January 2026 blend of links

Some links don’t call for a full blog post, but sometimes I still want to share some of the good stuff I encounter on the web.

¶

Our Algorithmic Grey-Beige World – Excellent column from Om Malik, on how algorithms, among other things, accelerated and reinforced our tendencies for conformity and blandness; so good in fact that I must have read it several times already.

robinrendle.com – Speaking of conformity and blandness, you definitely will not find those in the remarkable new design of Robin Rendle’s blog: beautifully made, delightful to explore. Rendle wrote a short post about the new version.

WikiFlix – A free streaming service for movies in the public domain. The video player doesn’t always seem to work, but for the collection of movies alone it is a worthy bookmark. (via Kottke)

Yoink – I’ve mentioned Yoink a few days ago, and I ended up buying a licence. This little utility makes so much sense on the Mac that I don’t understand why it hasn’t already been copied or sherlocked by Apple. What I like the most about this app is that it’s only there when you need it: this is a rare quality in software.

Ricoh GR IV Monochrome – I want this. I truly want this. My Ricoh GRIIIx is great and all, but I want this, so much. […looks at the price…] Well, Actually my GRIIIx is excellent, I don’t need this at all. Still, since it costs less than a third of a monochrome Leica camera, it’s just about a bargain, isn’t it?

The Case for Blogging in the Ruins – “Social media removed the friction of publishing, and in doing so removed the selection pressure that separated signal from noise. We "democratized" the ability to publish (good?) while simultaneously destroying the conditions that made publishing meaningful (bad!)”

Venn Diagram Creator – How on Earth is this bookmark not included by default on every web browser?

Thoughts and Observations Regarding Apple Creator Studio – “Whatever you think of this new 2026 icon for Pages, you can’t seriously argue that it’s much worse — or really all that different — from the previous one. But go back in time and each previous Pages icon had more detail and looked cooler. And then you get back to the original Pages icon and that one clearly belongs in the App Icon Hall of Fame.” I remember a time when the sole purpose I could find of the Finder “Cover flow” view option was to marvel at the Apple apps icons (I think my favourite was Contacts). Textures, details; these icons were truly delightful, and I was amazed at how good they looked in such a zoomed-in view.

Measured A.I. (Gina Trapani) – “Every time a chatbot tells me ‘That’s a great question!’ and ‘Now you’re thinking!’ I cringe. Your AI chatbot might as well be a fawning junior intern trying desperately to impress you.” I feel the same way with the almost systematic answer I get in the lines of: “Ah! That’s the classic dilemma…” or “This is a very common question…” Is this a trick to make me feel better? I know I could configure bots to never answer like that, but most of the time I use these tools logged out.

How Markdown took over the world – Great look at the origins of Markdown and at the context of its success, by Anil Dash. Also, I learned the word “curmudgeonly” from this.

More “Blend of links” posts