With a patronizing scoff of pity I looked at a tyrannical app in another land. It was a “Super App” called WeChat or KakaoTalk or LINE or Grab or Gojek. Every human being in that land needed the app. You needed it for transportation, for buying things, for identification, everyone had to have it. Why didn’t the...

As per ushe my reviews can get pretty spoileriffic because they are meant for writers who like to think about books they have already read rather than for readers who are deciding what book to read. But if you’re wondering whether or not to read Momo, do it, it’s great. It feels weird that I never read Michael...

Restaurants, please don’t make halloumi, paneer, “grilloumi” or similar hard cheeses be your “vegetarian” option because they are almost twice as bad for the climate as even pork is (and pork is already super bad). I know I come across as a killjoy nag on this doomposting blog but I don’t fault any one consumer for...

A family member yesterday who is going on an aoroplane vacation said “I know you don’t like that” and I was like… it doesn’t matter what I think. It’s not my opinion that matters. I actually think flying and travel is fun and fascinating. The problem is that millions of people have died from climate change already...

Sometimes you still hear that society is polarized and we need to move towards the middle. Pretty messed up considering how everything’s moved towards the right these past forty years, further than I ever would’ve imagined. Increased corruption Increased wealth gaps Persecution of minorities Genocides plural...

Okay, with this variant you win when the opponent can’t make a move on the board and is out of reserve pieces, just like the original 1960s game, but you only have six moves to win! Take six pieces each of an unused player color (if your version doesn’t have extra color pieces you can use dice or beads) and place...

Okay so I went on this rabbithole of anti-smartphone stuff online (don’t worry, my goody-two-shoes writing-things-down-on-paper self said that I could) and one thing that came up a few times was the whole “phones and social media are actually super necessary and I t’s classist and clueless and frankly cruel to say...

Lots to love in this book. Plenty of bad things too. I might or I mightn’t read more books from this guy. Reading over his bibliography, he sure has a lot of interesting pitches that makes me really curious. The main story here, I liked. It’s an adventure story that does feel like an adventure story but also has a...

My war against Screen and against Online is over and this is the peace treaty: No screen without a matching TODO item. I can spend any amount of time online or on devices or watching TV and do anything on there as long as I do this: Away from the screen, with the screen off or out of view, I look at my “to do” list...

When we talk about solving climate change (ration energy, leave the fossils in the ground, any DACCS and BioCCS should be funded directly instead of as an excuse to burn more fossils, fix market capitalism’s bugs or replace it outright, tax the rich, get money out of politics) what they hear is akin to as if we...

I want my anti-smartphone books to be red-hot and flaming Molotov cocktails thrown uncompromisingly at the algo silo surveillance mental ice age. 🔥🍾 I want The Interior Castle. The Conspiracy Against the Human Race. Zen Flesh, Zen Bones (and The Treasury of the Dharma Eye). Days of War, Nights of Love. A Pattern...

I have three different devices with either Google Play or Apple Appstore. I have three different devices with an NFC reader. There is zero overlap between these two categories; i.e. I do not own one single device that has both appstore and NFC. (Beyond the six that have either, I have a couple of devices with...