on phony cases presented to the court. And yes, it means that I don't trust the US court either. Apple has a better architecture where the encryption keys are protected and stored elsewhere, as reported in the following quote:

“Privacy and encryption experts told Forbes the onus should be on Microsoft to provide stronger protection for consumers’ personal devices and data. Apple, with its comparable FileVault and Passwords systems, and Meta’s WhatsApp messaging app also allow users to backup data on their apps and store a key in the cloud. However, both also allow the user to put the key in an encrypted file in the cloud, making law enforcement requests for it useless. Neither are reported to have turned over encryption keys of any kind in the past.”

Lil Finder Guy — Basic Apple Guy

Who is it? What is it? Is it friend or foe? Has it arrived in peace, or is it plotting to corrupt our SSDs and fray our USB-C cables?

📱 Apps & Services {#rss, #webapp}

1️⃣ I’ve been using a new feature of Micro.blog, an RSS reader that fully integrates in Micro.blog base offering. It won't replace my use of Inoreader any time soon, nor my custom-made RSS reader. 2️⃣ Speaking of RSS feeds, there is a new kid in town: Current, an opinionated RSS reader that tries to present things a bit differently. There are some similarities with Micro.blog offering, but I prefer the latter because it is more integrated into Micro.blog. 3️⃣ There seems to be a proliferation of nice little and well-focused web apps recently. One such example is Miniroll, which allows people to build and optionally share their blog roll, a list of recommended blogs. I built one that you can find here. I’m still undecided about this one. The developer behind Miniroll, Chris Hannah, also offers many more in his growing collection. 4️⃣ The maker of Raycast is now working on something that be a big advance: Glaze, a Mac app designed to build apps using AI and prompts. The demo is quite impressive. Introductory video is available here.

"The uncomfortable truth is that I'm not a customer in any traditional sense. I'm a tenant. I occupy digital spaces owned by corporations who can change the terms, raise the rent, or evict me whenever they see fit." — Greg Morris

🚧 Special projects {#webapp, #claude, #vibecoding}

1️⃣ I started working on a new web app using Claude AI: a bookmark manager. It will eventually replace AnyBox. While I love AnyBox, it is lacking a web version. Without this, my newsletter publishing workflow is more tedious than I think a web app should be. So far, it is progressing really well. I'll share more details in the next edition of this newsletter. Here's a screenshot below.

📺 YouTube {#android, #scifi, #history, #tech}

1️⃣ I'm impressed by some of Android 17’s prowess on the desktop. 2️⃣ Cosmos 1999 is my favourite sci-fi series, and I recently learned the series went into a full 4K restoration. It's quite impressive, as demonstrated in this video! 3️⃣ This video shows the visual history of Manhattan, New York. 4️⃣ A great conversation with great minds about AI and the future: Google's Demis Hassabis, Anthropic's Dario Amodei. It's a must-watch. 5️⃣ A great commentary video about Apple's recent announcements covering the MacBook Neo and the powerful M5 Pro and M5 Max chips.

🔮 Looking forward {#apple, #appledesign}

1️⃣ I’m looking forward to visit the Apple Store downtown Montreal this Wednesday to try the new MacBook Neo! It's been a long since I'm excited for. new Apple product, event though I'm not the target audience. Who knows, I might buy a new accessory!

🌟 Miscellaneous {#socialmedia, #socialnetworks}

1️⃣ I reproduce a text from Om Malik of a post dating back to 2022:

“Should we drop “social” from social media? There is nothing social about this social media. And most of these platforms are essentially networked information distribution systems, and more and more of that information is just noise or disinformation. And humans aren’t helping either.

Everyone, including Captain America fantasist billionaires and yours truly, in some fashion or the other, are nothing more than mere botnets? In our divided modern “now,” one person’s information is another person’s fake news. Rumors are mere facts for the media to report on with a question mark? And at the same time, the news is a source of rumors; all you need to do is add a question mark. Either way, can we stop pretending that social media is social, about friends & people?

The biggest lie these platforms feed us is the idea of them being “social media” and “social networks.” In reality, they exist to show advertising “content” to consumers, who hopefully would buy more. This endless scroll does its thing on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, or Twitter.”

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