Sometimes Dave Winer says smart things, though there are often strange gaps (maybe he is like Kevin Kelly, who says smart things because he has surrounded himself with smart people but generally can’t reconstruct the reasoning behind those things).

In this case, the difference between the 80s and today with regard to writing tools is sort of clear: in the 80s, most available tools for home computers either were small-computing products or (as in the case of Lotus) began as small-computing products and grew due to popularity. …

I write constantly, and I’m always on the lookout for advice on how to improve my craft — not out of fear that I’m insufficiently capable, but out of a desire to do better. Every time I crack open a book on the craft of writing, though, I have to wade through at least a chapter (only a chapter, if I’m lucky) that describes this dysfunctional codependent relationship with writing. Nobody actually likes to write, they say (in the same way as they might say no women actually like sex), and they continue, and we hate the rare people who…

It has been a little over two years since Manna for our Malices was launched to paying audiences on Steam and Itch. (Incomplete/demo versions had been available for free on itch during much of development.) Shortly before the official launch, I wrote the MfoM pre-postmortem.

I can’t give any intelligent update on almost anything covered in the pre-postmortem, which focused on themes and the kind of commentary on the genre I was trying to make. I’ve gotten a fair number of reviews, but none have mentioned these themes; if people are “getting the message” then they are keeping it to…

The more time I spend in the tech industry, the more often I see things that don't work at all (or barely work) getting enormous investment. When your industry is highly financialized, hype is an effective substitute for functionality (at least when it comes to your bottom line). This is especially true when it is difficult to determine effectiveness. Advertising is an industry where reliable, unambiguous measures of effectiveness over time are really difficult to produce, and targeted advertising involves adding a whole set of complicated factors (not in isolation) to any such experiment. …

Software developers are in a position of power. Most of the software that gets professionally developed is proprietary or is hidden away on remote servers, so end users are not allowed to see or modify its behavior; even were they allowed to change its behavior, we often use complicated tools that require years of experience to use effectively. While there may be a ‘market’, end users’ choice is limited: an end user may be able to choose between several implementations, but there are no software choices developed outside of the software-developer monoculture. In practice, user choice is even more limited…

Hot take: algorithmic sorting of timelines, displaying ads, and accepting subscription fees are all ‘editorial’ and therefore any for-profit organization should not be classified as a common carrier under section 230.

Show ads? Then you are making an editorial decision about which ads to accept — not common carrier.

Ask for subscriptions? Then you are making an editorial decision to exclude people who can’t afford your subscription fees — not common carrier.

This is not how this law has ever been interpreted, but if we decided to interpret it this way, we’d probably live in a better world.

Or rather:

…

Last February, in response to online pushes (for Women’s History Month) to “read more women”, I went looking at my bookshelf (which I had previously thought relatively diverse) and discovered that only a small fraction of the books I owned were by women; I read some that month, and mostly forgot about the issue. This past February, I was reminded of it again — after a year spent mostly reading male authors — and decided to try to make a more serious change. After all, women are half the population, not one twelfth of it — why spend one twelfth…

Something The Avengers did really well (especially during the Emma Peel era) was recognize the connection between conspiracy & affinity group. In almost every episode, some kind of plot is hidden behind a club or association for some particular topic.

In one, a private golf club is cover for terrorist training. In another, model train enthusiasts & senile retired military men are being manipulated by their butlers. We see a mensa-type organization turned via mind control, psychics (twice: first, real ones, then fake)… Cat fanciers get sold collectable collars that cause cats to attack by remote control. …