Wow, Apple put a lot of work into this 100 best albums website. Fancy. (I would've been fine with a simple numbered HTML list or music playlist.)
Working on something new to show this Friday for Micro Camp. Pulled it off the back-burner, it's a feature we've talked about at least a few times since last year.
I missed in the OpenAI livestream that the "o" in GPT-4o stands for "omni", but this is clarified in the blog post. Makes me feel a little better about the odd naming, which otherwise sounds like "4.0". That gripe aside, really impressive.
It's often difficult to see the impact of a new feature until it is working. Ideas and mockups only go so far. So many times this has happened with Micro.blog, where seeing it live is even better (or worse!) than I had hoped.
Only a dozen minutes into the Google I/O keynote and there are already a couple features I want… Asking photos what my license plate number is, and filming my bookshelves to make a list of book titles and authors.
Google’s product naming is getting better now that they’ve burned through all the plain words like Docs, Photos, etc. Gemini and Astra are nice.
There was good stuff in the I/O keynote, but OpenAI effectively undercut a bunch of it by demoing GPT-4o yesterday. Also lots of filler, really no need for a 2-hour session. My main takeaway is cheap pricing and new open source models to ship soon-ish.
I don’t think the Trump defense to discredit Micheal Cohen is going to work. So, Cohen hates Trump now? Of course he does. He lied and broke the law for Trump, then went to jail. If anything it just makes the whole story more complete and believable. 🇺🇸
Good morning! Coffee.
My superpower and greatest weakness is not letting the need for a major refactor get in the way of shipping something new. Beautiful code is nice, but too many developers forget the goal is user experience, not developer experience.
Finder on iPad
I'll admit I've only skimmed the recent "is iPadOS holding the iPad back?" posts from Federico Viticci, Jason Snell, John Gruber, and others. The iPad isn't part of my routine now that I'm back to using the Kindle for e-books.
Apple has had a decades-long battle with window management generally and the Finder specifically. At Ease, Simple Finder, Launchpad, Stage Manager, iOS Files... But it turns out the Finder is great. You could go a long way just by replacing Files with a touch-optimized Finder.
I wrote the above and then went back to Federico's post, where he actually highlights this same point:
After seven years, I’m starting to wonder if maybe it’s time for Apple to scrap the Files project and start over with a new app based on the strong foundation of Finder. We’re well past the point of excusing the Files app for being a young file manager; when you’re spending $3,000 on a high-end iPad Pro with plenty of storage, you want the app to manage that storage to be flawless.
Apple could do this even without turning iPadOS into a true fork of iOS. Boot the iPad into a new Finder that mostly obsoletes Springboard and Files.
A couple months ago on Core Int, I said we were at peak Apple. With every week, I believe that more strongly. Apple has been an inspiration for me for 30 years. A massive success. I think this is as good as it gets for them. They are simply too big to fundamentally rethink anything for what's next.
Ben Thompson in today's update on Google I/O:
What was much more dubious and vaporware-y were actual new products. And, frankly, this isn’t a surprise: one’s take on Google before the AI revolution would have been that the company can operate at scale like no other, but has lost the capacity to innovate; at the risk of confirmation bias, that was exactly the takeaway I had from much of this keynote.
I wonder if there's a disconnect with Google's ad-based business not knowing how to turn research into products.
Further evidence from The New York Times that the November election will be largely decided by people who are objectively ignorant. There's no way to sugarcoat it.
Nearly one in five voters in battleground states says that President Biden is responsible for ending the constitutional right to abortion, a new poll found, despite the fact that he supports abortion rights and that his opponent Donald J. Trump appointed three Supreme Court justices who made it possible to overturn Roe v. Wade.
🇺🇸
This post on The Verge assumes that AI hallucinations should be fixed, but generative AI is like a human assistant: helpful, sometimes wrong. The fixable issue is actually perception and UX, giving a false sense of confidence. Google will likely make this worse with “definitive” answers in search.
Google eventually turning their home page into ChatGPT is a rare opening for something new in traditional web search. It's not a certainty that AI assistants and web search will be a single tool. They can have very different purposes: one looking for answers, one looking for things to read or use.
Finished reading: Bookshops & Bonedust by Travis Baldree. I’ll read almost any book about books. Something was missing in this one compared to Legends & Lattes, through. 📚
The new Wicked trailer was released today. High expectations for this one. No doubt the music will be great, just hope they get the rest right too.
Micro Camp is... tomorrow! 🤯 It's extra micro this year, so if you blink you might miss it. Hope everyone can join us for a keynote conversation with Christina Warren and then the State of Micro.blog, announcing a couple new features, and Q&A. Starts 11:45am Pacific time.
We have some great door prizes for Micro Camp tomorrow! 🎟️
We're keeping things simple with Micro Camp this year: no email list, no registration. I did add a time zone helper link and an "Add to calendar" button on micro.camp, to make it easier not to miss when the livestream starts.
Questions about blogging or Micro.blog? We'll be answering questions at Micro Camp, from the chat tomorrow or you can submit a question anytime on this form.
Trying out the new pinned, columns interface on Threads. It's quite good. Fixes the minor gripes I had with clicking too much to get to the following list or replies.
Just in time for Micro Camp today, a brand new Core Intuition: episode 599! We talk about Micro Camp, Micro.blog, and domain names, then catch up on GPT-4o, Google I/O, and Apple.
It's going to be a busy day, but I wanted to pause to note two movies I watched this week and really enjoyed, for completely different reasons: Molly's Game and Marcel the Shell with Shoes On. I'm still amazed that Marcel was funded with such an obvious singular vision, unlike anything I've seen. 🍿
The chat on help.micro.blog is now open. This will be the back channel for the live broadcasts during Micro Camp 2024.
Thanks everyone who joined us for Micro Camp! I’m going to edit the videos and put them online this weekend, but the live broadcasts are on YouTube in the meantime.
I took the demo portion from yesterday's panel and uploaded it to YouTube as a separate 6-minute video clip. This shows the new replies curation and reply text box features.
I posted the video of our conversation with Christina Warren at Micro Camp 2024! We talk about early blogging, how social media is changing, whether it's actually easier to get started now, podcasting, what we should focus on as the social web grows, and more.
Uploaded the session video for Micro Camp's State of Micro.blog panel. The website now has YouTube links for the sessions, including our interview with Christina Warren.
The latest from Mark Gurman at Bloomberg makes the Apple + OpenAI partnership sound like a done deal. WWDC is just a few weeks away! Should be a good one.
Mural from I-35.
Wow, had no idea going into game 7 what would happen, but didn’t expect that. Timberwolves vs. Nuggets had its ups and downs. Gonna root for the Mavs in the conference finals. 🏀
