It's a grey, not-raining Tuesday morning in Portland, Oregon, on 17 January, 2022.
\nSome short things today:
\nJan Lenhardt wrote a very humble (in my opinion too humble) write-up of his searchtodon search experiment for ActivityPub/Mastodon networks. Caught my attention because: this is a fantastic example of carefully thinking through some of the issues involved in implementing search in what's very clearly turning into a consent-based environment. Anil Dash has a somewhat-counter perspective, too, that really emphasizes opt-in environments.
\nThe Open Circuits book has been doing the rounds in various of my feeds, a photography/art book/coffee table book showing the insides of various electronics. My favorites are what I think is the guts of an HDMI cable and an out-take/unused photograph of an RJ45 ethernet cable, the former of which because it makes me think of all things of the cross-section of a lamprey eel. Just beautiful, either way.
\nA short piece on developing expertise by Ken Adams, a contract drafting expert, in the face of something like ChatGPT. Caught my attention because: because of this quote:
\n\n\nIs artificial intelligence a route to expertise? Well, AI tells you what’s out there, so you might stumble into second-hand expertise, but mostly AI is driven by some combination of efficiency and expediency.
\n
I particularly like the part about AI being mostly driven by combination of efficiency and expediency and not offering expertise.
\nOn the other hand, Simon Willison continues to inspire by creating semantic search by what I can only inexpertly describe as expertly mashing up Datasette and the GPT-3 API, training and implementing prompt/query-engineering against his 3,000 blog posts.
\nArt of the Title has published its top 10 title sequences of 2022. Caught my attention because: who doesn't love title sequences (I do), I also love motion graphics design and art direction, plus it reminded me to re-read the Art of the Title piece on the Halt and Catch Fire titles (you're welcome) as well as check out Oliver Latte's portfolio, who worked on the titles for Severance.
\nToday I'm out looking at houses, which also means I get to use iPhone LIDAR-enabled room-scanning floorplan-making apps in anger. How exciting!
\nThat's it today. Much closer to 15 minutes. How was your weekend?
\nBest,
\nDan
\n","body_text":"0.0 Context Setting\n\nIt's a grey, not-raining Tuesday morning in Portland, Oregon, on 17 January, 2022.\n\n1.0 Some Things That Caught My Attention\n\n1.1 A Few Little Things\n\nSome short things today:\n\nJan Lenhardt wrote a very humble (in my opinion too humble) write-up of his\nsearchtodon\nsearch experiment for ActivityPub/Mastodon networks.\nCaught my attention because:\nthis is a fantastic example of carefully thinking through some of the issues involved in implementing search in what's very clearly turning into a consent-based environment. Anil Dash has a\nsomewhat-counter perspective\n, too, that really emphasizes opt-in environments.\n\nThe\nOpen Circuits\nbook has been doing the rounds in various of my feeds, a photography/art book/coffee table book showing the insides of various electronics. My favorites are what I think is\nthe guts of an HDMI cable\nand an out-take/unused photograph of an\nRJ45 ethernet cable\n, the former of which because it makes me think of all things of the\ncross-section of a lamprey eel\n. Just beautiful, either way.\n\nA short piece on\ndeveloping expertise\nby Ken Adams, a contract drafting expert, in the face of something like ChatGPT.\nCaught my attention because:\nbecause of this quote:\n\nIs artificial intelligence a route to expertise? Well, AI tells you what’s out there, so you might stumble into second-hand expertise, but mostly AI is driven by some combination of efficiency and expediency.\n\nI particularly like the part about AI being\nmostly driven by combination of efficiency and expediency\nand not offering expertise.\n\nOn the other hand, Simon Willison continues to inspire by creating semantic search by what I can only inexpertly describe as\nexpertly mashing up Datasette and the GPT-3 API\n, training and implementing prompt/query-engineering against his 3,000 blog posts.\n\nArt of the Title has published its\ntop 10 title sequences of 2022\n.\nCaught my attention because:\nwho doesn't love title sequences (I do), I also love motion graphics design and art direction, plus it reminded me to re-read the Art of the Title piece on the\nHalt and Catch Fire titles\n(you're welcome) as well as check out\nOliver Latte's\nportfolio, who worked on the titles for Severance.\n\nToday I'm out looking at houses, which also means I get to use iPhone LIDAR-enabled room-scanning floorplan-making apps in anger. How exciting!\n\nThat's it today. Much closer to 15 minutes. How was your weekend?\n\nBest,\n\nDan","raw_format":"markdown","source":"app","summary":"This issue explores how AI and technology are reshaping expertise and creative work, questioning whether efficiency and expediency—the hallmarks of AI systems—can actually substitute for genuine expertise. The pieces range from thoughtful explorations of search in decentralized networks and how contract experts navigate ChatGPT, to celebrations of human creativity in motion graphics and photography, all anchored by a skepticism about whether tools that prioritize speed and convenience can deliver the depth that real knowledge requires. There's an underlying tension running through these dispatches: between the seductive promise of technological shortcuts and the messy, deliberate work of actually building skill.","reading_minutes":2,"links":[{"url":"https://searchtodon.social/Adventures-in-Mastoland.html","normalized_url":"https://searchtodon.social/Adventures-in-Mastoland.html","domain":"searchtodon.social","anchor_text":"searchtodon","is_archive":0,"archive_url":null,"archive_service":null,"category":"external"},{"url":"https://anildash.com/2023/01/16/a-fediverse-search/","normalized_url":"https://anildash.com/2023/01/16/a-fediverse-search","domain":"anildash.com","anchor_text":"somewhat-counter perspective","is_archive":0,"archive_url":null,"archive_service":null,"category":"external"},{"url":"https://www.opencircuitsbook.com","normalized_url":"https://opencircuitsbook.com/","domain":"opencircuitsbook.com","anchor_text":"Open Circuits","is_archive":0,"archive_url":null,"archive_service":null,"category":"external"},{"url":"https://www.opencircuitsbook.com/#book-20","normalized_url":"https://opencircuitsbook.com/","domain":"opencircuitsbook.com","anchor_text":"the guts of an HDMI cable","is_archive":0,"archive_url":null,"archive_service":null,"category":"external"},{"url":"https://www.opencircuitsbook.com/#outtake-24","normalized_url":"https://opencircuitsbook.com/","domain":"opencircuitsbook.com","anchor_text":"RJ45 ethernet cable","is_archive":0,"archive_url":null,"archive_service":null,"category":"external"},{"url":"https://www.google.com/search?q=lamprey+eel+cross+section","normalized_url":"https://google.com/search?q=lamprey+eel+cross+section","domain":"google.com","anchor_text":"cross-section of a lamprey eel","is_archive":0,"archive_url":null,"archive_service":null,"category":"external"},{"url":"https://www.adamsdrafting.com/grinding-out-the-expertise/","normalized_url":"https://adamsdrafting.com/grinding-out-the-expertise","domain":"adamsdrafting.com","anchor_text":"developing expertise","is_archive":0,"archive_url":null,"archive_service":null,"category":"external"},{"url":"https://simonwillison.net/2023/Jan/13/semantic-search-answers/","normalized_url":"https://simonwillison.net/2023/Jan/13/semantic-search-answers","domain":"simonwillison.net","anchor_text":"expertly mashing up Datasette and the GPT-3 API","is_archive":0,"archive_url":null,"archive_service":null,"category":"external"},{"url":"https://www.artofthetitle.com/feature/top-10-title-sequences-of-2022/","normalized_url":"https://artofthetitle.com/feature/top-10-title-sequences-of-2022","domain":"artofthetitle.com","anchor_text":"top 10 title sequences of 2022","is_archive":0,"archive_url":null,"archive_service":null,"category":"external"},{"url":"https://www.artofthetitle.com/title/halt-and-catch-fire/","normalized_url":"https://artofthetitle.com/title/halt-and-catch-fire","domain":"artofthetitle.com","anchor_text":"Halt and Catch Fire titles","is_archive":0,"archive_url":null,"archive_service":null,"category":"external"},{"url":"https://www.extraweg.com","normalized_url":"https://extraweg.com/","domain":"extraweg.com","anchor_text":"Oliver Latte's","is_archive":0,"archive_url":null,"archive_service":null,"category":"external"}],"sections":[{"id":2636,"ord":0,"number":"0.0","heading":"Context Setting","level":1,"word_count":15},{"id":2637,"ord":1,"number":"1.0","heading":"Some Things That Caught My Attention","level":1,"word_count":6},{"id":2638,"ord":2,"number":"1.1","heading":"A Few Little Things","level":1,"word_count":369}]}