I just read and enjoyed this:
Machine learning (ML) is the science of helping computers discover patterns and relationships in data instead of being manually programmed. It’s a powerful tool for creating personalized and dynamic experiences, and it’s already driving everything from Netflix recommendations to autonomous cars.
Read “Human-Centered Machine Learning”
I just read and enjoyed this:
Technology isn’t an industry, it’s a method of transforming the culture and economics of existing systems and institutions. That can be a little bit hard to understand if we only judge tech as a set of consumer products that we purchase.
I just read and enjoyed this:
The standard way to talk about autonomous cars, shown in this diagram, is to talk about levels. […] This seems pretty straightforward, until you start thinking about how you might actually deploy this – and about the fact that some places are easier to drive in than others.
I just read and enjoyed this:
Whether you’re a developer who’s working on mobile apps, or just someone enjoying the millions of apps available for your phone, today is a very special day. It’s the ten year anniversary of the original iPhone SDK.
This is the best, easily comprehensible explanation of how bitcoin and blockchain technology work that I’ve come across:
The soaring price of bitcoin—the virtual currency is now worth more than $250 billion—has gotten a lot of attention in recent weeks. But the real significance of bitcoin isn’t just its rising value. It’s the technological breakthrough that allowed the network to exist in the first place.
Read “Want to really understand how bitcoin works? Here’s a gentle primer”
On a less technical, but much funnier note, John Oliver had some solid investment advice on Last Week Tonight for those wondering if they should put their life-savings in cryptocurrencies:
I just read and enjoyed this:
Everywhere we looked, conversational UIs were breaking out of messaging apps and into the products we use every day, from shoe shopping to cosmetics and everything in between. Many of these were successful, but many others were not.
Read “The cult of conversational design and why forms aren’t dead yet”
I just read and enjoyed this:
At Booking.com, they do a lot of A/B testing. At Booking.com, they’ve got a lot of dark patterns. I think there might be a connection.
I just read and enjoyed this, it’s quite funny:
The iPhone X is packed with new and novel technology. Face ID. OLED. Dual cameras in a compact package. As fascinating as that all is though, it has an unusual property that been little discussed: this phone is really, really tall. iPhone X’s screen is the tallest ever in an iPhone.
I just read and enjoyed this:
Apple has made many great laptops, but the 15-inch Retina MacBook Pro (2012–2015) is the epitome of usefulness, elegance, practicality, and power for an overall package that still hasn’t been (and may never be) surpassed.
Read “The best laptop ever made”
There’s probably a line to be drawn between lauding the 2015 MacBook Pro 15″ and the frustrating state of USB-C (but maybe I’m just projecting). I tend to agree with Marco Arment’s assessment that things have gone downhill from the 2015 MacBook lineup (even though I personally use and prefer the MacBook Pro 13″) and I find the current MacBook lineup uniquely unsuitable to my needs. Apparently I’m not alone. I could really use a new laptop at work, but there isn’t a single new MacBook model available that I find acceptable on a practical day-to-day basis, mostly because of their lack of ports. Of course I could spend a lot of money on a two year old computer, but somehow I can’t quite convince myself to do that. So for now, I’ll stick with an excruciatingly slow 2010 MacBook Air and wait for USB-C to suck less, which probably shouldn’t take much longer than another three or five years…
I just read and enjoyed this:
What does international political corruption have to do with type design? Normally, nothing—but that’s little consolation for the former prime minister of Pakistan.
