Jim Willis

  • 2019-04-29 14.01.11

    Whoa. Mesh. Where have you been all of my life? Picked up a Netgear Orbi bundle the other day on Amazon. All of a sudden all of my Rogue Amoeba Airfoil setup is WAY more stable and predictable. Stoked. Detailed review forthcoming. #wholehouseaudio #firstworldproblems

  • 2019-04-26 12.16.44

    surly

    Ten years ago Kyle built up my Surly LHT and he’s been my go-to guide for all things bikes ever since. New Jersey is so lucky to call this guy our own. Terrific to see him getting some recognition on The Radavist. #surly

  • Freedom vs Function

    Great piece by Brent Simmons (the guy who originally wrote MarsEdit, the app that I’m writing this entry in) about the freedom to make your computer your own and how that freedom is slowing eroding away.

    With every tightened screw we have less power than we had. And doing the things — unsanctioned, unplanned-for, often unwieldy and even unwise — that computers are so wonderful for becomes ever-harder.

    G4

    Just this week I built up an old Mac G4 with OS 9.2 on it with my son and recalled how much I loved Mac OS 9 and the flexibility to make it look and do all sorts of crazy stuff (Drag Thing!) That’s not so much the case with OS X and Marzipan threatens to make OS X even less flexible under the hood. The only real freedom and flexibility the end user has (besides changing the wallpaper, etc.) is at the command line. If that ever goes away then Linux starts to look very attractive from a desktop perspective.

  • Day One Morning Health Shortcut

    Some folks over on the Day One Community FB group were interested in this shortcut I wrote. It computes your 7-day average for active energy and steps, asks you a few questions and creates a Day One journal entry. You will need to modify this shortcut. It’s a little tricky as it pulls health kit data which is really fiddly. You can drop me a note if you get in too deep but I can’t promise I’ll be able to make it work for you. Download the shortcut here.

    I find the seven-day average data more interesting and useful. It was this podcast with Jim Collins that got me thinking about using multi-day averages to track certain metrics (e.g. as long as I’m average about 40 minutes per-day singing and playing guitar, I’m making progress, if my seven day average slips below that I am just treading water). Collins uses a 3month, 6month and 365-day average as opposed to 7, but the gist is the same. Very interesting approach to self-quantification. Go to the podcast and fast-forward to the 45-minute mark, great information.

  • 2019-04-20 20.56.36

    Was out cruising in the Atlantic Ocean this past week so broke my streak of posting but I’m back. Here’s a picture from the trip.

  • Ed Boyden on Minding your Brain

    I listened to this absolutely fascinating podcast yesterday. Tyler Cowen is a great interviewer and he and Boyden cover such a huge range of neuroscience topics: from mental illness to optogenetics to ketamine to meditation to blowing up bits of your brain using a material like the use in diapers so that the bits are large enough to study under a microscope. Really, really great discussion. Definitely worth your time, give it a listen.

    BOYDEN:I think one of the things we have to figure out is how can you detect consciousness, and how can you create consciousness? Alan Turing proposed the Turing test, where you would converse with something and you could try to decide whether it was conscious. But with Siri and Alexa and all this stuff in homes and on phones nowadays, I think everybody would agree that’s probably not enough. You need to know something about the internal state as well, but we don’t have a firm grasp on that yet.

    I also loved this exchange:

    COWEN: Is there a puppet master in the theater, or is it a kind of nominalist reality, where all there are are the different desires? And maybe the film involves a kind of illusion that someone’s in control, but that’s just another actor in the play?

    BOYDEN: Here’s another way of looking at it, which is there’s so many things that we’re consciously aware of, but the vast majority of the things that the brain is doing, we’re probably unconsciously aware of.

    For example, here we are in my office, and there’s all sorts of stuff around. Your brain has been processing a lot of it. If I point at that blue highlighter over there, you probably saw it earlier but were not paying conscious attention to it. But now that I point at it, you are consciously aware of it.

    I actually think that something that we have to understand is, how are all these unconscious processes — this roiling sea of stuff that we have no access to — how are those processes contributing to the emergence of consciousness?

    That’s one reason why I’m very excited to study the process of consciousness, if you will. What are the processes in the brain that lead to it that happen beforehand and that might help us understand, in a causal way, what gives rise to consciousness? But again, this is just an idea right now.

  • 2019-04-12 15.07.12

    Love it when shuffle gives you EXACTLY the right song for snaking through Red Bank traffic.</>

  • 2019-04-10 13.15.55


    5 years ago today (thanks Day One for the reminder). Seems like we’ve done a lifetime of travel in this thing and it’s only been 5 years. #bestpurchaseever

  • 2019-04-10 12.22.27

    Spring on Nassau St, Princeton.

  • Spotify or Apple Music?

    I’ve been using Spotify since July, 2011 (when it first became available in the US). It is my go-to streaming service. We’ve had the family plan for years. I use it to work on collaborative playlists with the other musicians with whom I play. I use it when I am learning new songs–being able to hear multiple versions/other artist’s versions of a song is super helpful.

    But primarily I use Spotify to discover new music. Spotify’s discovery features are without equal. I’ve become aware of and a fan of more new musicians on Spotify than all the radio or record stores in the world could have ever turned me on to.

    From Spotify’s weekly Discover playlist which has an uncanny knack for presenting me with artists I’ve never heard of (though occasionally, too, it is way off base) to its “related” functions that allow you to do really deep dives into obscure genres, Spotify does an amazing job at preventing stagnation in your listening habits.

    There are also a bunch of external tools the the Spotify API makes available for discover: Discover Quickly, Smarter Playlists and Organize your Music are all good tools for finding new music.

    What this means is that I’m regularly listening to artists who I would have never listened to otherwise. The problem is that Spotify (and, frankly all of the other streaming services) pay these artists squat. That streaming royalties are too low is a given.

    But now that Apple seems willing to pay artists more than Spotify, the question is whether or not an unfairly low royalty payment is better than no royalty payment at all? Meaning, if I didn’t discover the artist on Spotify I would never have listened to them at all. I mean, 1% of $1.00 is better than 0% of $10, right?

    At issue is the Copyright Royalty Board’s 2018 decision to raise the rate paid to songwriters by 44% over the next five years. Spotify, along with three other streaming services — Amazon, Google and SiriusXM/Pandora — is appealing that decision to the board, a move that has no direct precedent. The four companies have been shellacked with criticism by artists for their action…

    Apple, which would also benefit if the rate increase is nullified, is not part of the appeal…

    As a sign of how badly the PR war is going, many songwriters are canceling Spotify subscriptions and doing so publicly on social media, where they make sure to note their subscription fees will now be going to Apple Music.

    From: Apple Is the Real Winner in Spotify’s Battle Against Songwriters’ Rate Hike

    I understand why musicians would want to publicly cancel their Spotify accounts. They are trapped working in an industry that is and always has been horrifically unfair to musicians.

    But that said, I’ve been dreading the day that Apple takes off its gloves and reaches into its bottomless pockets in its war with Spotify. I love a lot of Apple’s stuff but, man, Apple Music absolutely sucks. Its interface is shit. Its discovery features are abysmal. I want Spotify to stay around, viable and –importantly–to keep finding new music for me to listen to.

    As a musician I’m torn here: go with the company that helps listeners find new music but doesn’t pay those musicians well or go with Apple who pays more but in the end probably pays a smaller universe of musicians because they push the same limited pool of performers to everyone.

    For now, I’m sticking with Spotify but will keep exporting my playlists to Apple Music for when Apple drives them out of business.

    

Current Spins

Top Albums

Check out my album Set It All Down on your favorite streaming service.

Posts Worth Reading:

Free Internet vs Internet of Free Stuff

Letterboxd

Reading Notes

  • Read: Why Not Bluesky
    The real problem, in my mind, isn’t in the nature of this particular Venture-Capital operation. Because the whole raison-d’etre of Venture Capital is to make […]
  • Read: The Imperfectionist: How Not to Freak Out, Part Two
    The antidote to all of this, in the broadest terms, is *more reality*, more immersion in the finite here and now: more writing on paper; […]
  • Read: Recording: After the Election – Four Ways We Can Respond
    “Under the worst conditions, what’s the most important thing to have?” He replied: “Friends.” Source: Recording: After the Election – Four Ways We Can Respond […]
  • Read: Mud Boots of Empathy in Spain
    Spain’s unity at this moment is from the bottom up. Or, as Spanish professional soccer player Ferran Torres wrote on social media, “The people are […]
  • Read: Vision Con
    Unable, then, to see the world because I have forgotten the way of being in the world that enables vision in the deepest sense, I […]

Saved Links

  • Doppler Music Player for Mac and iOS — Brushed Type
    Built for people who buy music — Direct link
  • Sill
    Top news shared by the people you trust Sill streamlines your Bluesky and Mastodon feeds to give you a clear picture of what’s happening. — Direct link
  • Techmeme Ride Home
    The day's tech news, every day at 5pm. From Techmeme.com, Silicon Valley's most-read news source. 15 minutes and you're up to date. — Direct link
  • Queue
    Beautifully Simple Podcasts. — Direct link
  • Surveilled (2024) — The Movie Database (TMDB)
    Uncover the insidious ways in which our daily lives are being surveilled by the state. In a gripping chase, Ronan Farrow travels across the world following breadcrumbs and finally exposing a dark world of spywares, hacking, and peddling of private information, where activists and journalists are persecuted, and no one is protected from the watchful and vicious eyes of authoritarianism. #API #Actors #Actresses #Cast #Credits #Movies #Photos #Ratings #Reviews #Shows #Streaming #Synopsis #TV #Teasers #Trailers #User — Direct link
  • The Technology the Trump Administration Could Use to Hack Your Phone | The New Yorker
    Western democracies have been roiled by the use of spyware to target politicians, journalists, and other vulnerable groups. Could it happen here? Ronan Farrow reports. — Direct link
  • The Markup
    The Gentle January series shares one practical privacy tip a day from a Markup staffer who actually uses the advice in their own life. — Direct link
  • ongoing by Tim Bray · Why Not Bluesky
    "to be clear, I’m a fan of the Bluesky leadership and engineering team. With the VC money as fuel, I expect their next 12 months or so to be golden, with lots of groovy features and mind-blowing growth. But that’s not what I’ll be watching. I’ll be looking for ecosystem growth in directions that enable survival independent of the company. In the way that email is independent of any technology provider or network operator." — Direct link
  • The Great Migration to Bluesky Gives Me Hope for the Future of the Internet
    "I have been impressed with the tools that the open source development community is building to bridge the gap between the AT protocol and ActivityPub, and I’m hopeful that some mixture of Bluesky and Mastodon will eventually serve most of my needs as a social media user and, hopefully, as someone who co-owns a website" — Direct link
  • Helium Mobile
    Ditch big telco. Rise above with The People's Carrier, a new carrier owned by the people, and earn crypto. — Direct link