Something Later

On Browsers, AI, and the web ⇥

The thing that so many of these AI chat-for-search replacement systems miss is that the browsing part of web browsers.

But more importantly, there’s something else about this whole idea of chatting-with-a-computer-to-get-answers-from-the-web that I find incredibly off-putting: the complete lack of potential for serendipity. Clicking on links and landing on random sites has the potential to take me in unexpected directions. And also the web is filled with creative people who have incredibly interesting sites from a visual point of view. All that is absent in a chat-based world and that’s something I just can’t personally accept for myself. Feels like such a boring way to browse the web.

AI has so much potential and interesting use cases but so far I feel terribly uninspired by what I’m seeing out there.

Bingo.

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Phosphor Icons ⇥

I'm a sucker for a good icon library.

"a flexible icon family for interfaces, diagrams, presentations — whatever, really."

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AI Statement of Principals ⇥

Alan Jacobs lays out a(n extremely) concise statement of principals in regard to LLMs and AI. There's a lot of nuance and detail to unpack behind each point but I like the way he distills it to four bullet points.

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LLMs and Compositional Work ⇥

Jeremy Keith has some measured reflections on the ethics and uses of LLMs:

My own take on this is that transformative work is often the drudge work—take this data dump and convert it to some other format; take this mock-up and make a disposable prototype. I want my tools to help me with that.

But compositional work that relies on judgement, taste, and choice? Not only would I not use a large language model for that, it’s exactly the kind of work that I don’t want to automate away.

Transformative work is done with broad brushstrokes. Compositional work is done with a scalpel.

Large language models are big messy brushes, not scalpels.

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Untitled

It is clear that the further technological liberation from the duress of daily life is only leading to more disengagement from skilled and bodily commerce with reality. Perhaps the account above fails to do justice to the riches of information, entertainment, and games that the new electronics will present us with. But these too will be consumed, i.e., they will not make demands of commitment, discipline, or skill. They will be more diverting due to greater variety and closer fit with our individual tastes. Since they will fail to center and illuminate our lives, however, their diversion will more and more lead to distraction, the scattering of attention and the atrophy of our capacities.

— Abert Borgmann, Technology and the Character of Contemporary Life, p. 151

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THE GIANT PLAGIARISM MACHINE ⇥

I’d like to remind you that our company policy is pro–Plagiarism Machine™. We’re a tech-forward, future-oriented company that doesn’t shy away from the promise of new innovation—even if that innovation is a Giant Plagiarism Machine™ that copy-pastes existing innovation into fake sentient sentences.

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Untitled

Conservatives are correct, I believe, in their attempt to draw matters of ultimate concern into the universe of political concern. But, as suggested, they tend to short-circuit the discursive transaction of such problems. What is worse, as a rule they are inconsistent in their policies. The traditional good they seek to secure through civil and criminal legislation they undermine through economic legislation. Is is through the latter that democracies are given substance, and in this regard conservatives and liberals alike have fallen prey to the irony of technology.

Both are committed to a policy of economic growth in excess of the increase in population. Though they differ in the ways in which they want to distribute the fruits of economic growth, both factions understand such growth as an increase in productivity, which yields more consumer goods. Improved productivity, as we shall see, entails the degradation of work, and greater consumption leads to more distraction. Thus in an advanced industrial economy,* a policy of economic growth promotes mindless labor and mindless leisure*.

The resulting climate is not hospitable to the traditional values of the conservatives. This is the predicament of the conservatives. Nor is such a climate favorable to "human development in its richest diversity." It produces a wealth of different commodities. But underneath this superficial variety, there is a rigid and narrow pattern in which people take up with the world. This is the liberal predicament.

— Albert Borgmann, Technology and the Character of Contemporary Life, p. 93-94

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Fiscal Conservatism is Dead ⇥

Taegan Goddard:

And maybe now we can finally retire the myth of Republican fiscal conservatism. For at least 40 years, the pattern has been unmistakable: When in power, Republicans don’t rein in deficits — they explode them. This bill just adds another chapter.

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Pow: Delightful SwiftUI effects for your app ⇥

Pow is a collection of SwiftUI transitions that add that little bit of extra delight to your iOS app.

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Denial ⇥

If you’re going to use generative tools powered by large language models, don’t pretend you don’t know how your sausage is made.

🔥

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