Notes for May 3rd 2024

Song of the week:

Notes

  • It appears the US is going to shut down TikTok, which feels odd. Not least because it flies in the face of competition, free markets and the general American dream. It also seems to call into play the fact that the US government is just unable to legislate tech companies into regional nuanced compliance (e.g. data residency, transparency in usage, etc.). It's also strange because the White House & Biden campaigns appear to be continuing to actively use TikTok.
    • In a similar vein, it also shows that the CEO of the social media giant, Shou Zi Chew (hailing from Singapore) just never really embedded with lawmakers and figured it out.
  • I'm in NYC next week for work. All my pre-work and prep is done and I'm ready to rock. My flight leaves at 5pm on Monday, which is nice because it gives me some breathing space. And the flight is so short (especially compared to SFO) that I'll barely feel it, and land at about 7pm local time!
    • I felt like I didn't have a chance to flex my camera at all in SFO, so this time I'm going to endeavour to do something sight-seeerish in order to take some snaps. I have some spare time on Tuesday so a visit to Chelsea or something is in order.
    • Secondarily, I really want to visit a good record store in the city. I love what Dublin has to offer but I'd love to go somewhere with $100 and just get some cool stuff to bring home. Both to chill & listen to when I'm in a work mode (I lean into vinyl to force myself to get away from the computer periodically) but also to sample and cut up.
  • One thing I promised myself that I would do ages ago was to work on music every month with friends. Or more so, against them. They've been a bit wishy-washy on it but I've ploughed on and created some stuff. I weirdly oscillate between ambient chill out stuff (likely a result of having equipment that matches that world so nicely, particularly my effects pedals) or full-on industrial stuff. The industrial stuff is really because I naturally flow there musically anyway. I love metal, I love hard rock and I love the edgier end of electronic music. So it sits nicely there. And it's composition, while complex layer-wise, it's pretty bog standard so easy to bash something good out, but make it special with layering.
  • Apple delivered it's earning reports this week. And that's not news worthy, really. Not as a consumer. What's interesting is the Apple blogosphere digging into every syllable anyone on the call said. Any analyst asking questions is bad cop, anything Apple says is good cop. As if the analysts don't represent a significant portion of Apple's ability to raise R&D money. It's an insane blogosphere that I used to love because it was critical, scrappy and interesting. Now it's less inspiration and more a heeding of a future where all niche interest groups wind up bloated, fat and drunk off of success of their niche; pretending they courted the success themselves.
    • Also, looking at 3 or 4 major players in this space, they have no divergent views, opinions or stances. They're awash with mediocrity.
  • The Rabbit R1 AI device has been released and it's being bludgeoned, as expected. It's shit, slow, not that much functionality and apparently the hardest working team involved in the entire project were the Teenage Engineering designers, who got to at least have a bit of fun with it.
    • MKBHD is getting flak for killing 2 AI device companies in a row. But he's actually been very professional and impartial in his reviews. It's not his fault that this is useless plastic shit being sold at relatively premium prices.
    • And this whole thing reminds me of crypto. The parallels of early adoption by people aping religious fanaticism rather than tech pragmatism (in the guise that tech solves problems first & foremost) are extreme. The crypto bros never went away, they just migrated. I even saw a friend of mine who's fully latched onto the AI hype train wax lyrical about how AI companies are to be trusted and it's crazy that publishers would sue for what is clear & obvious copyright infringement. These companies are less Apple-in-the-2000s innovative and more Wish.com.

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Published on: 3rd May, 2024

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