The Ephemeral Scrapbook — Edition 2025-07

👤 Personal

1️⃣ In light of the troubling daily news that we endure, I started a new training program, which makes me an aspiring peace supremacist and democracy propagandist. I'm so into this that I decided to update my Micro.blog profile page description and will probably make the change elsewhere (on Bluesky, for example). 2️⃣ I’ve been spending quite some time recently trying to follow the news. There is so much happening, and it goes too fast. It's hard to comprehend what is happening and how the world changes. I would lie, saying that it doesn't affect my morale. It does. 3️⃣ I’m afraid because of this and what comes next, even as a Canadian. But, not all is lost as some people still are lucid enough and willing enough, sorry, not afraid to call out names and stupidity when they see it.

🗺️ Discoveries

1️⃣ A new blog discovered this week, Labnotes, thanks to my Micro.blog timeline. The blog is hosted on Ghost and, as such, offers to subscribe. I prefer to read it through RSS. This guy maintains a newsletter reminiscent of mine but a lot more chaotic, which is not a problem, per se.

👨🏻‍💻 Writing

1️⃣ I'm someone who writes a lot. I wrote for a blog. I write for journaling. I write in my personal life and my professional life. I write reports. I write analysis. I write strategies. I write blog posts. Overall, most of my writings will be short-lived. A year from now, what I wrote this week at the office won't have much value. This newsletter edition won't have much value a year from now, either. But, trying to find a meaning to all this writing, I would argue that each piece I write is a little piece put together to help me become who I am. I'm one of those who think that problem solving must involve a lot of writing. I'm also one who considers that writing helps digest and retain information. Writing might also help me understand what is happening in this troubled world. Writing is essential to my existence. 2️⃣ Speaking of writing, if you are one of those like me who likes to write and would like to start a blog, consider looking at this comprehensive comparison of blogging platforms. It might be the best time investment for you today.

🌄 Photography

1️⃣ We had two major snowstorms in the last weeks here in Montreal, dumping 74 cm of snow, and it was a great opportunity for me to go out for a few walks and snap a few pictures. Here are my best ones. 2️⃣ What a great photographer, Mike Schaffner on Glass. When I started scrolling through his photo catalog, I couldn’t get enough and wanted to scroll and scroll so that my enjoyment wouldn’t stop. Such a talented and inspiring guy. 3️⃣ The original Macintosh design is timeless. Great photographer series on Reddit.

“All empires end, but I really can't convince myself that Instagram will stop being the place for photographers anytime soon. There are just too many people there. Momentum is hard to stop. Time will tell, and I will likely be proved wrong. But that day seems like a long way off.” — Andy Adams

Mike Schaffner on Glass Photography Community

Mike Schaffner. Photographer (primarily BNW) & Blogger ( https://mikeschaffnerphotography.com/ ). All photos are mine. No AI.

🍎 Apple

1️⃣ I’m not excited for the iPhone SE or 16E or whatever. Am I excited about the upcoming iPhone 17 Pro? Neither. I plan to skip this year’s upgrade cycle for non-technical reasons, also known as political reasons. Meanwhile, enjoy the following mockups. I dig them, but Matt doesn’t. 2️⃣ Gone are product Red at Apple. Gone is the TouchID home button on the iPhone. Gone are the non-OLED screens in the iPhone lineup. Gone is the iPhone SE, and the last iPhone with a lightning port is gone. Welcome to the new no-frills iPhone 16e and new confusion. A new star is born: the Apple C1 chip. For many reasons, introducing the C1 chip is the most interesting thing Apple has done in a while. If they can release a competitive chip in performance while making a difference with battery life, I think Apple has a winner here. Could this mean Apple will introduce cellular capabilities to future MacBook Pro, for example? I would bet yes on this. 3️⃣ Apple will retire Advanced Data Protection from the UK because they don't want to create the requested backdoor for the government. I applaud this move because otherwise, this would go against Apple's privacy protection message. 4️⃣ Is Apple prepping a new accessory category? Hints found in iOS 18.4 beta 1. The HomePad? The iPadPod? The HomePod, the real one, this time? Who knows.

“What Apple managed to assemble is a sandwich of uninterestingness and raise its final price to $599. They discontinued a line of iPhone models that was ‘midrange with personality’, and released something that isn’t distinctive in any way, its price positioning makes it difficult to recommend” — Riccardo Mori

« But Apple is a pretty terrible Google, just as Google is a pretty terrible Apple » — Marco Arment replying to Jeff Johnson

🚧 Special projects

1️⃣ After much thinking in recent weeks, I finally found the project that I’ll be doing with Realmac Software’s Elements: I will recreate and rework in its entirety my about.numericcitizen.me mini website. This website is currently done with Craft and published and shared as a single document using Craft’s built in publishing capabilities. It was easy to start but I’m not satisfied at all, even after a small redesign late last year. To ease the transition, I’m going to use another subdomain: whois.numericcitizen.me. The first steps is to setup this subdomain, create a place on GitHub and link my Cloudflare page to it. Elements will publish locally, I’ll then commit the files to my GitHub repository then CloudFlare will pick them up from there. It’s my current understanding of the process, this might change further down the road. Meanwhile, you can have a quick look at the future website structure with the following mind map.

📱 Apps & Services

1️⃣ Grok, a new generative AI service from one of the Musk businesses. I’ll pass. I pass anything that might be coming from Musk. 2️⃣ Feeling frustrated not seeing one of my photos posted on Micro.blog not being cross-posted to Pixelfed, I vented my frustration. Someone responded with a suggestion to look at Echofeed. I did reluctantly but found that Pixelfed is not part of the supported services. I’ll stay with Micro.blog even when posting to Pixelfed, but I’ll submit my issues to Manton in due time. 3️⃣ Realmac Software Elements website builder is inching closer to an official release by opening the beta to all. Official website right here.

📺 YouTube

1️⃣ Impressive new app for the Apple Vision Pro. 2️⃣ Another app for but for MacOS: it's an app launcher. Intriguing. 3️⃣ Eight hours of Severance music. Yep, eight hours of background music from the Apple TV+ show.

💎 Miscellaneous

1️⃣ I renamed the Gulf of Mexico because I could. You should probably do the same; it's therapeutic. 2️⃣ You're missing the point if you spend more time setting up productivity systems than actually working. It is a good video about Sam Altman’s productivity method. I should repeat this in my head more often. 🤦🏻‍♂️

🔮 Looking forward

1️⃣ Apple released a new round of betas for all their platforms. Of all the additions, I can't find anything noteworthy in iOS 18.4 beta 1 that will make my digital life easier, so I'm now looking at iOS 18.5 when it comes out, probably around May or early June, when the promised reinvented Siri will be introduced.

I wish you a great week! ✌️ 🇺🇦 🇨🇦 🇪🇺 💪🏻