May 2021

  • Comparing cameras

    On the top left is a photo taken with my trusty old (also much used and abused) Canon 5D Mark III. On the top right is one taken by a borrowed new Sony a7Riii. Below both are cropped close-ups of detail. The scene is in a room illuminated by incandescent track lighting. It is not Continue reading

  • Apple vs (or plus) Adtech, Part II

    My post yesterday saw action on Techmeme (as I write this, it’s at #2) and on Twitter (from Don Marti, Augustine Fou, et. al.), and in thoughtful blog posts by John Gruber in Daring Fireball and Nick Heer in Pixel Envy. All pushed back on at least some of what I said. Here are some Continue reading

  • Apple vs (or plus) Adtech, Part I

    This piece has had a lot of very smart push-back (and forward, but mostly back). I respond to it in Part II, here. If you haven’t seen it yet, watch Apple’s Privacy on iPhone | tracked ad. In it a guy named Felix (that’s him, above) goes from a coffee shop to a waiting room Continue reading

  • Making useful photographs

    What does it mean when perhaps hundreds of thousands of one’s photos appear in articles, essays and posts all over the Web? It means they’re useful. That’s why I posted the originals in the first place, and licensed them to require only attribution. Because of that, I can at least guess at how many have Continue reading

  • How the cookie poisoned the Web

    Have you ever wondered why you have to consent to terms required by the websites of the world, rather than the other way around? Or why you have no record of what you have accepted or agreed to? Blame the cookie. Have you wondered why you have no more privacy on the Web than what Continue reading

  • First iPhone mention?

    I wrote this fake story on January 24, 2005, in an email to Peter Hirshberg after we jokingly came up with it during a phone call. Far as I know, it was the first mention of the word “iPhone.” Apple introduces one-button iPhone Shuffle To nobody’s surprise, Apple’s long-awaited entry into the telephony market is Continue reading

  • My podcasts of choice

    As a follow-up to what I wrote earlier today, here are my own favorite podcasts, in the order they currently appear in my phone’s podcast apps: Radio Open Source (from itself) Bill Simmons (on The Ringer) Fresh Air (from WHYY via NPR) JJ Reddick & Tommy Alter (from ThreeFourTwo) The Mismatch (on The Ringer) The New Continue reading

  • A half-century of NPR

    NPR, which turned 50 yesterday, used to mean National Public Radio. It still does, at least legally; but they quit calling it that in 2010. The reason given was “…most of our audience — more than 27 million listeners to NPR member stations and millions more who experience our content on NPR.org and through mobile Continue reading

  • On the persistence of KPIG

    On Quora, William Moser asked, Would the KPIG radio format of Americana—Folk, Blugrass, Delta to modern Blues, Blues-rock, trad. & modern C&W, country & Southern Rock, jam-bands, singer/songwriters, some jazz, big-band & jazz-singers sell across markets in America? I answered, I’ve liked KPIG since its prior incarnation as KFAT.I’ve liked KPIG since its prior incarnation as Continue reading