Technology

Reboot Redesign ReDo

by

After recent price increases, subscription fatigue, privacy concerns and probably long overdue contentment, it’s time for a change. I’ll be withdrawing more from technology, technology blogs and restructuring everything to maximize privacy, reduce monthly subscription spending and pursuing avenues of personal interest.

I am heavily embedded into the Apple eco-system after decades of using Windows/Android. I have stuff scattered all over the internet, cloud storage and external hard drives with almost zero organization. That’s changing as of today.

First up, a new identity. I will no longer be using my personal name online. I don’t need to “brand myself” anymore since I am done playing the game. I created a new Apple ID that is generic and not personal. Then I created an iCloud account to go with it. Next, I purchased a new web domain (silverfox.website) and email address to match it and then made THAT one the new/updated Apple ID. The hard part is switching everything from contact information to businesses and services I use over to the new account. Sure, I’ll lose a lot of subscriptions, but I am pairing them down and prioritizing anyway.

With iCloud+ services such as Private Relay and “Hide My Email” I can create generic, disposable email addresses. Apple then allows me to use random, generic passwords and will even store them for me using their KeyChain.

When all of this is sorted I need to discipline myself to keep it organized, unlike my previous attempts. Maybe then I can get back to enjoying what I love in peace such as photography, reading and geocaching.

It Happened

by

After two years of silence, I finally heard the fan kick in on my M1 MacBook while downloading images off Adobe to my external hard drive. Took me by surprise!

Philosophical Intelligence

by

Anyone wishing to explore artificial intelligence first needs to study philosophy.

Eastern works such as Tau, western works such as the meditations of Marcus Aurelius, the Bible, and other modern day thinkers.

To understand and explore artificial intelligence, we have to explore the implications or consequences for this understanding and knowledge of ethics, consciousness, epistemology, intelligent problem-solving and most importantly, free will.  

While taking a couple of Stanford online courses on quantum theory, quantum computing and quantum mechanics, I was overwhelmed by the theories and possibilities. Quickly, those theories will become reality. An intelligent, conscious being driven by qubits and binary coding will exist. What would it’s role be? Will it have a place among us? Will it have the same rights and freedoms that we do?

Something to think about because we can.

Wallpaper Downloads

by

I’ve had the opportunity to make a few backgrounds for the iDevices and wanted to share them at no cost if you are interested. Good for any device. Just click here to download and save to your screens. Let me know what you think and maybe even send a screenshot with them installed?

More on the way…

Authentic Intelligence

by

I’d like to put it out there to the World Wide Web right now- if I ever use artificial intelligence to write this website for me, I’ll shut it down first. But, until the damn thing grows arms, breasts and sentience, I’m in charge, so we’ll do things my way.

While it is true that artificial intelligence (AI) is changing the way we work, read, and create, I don’t believe it will take away the human soul’s creativity. AI can absolutley be seen as taking over if you think of it as sentient, but it isn’t. It is all programmed, programmable and flawed. Just like us.

AI is a tool in our toolbox, nothing more. Those tools are no different then a hammer/chisel to sculpt. No different then pencil/paper, paint/canvas, light/film/photo.

AI can be viewed as an intern. Some interns are paid and most are not. But either way, we can allow AI to do some research for us, format the data and organize data to fit our desired outcome. Now, would I trust an intern’s copy without proof-reading? No. We polish it up and make it our own, conform to our needs and desired outcomes.

If I ask AI to generate a blog post for my website I am sure it will be very competent in spitting out text that is very factual, very droll, with keywords that will generate search engine optimization and offer suggestions on how to best get the best return on investment for all of it’s hard work and I take all the credit.

Image Credit: Me (human) + AI

But it isn’t me. It won’t be personal now matter how I try to spin it off as my own. It is artificial, emotionless, calculating and maybe too perfect in comparison to my flawed brain, typos, run-on sentences, etc.

This website will no longer be a personal website at that point. It would be formatted to reach the most viewers based on the most current topics of thing that I personally don’t give a damn about. That isn’t a personal blog. It is artificial.

To be clear, I do not fear artificial intelligence. As a closet geek, I am amazed at what programmable software can do right now and still wonder what is holding us back to do even more. I took a few semesters at Stanford online for quantum computing and quantum mechanics and was in awe at the theories and possibilities. Combining quantum computing with machine learning and artificial intelligence is a step forward to benefitting mankind.  I do fear that like all tools in the hands of humans, that it can be perverted to do harm to others.

🤖
“We refuse to accept the responsibility for anything that we’ve done, like we did with the Cylon. We decided to play God, create life. And when that life turned against us, we comforted ourselves in the knowledge that it really wasn’t our fault, not really. You cannot play God then wash your hands of the things that you’ve created. Sooner or later, the day comes when you can’t hide from the things that you’ve done anymore.” – Commander William Adama
🤖
“Technology changes, but people stay the same.” – Robopocalypse

However, as I said earlier: until the damn thing grows arms, breasts and sentience, I’m in charge of this personal website, so I’ll do things my way.

Reading Hacks

by

RSS, or, Really Simple Syndication, is having a comeback moment for many people. I’ve used this invaluable web tool since 2005 to hack my reading workflow and highly suggest others pick this up. It’s a web feed that allows users and applications to access updates to websites in a standardized, computer-readable format. It’s an easy way for you to keep up with news and information that’s important to you, and helps you avoid the conventional methods of browsing or searching for information on websites.

My feed reader of choice: Feedbin

The benefits of using RSS include the ability to stay up-to-date with the latest news and information from your favorite websites without having to visit each site individually. It also helps you avoid the clutter of email newsletters and other notifications, and allows you to easily organize and filter the content you receive.

RSS was originally introduced in 1999 by Netscape Communications Corp., for use with its MyNetscape portal. After Netscape abandoned the standard, software maker UserLand picked up development. Although RSS formats have evolved from as early as March 1999, it was between 2005 and 2006 when RSS gained widespread use, and the (“”) icon was decided upon by several major web browsers. RSS feed data is presented to users using software called a news aggregator and the passing of content is called web syndication

All that to say, is that most of your web reading sources come to you, as opposed to visiting each website to browse their content feed. I’ve subscribed to hundreds of websites, blogs, tweets, YouTube videos, newsletters over the years and all without leaving my RSS feed reader. You can then save an article to read for later use. Read what you want, when you want. Brilliant.

After gathering your content, then what? For me, I take notes and save them for later.

Readwise

Enter Readwise Reader- One tool to benefit, or hack your reading experience. With the content I consume via RSS feeds, I can then highlight and annotate notes inside the app. Some other benefits they offer:

  1. Annotation, tagging & highlighting text are the killer features of digital reading.
  2. Ghostreader is a GPT-3 companion for reading. It will analyze the text and then format a summary for you, ask questions, define terms and simplify complex language.
  3. Text-to-speech- listen to any document narrated with the lifelike voice of a human.
  4. Integrated with your favorite tools- Your annotations can flow effortlessly from your reading app into your writing tools. Instead of wasting hours of reformatting, reorganizing, and repeating, Reader eliminates the hassle. Export to Readwise, LogSeq, Obsidian, Roam etc.
  5. Read anywhere, anytime. Online, offline. iPhone, iPad, MacBook or the web.
Screenshots of Readwise on the web, iPad and iPhone. 

Readwise is a companion app to Readwise Reader. When I consume books on my Kindle , I can highlight and annotate notes in that device. Those notes are then synchronized into Readwise and then automagically imported into my personal knowledge database for later. The same occurs when I use Apple Books. Neato.

Conclusion

The purpose of  note taking isn’t to remember- it is having the freedom to forget and reference for later.

Think of all this as taking a pencil and highlighter to writing in the margins of a physical book to take notes on and review later. But digitized.

Readwise is $8.99/mo. Matter, an alternative to Readwise, but needs more development in my mind, is also $8/mo. To be clear, this is not a piad sponsorship. But I wouldn’t turn down a gratis subscription either.

Autodiadactism

by

“Autodidacticism (also autodidactism) or self-education (also self-learning and self-teaching) is education without the guidance of masters (such as teachers and professors) or institutions (such as schools). Generally, autodidacts are individuals who choose the subject they will study, their studying material, and the studying rhythm and time. Autodidacts may or may not have formal education, and their study may be either a complement or an alternative to formal education.” – Wikipedia.

That reads as impressive, no? All that to say, I enjoy reading, studying and figuring things out on my own, for my own enrichment. Over the years I am slowly fine-tuning the process. I have built my own personal knowledge database which houses decades worth of knowledge, thoughts, writings, white papers etc all in .txt, .pdf and .md formats.

📚
If you enjoy reading for knowledge, do you receive value for that time? How do you retain what you’ve read? How can you refer back to a specific instance that you came across but can’t remember where?

This is where my personal knowledge management database comes in. I call it “Grey Matter.” Others refer to their database as a “Second Brain.”

A visual graph of decades worth of inter-connected notes in my Grey Matter database
Look at that web of connected notes!

After converting then, importing all your documents into the database, you then need to sort and organize in a way that seems logical to you. I choose to sort by year/month such as: 2023/03. If you take good notes, you should be able to sort by categories after that. An extra step for me is to backlink each note to another relevant note. Example: By typing double brackets, [[photo workflow]], the database then suggests previous documents with your suggested topic. As soon as you do this, the database generates a link to that document in your current document.

Back-linking for the win

When you perform a search for something you want to recall, look it up and every document with that tag or backlink will display and you can choose your relevant article. Neat, yeah?

Make connections to your thoughts scattered over time

As a self-proclaimed autodidact, I enjoy hybrid models of both, old knowledge and new knowledge. The challenge is discovering solutions to merge the two of them together for your benefit.

Cropping My Photo Gear

by

Just how good is the iPhone as a camera? Good enough for someone like me, a photographer for over three decades, want to sell off almost all of his gear. It is that good. I just sold off the mirrorless Sony A7 and am looking at other options to sell off the 35mm cameras and film. With film prices going up (again!) a few days ago (thanks Kodak), film developing is no longer in the budget. I am keeping Nikita, the Nikon D90 because she is one of my all time favorites. The Canon will stay here to be used by MissAdventure. The Minolta 110mm is staying because I have to have at least one film camera for nostalgia, right? Right. Shut up.

Sold: Nikon D200, Sony A7

Selling: Nikon D50, Holga 120mm, Pentax K1000 35mm, Nikon F35mm, Canon SureShot 35mm, Lomo Diana 110mm, Polaroid Instant 600 (2), Fujifilm Instax

Keeping: Nikon D90, Canon Rebel T6, Minolta 110mm

Most of the gear is listed here:

Photo Denbow – Gear
Lifestyle Photography
Photo Denbow

The iPhone 13 Pro Max

I need minimal gear. I’ve gone all-in on so many cameras, lenses, & accessories over the years, it makes me wonder what I could have done with all that money spent. Here is where minimalism, or essentialism kicks in: the iPhone. This device checks all of my requirement boxes.

Process

  • Portable
  • Anywhere
  • Anything
  • Built in lighting
  • Minimal
  • Consistent style of shooting

Photography gear

  • One camera- iPhone
  • Three interchangeable lenses, maximum
  • Carry-case for said lenses

Set of three Moment Lenses, our Phone Case, and a Lens Pen.
Save some cash! Get a set of any three of our lenses, perfect for capturing more than you could with your phone alone, plus our Phone Case, Lens Pen and a Strap
MomentMoment

I am eagerly awaiting my recent purchase of the Moment brand lens starter set to upgrade my iPhonetography. The wide angle, telephoto and fisheye lenses are going to be a joy to use. Check it out ^.

With forced limitations that come with minimal gear comes new chances for me to get more creative for the desired results.

Because I am cropping my gear, I feel like a huge weight is off my shoulders. Literally. I don’t need to make gear choices anymore. Everything is minimized and maximized for mobile photography.

Do you use all your gear? Could you benefit from a gear resizing too?

Rage Against The Machine

by

My personal printing at home history has always followed the same patterns:

  • Buy a printer (with scanner, copier, fax!)
  • Buy the over-priced, proprietary ink.
  • Use the printer.
  • Enjoy a small window of time for when the printer actually works.
  • Don’t use printer awhile until I need it again.
  • Run an urgent print job I need immediately.
  • The printer does not work.
  • Waste time trying to get the printer working.
  • Take the copies I need printed somewhere else and over-pay.
  • Get rid of the printer.
  • Buy a printer.
  • Buy the over-priced, proprietary ink.
  • Get rid of printer.

This planned obsolescence is maddening for almost everyone who owns one of these damned things. It isn’t one brand, it is the market and no one is willing to help you. Guess what, Hewlett Packard/Brother/Epson? Piss off enough people and they won’t buy your crappy products anymore. This printer is my last home printer.

Oh, does anyone want an Epson printer/copier/scanner/fax? Only used a few times. Free to a good home. Or a bad home, I don’t care.