About 5 years ago (!) I posted my Holiday Movie Power Rankings. I still think that the list holds up. The biggest change I’d make is move A Christmas Story down a notch or two and move Elf up.
As far as how much time I spend watching Christmas movies these days, that list would be replaced with Polar Express and the final 20 minutes of the Home Alone movies on repeat clocking in at the top. Having a 6 and 3 year old will do that.
Greta Thunberg: TIME’s Person of the Year 2019
The climate activist has succeeded in turning vague anxieties about the planet into a worldwide movement calling for global change.
The most important issue of our time. The boomers have mortgaged the future on the backs of their children, but we can’t sit by and allow that to happen to future generations as well.
I was surprised to see that Music fixes were rolled into the new MacOS 10.15.2 release that came out this week. While I’m pleased to see that they’re iterating on the “new” app and taking customer feedback into consideration, I’m wondering why Apple isn’t shipping releases like these incrementally. Frankly, the same could be said for a lot of their applications.
With the fairly well-documented iOS 13 and Catalina update quality issues still fresh in mind, the company really needs to both focus on the quality of their overall platforms and the way in which they release software. One arrow in their quiver could be shipping updates to the core OS separate from apps unless required by new hardware changes. Does it add additional QA burden to test multiple permutations of software/OS combos? Yeah, it does. But when OS releases are tied to hardware releases at times it can be helpful to approach the rest of their software rollouts incrementally rather than shipping everything at once.
There’s no good reason that Music on MacOS or iOS can’t ship with smaller UX enhancements separate from an OS release. Same goes for Mail, Safari, etc.
From MacRumors:
Costing just under 20 Swiss francs, the optional remote was reportedly developed in close collaboration with Apple, after a sizable section of Salt TV’s customer base apparently complained about the poor usability of the Apple Remote that comes with every Apple TV 4K.
I’d love for Apple to release a version of the Siri Remote that doesn’t have that awful touchpad on it. Easily the worst part of the Apple TV experience.
Kelsey Campbell-Dollaghan for Fast Company:
Though its official sunsetting in 2017 inspired many nostalgic blogs about the chat service, it’s safe to say AIM’s legacy is still very much alive in the apps we use every day—and in the contours of the internet at large.
A great recap of the rise and fall of AIM, AOL’s instant messaging service that changed the web forever.
I have so many great memories of AIM. It came up during time time in high school and into college so this was the way my friends and I stayed in touch pre-social networks. There are still some ongoing disputes about who holds the record for longest AIM uptime…
Something I promised and failed to do earlier this year was to write more often. I stand before you again, making a similar promise. The key difference his time is that I’m smack in the middle of a posting streak. I committed to make one post a day for the month of December, no matter how big or small. By creating a much more measurable goal and writing it down in my Things to do list as a daily reminder, I’ve been much more consistent thus far.
I’m not going to post daily forever. But I’m going to come up with a more measurable commitment and hold myself to that once January rolls around.
FSU isn’t great at coaching searches. This is their 4th coach in nearly 40 years! A lot of times after a coach is fired, their replacement is essentially the polar opposite of the person who was just let go. I think the administration did a good job of getting someone who had the best qualities that Taggart embodied while also correcting for his unorganized, players-coach style.
An intro press conference doesn’t tell you a lot other than how good of a salesman the new coach is, but he said all of the things you’d want him to say.
I’m really excited to see what sort of staff Norvell puts together and what the next few years look like. 2020 is gonna be rough, but after that I anticipate a turnaround.
Take a look back at your year online. What you find might surprise you.
This cracked me up. Also shows how much of a cultural phenomenon the Spotify Wrapped feature is.
A great overview of what you should be worried about on the web when it comes to your data and what folks can do with it. If you really want to dive in on this, the linked article from the EFF really expands on the ideas. As the author states above, I’m also not opposed to advertising in principle. What I’m opposed to is the massive amount of personalized data companies gather about me to deliver mediocre ads that are not any better than those you might get in a non-targeted way.