The Ephemeral Scrapbook — Edition 2025-09

👤 Personal

1️⃣ I have always believed that computers and software are powerful tools for empowerment. To me, AI appears to be a layer of less tangible on top of that, but significantly enhancing that power. That's my feeling when I'm ChatGPT or, more recently, Perplexity. 2️⃣ The last few weeks have been awful on the news side, and I got sucked in more than once into the news feed, reducing the free time for writing and doing other more creative stuff.

🗺️ Discoveries

1️⃣ In the last two weeks, I discovered Fastmail, an email service provider that is cool, nice, effective and powerful enough to replace HEY Mail, at least for me. Read all the details in this article.

👨🏻‍💻 Writing

1️⃣ My monthly blog posts digest for February is out! 2️⃣ We live in challenging times on multiple fronts, and I can sense the collective anxiety in the air. Beyond my own feelings, there’s a tension that seems to linger everywhere. Talking about it helps, and so does writing. Putting concerns, frustrations, and misunderstandings into words is one way I try to make sense of it all. I often share my thoughts—sometimes rants—on figures like Trump, Musk, and Putin, and the impact they have on the world around us. At times, I feel powerless, but writing offers a small measure of relief. It’s like trying to scream without making a sound.

“Posting won’t be enough to get us out of fascism, but it might help some people to get through it. So please, everyone, don’t be discouraged; and don’t stop posting.” - Martin McCallion's personal site.

🌄 Photography

1️⃣ Glass made a significant architecture rework of their image processing pipeline: better image compression with an adaptive pipeline, image protection against AI training, better load times with distributed caching, etc. More details in this article, which is well worth reading. 2️⃣ Did Apple know that Adobe Photoshop for iPhone was coming when they bought Pixelmator? 3️⃣ Foto is a new photo-sharing service, à la Glass. That's intriguing, but I see many similarities between them. 4️⃣ Sigma launched a new camera, among other things, called BF. It has a futuristic but strange look. I'm wondering how good it is to handle with such sharp edges. According to this review from Petapixel, no.

BF | CAMERAS | PRODUCTS | Sigma

This page is about Sigma’s BF.

Sigma

🍎 Apple

1️⃣ As reminded by MacRumors, Steve Jobs would have been 70 on Mon, Feb 24. 2️⃣ Apple announced its intention to invest a lot of money in the US, I mean, A LOT! New data centers, improvements to current infrastructures, and new education centers are among the listed investments. Was this a deal between Tim Cook and the orange clown so that Apple is not subject to the 10% import tariffs on the iPhone? Call me a cynic if you want, but the timing is dubious. 3️⃣ Another iPhone 17-related leak. This time, it's the CAD designs. 4️⃣ Twenty-five years of MacRumors! Wow! 5️⃣ As reported by MacRumors, Apple made a breakthrough with the design of the upcoming foldable iPhone so that there is no apparent crease. The next step is reducing the thickness of any upcoming foldable iPhone, and the solution might reside in the upcoming iPhone 17 Air. All addressed challenges to make the iPhone 17 Air as thin as possible; it's a step toward a thinner foldable iPhone. 6️⃣ The next Apple silicon moment is here. That's incredible. I first thought Apple would not offer a suitable wireless modem when rumours floated that they would produce their modem. And Apple is already working on the next-generation modem and their WiFi chip! 7️⃣ Do you like Apple's recent advertising? I'm not sure of the ones about genmojis billboards or short videos on YouTube about the iPhone 16e. I'm probably not the target audience. This is Apple today: targeting so many different audiences where I rarely fit in. 8️⃣ Apple is apparently going forward with AI-generated review summaries. Can we expect something in line with on-device notification summaries? Maybe. Many reviews are badly phrased, to thr point of being hard to decipher. It will be interesting to see how Apple’s strategy fares here.

🚧 Special projects

1️⃣ After reading this blog post from Lou Plummer about leaving Google Gmail, I decided to take a similar journey but for HEY Mail. I already set the goal of reconsidering my use of HEY Mail, thanks to my values not aligning with 37Signals’ leadership values. The problem is: where should I go? Email is still central to my digital life, and moving things around should be carefully considered. I registered with Fastmail and started the 30-day free trial. The first step will be to replace my native HEY mail address with Fastmail’s, and the second step will redirect all my newsletter subscriptions to Inoreader. I rarely use the HEY Mail newsletter reading experience, so that one is a no-brainer. After a quick search in Apple's Passwords app, I'll need to convert 37 accounts to a different email address, which is manageable. Some of my accounts are no longer required, so I am reducing the list slightly. It's a great time to do some cleanup, too. Next, I will migrate my Gmail account by importing my mailbox. The only problem is that I need to be a paying subscriber to Fastmail to convert my email addresses. Fastmail prohibits, for security reasons, the use of confirmation emails while being on the free trial.

📱 Apps & Services

1️⃣ Inoreader's improvement streak continues. As reported on their blog, website tracking was vastly improved this time. 2️⃣ Apple continues to update Photomator and Pixelmator, but release notes are terse. This is the second update since Apple took over and officially marked Photomator as an Apple-branded app. Not much was shared on both releases regarding what was updated or fixed. I hope this is not a trend. 3️⃣ A new newsletter is born: AppAddict. Lou Plummer, a prolific app reviewer, is putting it together! I discovered a few apps because of his work! It's nice to see the next step for him. 4️⃣ I think I will cancel my subscription to Readwise, which is due for renewal on April 1st. I don't actively use this service besides letting it store some text highlights coming from Micro.blog or Inoreader. I’ve been using Readwise for five years. That's a lot of money. You can visit my current active subscription page here. 5️⃣ Here is a good question by 9to5Mac: are my application download decisions influenced by the app privacy label? Short answer: no. I rarely consult them. 6️⃣ Notion keeps improving all the time. I use it every day for the job, and I wish I could use it for more use cases. 7️⃣ Have you wondered which audio transcription tool is better? Look no further than this report from Tidbits. I happen to have both Audio Hijack and MacWhisper. I prefer the latter.

📺 YouTube

1️⃣ Remember Skype? It's going offline in May because of a decreasing user base. Skype was among my first experiences of connecting to the Internet. I wasn't fond of the app design and rigging bell, but it was unique and enabled the start of something that would eventually become much bigger. 2️⃣ I created a new video about a browser extension with Craft. It's a web clipper missing from Craft after five years of being available. 3️⃣ Digg is coming back soon! Yep! Cue the promo video now!

💎 Miscellaneous

1️⃣ Following this report, it’s clear that we should reconsider our admiration for Musk because his current actions are wrong on so many levels. The latest issue concerns Grok. He is doing the same thing the Chinese government is doing with DeepSeek, except the censorship targets are Trump and him. 2️⃣ I started using Perplexity recently because I'm trying to diversify my dependency on generative AI tools. I'm using it at work and I really like what I'm getting from my many searches. It's the next-generation web search engine! 3️⃣ Someone likes my numericcitizen.me website! 🥰. 4️⃣ There is a new version of the Ubiquiti Dream Router! Early in the COVID pandemic, I replaced my aging Apple Airport Extreme for the Dream Router, and I was happy about it. I'm still happy! But this new edition seems like a solid upgrade and it is relatively cheap! This might be my only serious tech upgrade for 2025!

Social media in 2025: why creatives are ditching ‘rented’ spaces for owned platforms

Fed up with Facebook, Instagram, and X? Creatives in 2025 are reclaiming control, ditching social media for owned platforms that foster independence and authenticity. We’ve been talking for some t…

Creative BoomTom May

In 2025, many creatives are leaving social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and X, opting for "owned" platforms like personal websites, newsletters, and blogs. This shift is driven by concerns over privacy, algorithm changes, and a desire for more control and authenticity. Creatives are tired of giving their content and energy to platforms that benefit large corporations. While transitioning to owned platforms presents challenges like visibility, many adopt hybrid approaches, using SEO, email newsletters, and community building to connect with their audience. This movement signals a potential end to social media's dominance, with a resurgence of independent online spaces where creators have full control. Some creatives even focus on in-person meetups and closed communities. The key message is that the future of creative expression lies in building your own platform rather than being a product of someone else's.

🔮 Looking forward

1️⃣ I'm looking forward to enjoying using Fastmail even more! 2️⃣ I'm also paying attention to the consequences of Apple’s announcement of the new Apple Intelligence Siri delay.

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