Category: Words

  • Socialising kittens that are 10 weeks or older

    When we first brought our rescue kittens home, I scoured the web looking for hints and tips for getting them socialised.

    Generally speaking, the best time to socialise kittens is before they’re 10 weeks old – and much of the help you’ll find online describes this in detail. However, if you have young rescue kittens that are older than 10 weeks, it’s extremely difficult to find good advise on socialising them.

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  • Online ads are stuck in the ’90s

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    The Outline’s Josh Topolsky waxing eloquent on Recode Media podcast:

    The TV ad works because it’s good for TV. The magazine ad works because it’s good for magazines. You know what Instagram and Snapchat and Facebook (to some degree) and Pinterest figured out? There’s an internet ad that works really well, it just isn’t the box that is on every website.

    Figuring that out is the key to unlocking what advertising should be on the internet, and the key to unlocking what good advertising looks like, and very few people have done it well. Almost no one – I would say zero – publications have built a system that is holistically, like from the ground up, designed around the marriage of both interesting, digital-first content and interesting, digital-first advertising.

    Nailed it.

    The Outline isn’t for everyone, and that’s by design. Their content/ad strategy has been super fascinating to watch, especially in connection to the media manifesto Topolsky published in 2016.

    It’s been doubly interesting to compare The Outline to the launch of The Ringer, Bill Simmons’ media company, which he spun up after breaking from ESPN. The Ringer launched on Medium first to minimise their launch runway, but moved to the Vox media stack less than a year later. The Ringer is a heavily staffed blog, and I think it can be safely argued that their written content is not particularly compelling or well presented, and there has certainly been very “bog-standard” approach to advertising (with Vox handling the ad sales after the move).

    Now – all that said – in addition to the site, The Ringer has a hugely successful podcast network with Bill’s podcast alone estimated to be bringing in around $50,000 per episode. Simmons is clearly leaning heavily into podcasting (as well as experimenting with a variety of video stream/show formats), with the development of the site and it’s associated ad strategy taking a relative back seat.

    None of this is zero-sum, of course. There’s room for a lot of ‘winners’ in the online media space. But watching it all unfold is a great spectator sport.


    The Pod Pod is a selection of recommended single podcast episodes.


  • Red Dead 4K: The Redemptioning

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    In the midst of announcing a massive drop of backwards compatible and enhanced games, Microsoft released a 500MB update to Red Dead Redemption enabling 4K on the world’s most powerful console.

    Yes, this is a 4K screencap of a 2010 console game.

    This. Is. Fucking. Amazing.

    Most observers reckoned 4K for RDR would never come due to the engineering of the game – many thought the resolution was baked-in for performance reasons. But it seems the Back Compat team at Microsoft are wizards indeed.

    So how does it look?

    Stunning.

    I mean, it’s ridiculous how good it looks. The 360 version (which is also what ran on the initial Back Compat version) was noticeably blurry and shimmery, especially in motion. It still looked great though, and you did get the impression that R* had put a lot more under the hood than the hardware was capable of displaying. And now we know that’s the case.

    The result is that Read Dead Redemption is now – again – a joy to play.


    More Red Dead:

    Finding John Marsden – A wonderful short doc from Polygon about Rob Weithoff, the voice of John Marsden

    In depth review (thinreaper) – One of the best game reviews/critiques I’ve ever invested an hour and a half in


  • Ends and means

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    Google’s handling of HTTPS and AMP is fascinating to watch. It seems that really smart people are worried about how this will all end up.

    I find myself identifying strongly with this piece from Jeremy Keith:

    I remember feeling very heartened to see WikiPedia, Google and others take a stand on January 18th, 2012. But I also remember feeling uneasy. In this particular case, companies were lobbying for a cause I agreed with. But what if they were lobbying for a cause I didn’t agree with? Large corporations using their power to influence politics seems like a very bad idea. Isn’t it still a bad idea, even if I happen to agree with the cause?

    There’s an uncomfortable tension here. When do the ends justify the means? Isn’t the whole point of having principles that they hold true even in the direst circumstances? Why even claim that corporations shouldn’t influence politics if you’re going to make an exception for net neutrality? Why even claim that free speech is sacrosanct if you make an exception for nazi scum?

    Those two examples are pretty extreme and I can easily justify the exceptions to myself. Net neutrality is too important. Stopping fascism is too important. But where do I draw the line? At what point does something become “too important?”

    There are more subtle examples of corporations wielding their power. Google are constantly using their monopoly position in search and browser marketshare to exert influence over website-builders. In theory, that’s bad. But in practice, I find myself agreeing with specific instances. Prioritising mobile-friendly sites? Sounds good to me. Penalising intrusive ads? Again, that seems okey-dokey to me. But surely that’s not the point. So what if I happen to agree with the ends being pursued? The fact that a company the size and power of Google is using their monopoly for any influence is worrying, regardless of whether I agree with the specific instances.


  • A Researcher Just Found A 9,000-Video Network Of YouTube Conspiracy Videos

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    Buzzfeed:

    Albright said the results suggest that the conspiracy genre is embedded so deeply into YouTube’s video culture that it could be nearly impossible to eradicate.

    “It’s already tipped in favor of the conspiracists, I think,” Albright told BuzzFeed News. “There are a handful of debunking videos in the data. They can’t make up for the thousands of videos with false claims and rumors.”

    Albright also suggested that the proliferation of these videos makes it more attractive for others to create this content.

    To anyone who dabbles in occasional conspiracy-theory deep dives on YouTube, this rings true. There is an absolute avalanche of dipshit conspiracies on YouTube, and most people lack the mental dexterity to tell that a video is playing loose with the facts – especially if it meshes nicely with their existing worldview.

    Less common is the conspiracy parody. The Outline absolutely nailed it with this gem:

    I’ve often thought a conspiracy channel would be an easy way to make some quick beer money, but it seems I’m much too late to the game.

    Or am I?

    Yes, I am.


  • Humans fighting giant beasts! I’ll pass.

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    How many games shown at E3 featured humans fighting giants, or giant beasts, or zombies? I’ll admit the games look well executed, but can we get some new concepts? God damn.

    Over the last few days I’ve actually convinced myself that Steep from Ubisoft might be a game I could really get into. The intro/reveal felt stiff (can scripted game intros get any worse?) but the idea of it has grown on me. I described it to a friend as Skate but on a mountain range – which seems like a phrase the PR people should have used to sell it.

    Increasingly I’m looking for fun gameplay experiences that don’t demand solid 2-3 hour blocks of my time (sorry, Metal Gear Solid V, I love you so much but I’m also a husband and dad). Ori and the Blind Forest filled that spot really well for me – a game that is as rewarding in 20 minute blocks as it is in 2 hours of play.

    Steep genuinely looks like something I can add into my unwind-at-home routine really easily: an open world mountain I can ride pretty much endlessly, while finding new lines and spots.


    Register for the Steep beta.
    15 mins of gameplay (Polygon).
    15 mins of gameplay (IGN).


  • Blogging? Blogging.

    I’ve finally re-re-re-fired up this blog as a blog.

    Regularly reading Dave Winer write about the open web, and where blogging fits in around all these walled gardens, has made a lot of sense to me lately.

    I post very regularly on Google+ (you should follow me there), and for a while I’ve felt like my mini-rants were worthwhile, but perhaps not ‘blog worthy’. That line of thinking is horse shit, of course. A blog can be whatever you want it to be, and whether people are actively reading it or not shouldn’t necessarily be the primary motivator for me.

    So here I am, desperately trying to post daily-ish, even if it’s just sharing a great link or two. I’m hoping that staying motivated by staying disciplined will help me become a better writer (of blog posts, at least).

    And at the very least if no one ever reads this, at least it’s still mine.


    Further reading:

    “A good blog exists independently of people reading it. Even if no one read my blog, I’d still write it. Not exactly sure why. Maybe it’s something like this — I would still cook even if I was the only person eating.” – A note about blogging

    “We can avoid this, it’s not too late. You have a choice. Post your writing to places other than Medium. And when you see something that’s interesting and not on Medium, give it some extra love. Push it to your friends. Like it on Facebook, RT it on Twitter. Give people more reasons to promote diversity on the web, not just in who we read, but who controls what we read.” – Anywhere but Medium

    “Other than writing a daily blog (a practice that’s free, and priceless), reading more blogs is one of the best ways to become smarter, more effective and more engaged in what’s going on. The last great online bargain.” – Read more blogs

    “I’ve said this 1,000 times before and I’ll continue to repeat myself (since I get new readers fairly consistently) but the only thing that matters when writing (publicly, privately, for personal use or professionally) is that you write. Period. Nothing else really matters.” – Results from a Blog Experiment: 365 Days and 5,000 Posts


  • Don’t Call It A Choke

    Photo credit: ESPN

    After The Oklahoma Thunder lost Game 6 to the Golden State Warriors, tying the series at 3 all, the “choke” echo chamber started firing up.

    Honestly, I’m completely over the ‘choking narrative’.

    It’s lazy.

    Why analyse the series when you can just yell “CHOKE”, right? Seven games worth of defensive rotations, pick and roll coverage, cross matches, game-to-game adjustments, shooting slumps – don’t worry about it. Just yell ‘choke’.

    It’s dismissive.

    The choke narrative completely ignores the fact that another team (The Warriors) was actively trying to beat them. And it completely minimises the sacrifice and hard work that the OKC players and coaches and staff made, not only for this series, but for the entire season.


    It’s myopic.

    Klay Thompson shot an NBA record 11 threes in Game 6. Klay and Steph beat the Playoff record for threes in a series, each. Yeah, OKC ‘choked’ though. The choke narrative ignores context.

    It’s arbitrary.

    What’s an appropriate number of wins or losses before a team chokes? If OKC went up 3-2 after a 2-2 tie and lost, is that still a choke?

    It’s dickish, and do we really need more dick behaviour in the world?

    If you’re a genuine GSW fan you’re excused, but for the rest of you: ease up. You just witnessed an incredible series in which both teams laid it all on the line in a Conference Finals matchup for the ages. Maybe take some time to appreciate it.


  • Vaundog

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    My dear friend Vaughan would have turned 40 this year.

    Vaughan and I bonded through music and basketball. We sat for hours with a Dr Sample SP-202, a Tascam 4 track, and an old hi-fi record player with a paper towel ‘slipmat’, creating loops and beats and experimenting with sound.

    loops

    Some time around 2000, Vaughan bought a Pentium computer with a decent sound card, which upgraded our musical noodlings from 4 tracks on tape to 16 tracks of digital thanks to a free version Cool Edit Pro. Over the years Vaughan wrote and recorded many songs in his various Auckland flats, on his parent’s farm in Kaihere, and alone in the Coromandel while renovating his parents’ new house. I’ve had a collection of his tracks backed up for years now (first on old data CDs, then an iPod and now in the cloud).

    Since Vaughan’s passing I’ve struggled to listen to his music at all. Attempting to do so has brought on a deep sadness which conflicts heavily with my enjoyment of his music and those golden memories of hanging out.

    But this changed for me in March when his sisters celebrated his memory on his 40th birthday in a Facebook post. Listening to his music now I still feel his loss, but the sadness has diminished over time. I’m able to enjoy his art again. I miss you Vaughan, but I’m glad I can still hear your voice in your music.


  • Twitter’s Mobile App Timeline is a Clusterf*ck

    I had to leave work early on Wednesday and with just over a quarter left of the Thunder vs the Warriors game I thought I’d stream the rest of the contest on my commute. Sadly, I had no such luck as the NBA app doesn’t stream video on Android N at the moment (sadface).

    So I decided to follow along on Twitter.

    I’m rubbish at curating Twitter lists (the concept and execution is pretty obtuse, which doesn’t help) but I follow a bunch of great NBA Twitter profiles, so my timeline lights up during these Conference Finals playoff games.

    Instead of using Falcon Pro, my go-to 3rd party Twitter client, I thought I’d give the native Twitter app a shot to enjoy those sweet, juicy in-line Vines people share during the game. What I experienced instead, was an avalanche of fail as Twitter bombarded me with everything BUT the tweets I was interested in.

    Let’s take a quick look. (more…)