March 2025 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.

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Has Search Become Just a Feature? – “The traditional web — with its banners, pop-ups, and paywalls — increasingly feels like a relic from a less sophisticated era.” If you aren’t already aware of the potential consequences of A.I. for the web, Om Malik’s post is a great — if a little optimistic — way to catch up. I wonder if websites, as we know them today, i.e. public-facing, are doomed to become mainly source material for A.I. apps or, worse, purely confidential points of reference in their databases.

A young Sam Altman in The Alienist, 2018 – Speaking of A.I., this Bluesky post from old internet acquaintance Daniel Benneworth-Gray is just chef’s kiss.

QuickGPT – While we are on the topic if A.I., do you know this very simple yet very useful Mac app by Sindre Sorhus? I use ChatGPT for various tasks at work, and I find QuickGPT to be, yes, quicker to use than OpenAI’s ChatGPT app, more stable than MacGPT, and better integrated into the system.

Sigma BF – You’ve probably seen this camera everywhere already, but I had to include it in this month’s list. Sometimes an object is so beautiful that its primary function becomes secondary. I don’t care if the pictures this device takes are good or not; I just want to hold it.

ChangeTheHeaders – “ChangeTheHeaders is a Safari extension for iOS, iPadOS, macOS, and visionOS that allows you to customize HTTP request headers such as Accept, Accept-Language, Cookie, and User-Agent.”

Valesuchi & Matias Aguayo – Nasty Woman – An eight-year-old brilliant remix that I really enjoyed then, which feels even more essential today. From the article on Remezcla: “The track samples a speech from actress Ashley Judd, who recites 19-year-old Tennessee poet Nina Donovan’s spoken word missilery launched at ‘a man whose words are a distraction to America.’”

Train bien: a collection of Tokyo transit tickets from the 80s – My train tickets have never looked this good, and it’s not even close. For print, I can hear and understand the excuses, but for digital tickets? Why isn’t there more art around the plain QR codes?

The New Swiss Passport – Obviously, there is some Helvetica involved. (via Kottke)

Teen Warned Not To Accept Group Chat Invites From National Security Advisors She Doesn’t Know – I also laughed to tears reading this one.

More “Blend of links” posts