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Official Anthropic Copyright Settlement Book Lookup Tool Available ⚙︎

Now that the Anthropic settlement has received preliminary approval, authors can look up their books in an official tool. From the Anthropic Copyright Settlement site:

To see if your book is included in the settlement, select how you would like to search and enter your search terms.

You can search by ISBN/ASIN, Title, Author, or Publisher.

The search results differ from the search tool The Atlantic created. The site has an FAQ about that:

51. My work was on The Atlantic’s list of LibGen files. Why is it not on the Works List?

The Works List only includes works that meet the Class definition (as identified in FAQ 5). A work on The Atlantic’s list of LibGen files may not meet the Class definition for many reasons […]

Those reasons will disappoint many authors whose work was pirated, but which didn’t meet the criteria for compensation.

Clues by Sam ⚙︎

A new (to me) daily logic game where you “figure out who is criminal and who is innocent.” The clues are of the “There are more criminals than innocents to the right of Frank” and “There are exactly 2 innocents in row 3” variety. Each clue leads logically to the next, and there’s no guessing allowed: if the available clues don’t allow for a logical determination of a suspect’s innocence or criminality, you’re prevented from making that call. There is also, naturally, a Wordle-style “social media” component for sharing your results and time. Here are my results from today (I’d be much better at this if I wrote down the identified logic and built truth tables. Instead, I try to keep it all in my head, with the demonstrated slow results):

I solved the daily Clues by Sam (Oct 1st 2025) in less than 33 minutes
🟩🟩🟩🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩
🟩🟨🟩🟨
https://cluesbysam.com

I loved (and was pretty good at) these logic puzzles as a kid, and this one hurts my brain in exactly the right way. I find them much more enjoyable than Sudoku.

Ok, Fine, KPop Demon Hunters Is Great ⚙︎

And exactly what it says on the tin. This nine-minute trailer compilation will tell you quickly if this is your cup of ramen (“Beating you is what I do do do” is what hooked me). Gorgeous animation, vibrant characters, engaging story… oh yeah, and annoyingly infectious music. It comes by its three hundred million views honestly. Naturally a sequel and live action remake are in consideration. (Warning: spoilers abound in those links.)

Calendar Icon’s Lost Sentimentality

A few weeks ago, with the introduction of macOS 26 imminent, BasicAppleGuy published a collection of macOS icons from across its four-decade history:

With this release being one of the most dramatic visual overhauls of macOS’s design, I wanted to begin a collection chronicling the evolution of the system icons over the years.

I am a sentimental man, and this was a heck of a nostalgia trip for this “Apple Guy”: I’ve used every Mac operating system since the ’80s, and seeing some of these old icons brought back fond memories, especially the icons from the 1994–2001 era, which I consider my Macintosh “coming of age.” 

The modern icons have certainly lost some of their charm, leading to (legitimate) gripes about icons that look like placeholders, but there was one that really stuck in my craw:

Calendar.

My bellyaching about the Calendar icon was initially based on late macOS 26 betas. That’s the last icon (“2025–”) shown in Basic Apple Guy’s Calendar collage: a small, abbreviated day (“Thu”) in red and a large date (“17”) in black, both over a cream gradient background. At first glance it could easily be mistaken for the previous icons.

Array of five Calendar app icons from 2003 to 2025. All (except the last one) have a red banner with “Jul” in white above a white background with a large “17” in black. The last one removes the red banner and replaces with a red “Thu”.
Image credit: BasicAppleGuy.

But I had two issues with that new icon:

  1. It dropped “Jul”
  2. It replaced it with “Thu”

Even as the Calendar icon design morphed over the years, “Jul 17” remained. That date wasn’t chosen at random: it’s the date that Calendar—or more accurately, iCal, as it was then called—was first introduced: July 17, 2002.

It was a lovely little easter egg, an homage to its history, and a wonderful touch of humanity: a reminder that Apple is made up of people who care to include such details, as trifling as they may seem.

Apple’s product imagery is chock full of such easter eggs: iPhone and iPad time is always 9:41. Apple Watch time is always 10:09. And the Calendar icon was always July 17.

Now, this tiny touch of whimsy was gone from Calendar. Removing “Jul” from the icon throws away two decades of Apple history. It torches the goodwill of millions of long-time Mac users, and even new Mac users who might appreciate these little nods to nostalgia.

But wait, there’s more.

Why Thu in the revised icon? Was July 17, 2002 a Thursday and the new icon simply a more subtle reference to the release date? Let’s open Calendar, and jump back in time.

⇧⌘T 7 ⇥ 17 ⇥ 2002 ⏎

(For the non-Mac nerds, that’s Shift-Command-T to open Go to date; 7 tab, 17 tab, 2002; then press Return.)

Nope, July 17, 2002 was a Wednesday.

An Apple that paid attention to these details would have performed this basic check and used the right day to maintain a subtle connection to the icon’s past. Using “Thu” instead of “Wed” suggests the meaning behind the “Jul 17” date wasn’t fully understood.

I’ll be the first to acknowledge how trivial this complaint is, but much like reversing the colors of the Finder icon (since fixed) or the transparent-by-default menu bar, it’s another small sign that some at Apple don’t know—or care about—the history and traditions of Apple. Perhaps they aren’t even aware there is history and tradition to care about. It feels like we’re slowly seeing the death of sentimentality at a company that has historically embraced it. Is there anyone on the inside who still cares about these little subtleties and—crucially—is in a position of influence and authority to keep these flickers of fun alive? Phil? Joz?

With the release of macOS 26 came yet another Calendar icon. Gone is “Jul,” “Thu,” even the large “17.”

In its place is a red banner atop a cream background and an array of black dots representing days—and one red dot.

macOS 26 Calendar icon.

While I mourn the loss of “Jul 17,” and it’s not (by American standards) a July 2002 representation, I actually much prefer this newest icon over the “Thu” variant: it more directly harkens back to the earlier designs. (I’ll attribute the loss of text to efforts to be more international friendly.)

And that red dot? It marks the 17th day.

Now, I know I should be satisfied that some small sliver of sentimentality survives in the newest Calendar icon. But I can’t.

That red dot falls on a Thursday.

Why Every Mister Rogers’ Intro Theme Is Different ⚙︎

Yes, every intro of the nearly 900 episodes of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood was played live, but that’s not the reason—it’s because of improvisational jazz pianist Johnny Costa.

(I fell down @treehousedetective’s YouTube rabbit hole; his channel is filled with these surprising-yet-apparently-true nuggets. I highlighted this one because of its wholesomeness. Slightly less wholesome: why classic cartoon characters wear white gloves, why Mr. Snuffleupagus was finally revealed to adults, and why Doc and Marty were friends. I’ll never unknow these things.)

Jordan Mechner’s Favorite Version of ‘Prince of Persia’ ⚙︎

Jordan Mechner, answering a question he gets a lot:

Which is your favorite/definitive version of the original Prince of Persia game?

He runs through the various versions, starting with the one I played incessantly:

The Apple II version was the original. It’s the only version I programmed myself; Prince of Persia’s gameplay, graphics, animation and music were all created on the Apple II. I spent three years sweating over every byte (from 1986 to 1989), so it’s close to my heart in a way no other version can be. That said...

I was surprised to learn the 1990 PC version is Mechner’s preferred variant:

If someone asked me the best way to play old-school PoP online today, I’d likely recommend the DOS version.

He calls the Mac port “terrific” (I, surprisingly, never played it). Of the Super Nintendo version, which I played the heck out of, Mechner wrote in his journal:

Wow! It was like a brand new game. For the first time I felt what it’s really like to play Prince of Persia, when you’re not the author and don’t already know by rote what’s lurking around every corner.

He called playing it a “delighted thrill.”

Mechner also makes passing reference to “Sands of Time,” which I played a lot on my PlayStation 2.

Thirty-five years on, I’m still playing Mechner’s game. Sitting on my PlayStation 5 right now is Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown.

The Athletic: What We Learned From MLB’s Spring Robot-Umpire Test ⚙︎

Jayson Stark, writing for The Athletic back in March, examined the results of MLB’s Spring Training test of the Automated Ball Strike (ABS) Challenge System that’s coming next year (main link is paywalled, sorry; here are Apple News+ and Internet Archive links):

Stark spoke with players, managers, and team executives to get their take on the system. My main takeaway is that the system works… for some definition of “works”:

Every hitter, catcher and pitcher has an idea in his head of what a strike is and what a ball is. So for ABS to work — really work — the electronic strike zone has to feel essentially like the zone baseball players have in their heads.

You know what won’t work? If that zone feels just like some sort of technological creation.

So which was it this spring? Uh, let’s just say it’s a work in progress.

Tigers catcher Jake Rogers, on reviewing the ABS results after games:

“It’s crazy,” Rogers said, “because on ABS, you look at the iPad … and (the pitch is) half an inch below the zone. And then we get our report back with the old strike zone, and it’s a full ball in the zone. So it’s like, wow, it looks like a strike. It feels like a strike. And all of a sudden, you’re thinking: Do you challenge, or do you not challenge? So you go back and look at it, and it’s a ball (on ABS).”

Journeyman pitcher, Max Scherzer:

In his recent appearance on the Starkville podcast with me and Doug Glanville, Scherzer said one thing he’d like to see is “a buffer zone, maybe around the challenge system. So hey, if you challenge and it’s in the buffer, the call stands. So you keep human power, the human element, still with the umpire.

“I’m OK changing the call when it’s an egregious call,” the Blue Jays’ future Hall of Famer said. “But when we’re talking about a quarter of an inch that you can’t really detect it, I don’t necessarily know if that makes the game better.”

I agree with Scherzer. It’s great to have the system to correct clearly wrong calls. I’m less enthused about relying on it to make a call based on fractions of an inch—which no human could reliably distinguish in the best of circumstances anyway. If an umpire calls a pitch a ball, and was “wrong” by an eighth of an inch, that’s not a bad call. It’s a human call, and baseball is still a human game.

Stark asks, ”Are we sure this is what we want?”

Do we really want a World Series decided by a pitch that’s literally the width of a hair off the plate? I asked that question of an AL exec. He swatted it away like a piece of lint.

“Maybe just get the call right,” he said.

Stark closes:

What’s the true goal here? What are we trying to accomplish?

Technology is awesome. Robots are the future. And right calls are better than wrong calls. But is the sport truly better off if a World Series gets decided on a pitch 1-78th of an inch outside a robotized strike zone? The answers are so much harder than the questions.

MLB Approves ‘Computer’ Umpires for Challenged Ball/Strike Calls ⚙︎

MLB, earlier this week:

Major League Baseball (MLB) today announced that the Automated Ball Strike (ABS) Challenge System has been approved for Major League play by a vote of the Joint Competition Committee. Beginning in 2026, the “Challenge System” will be used in all Spring Training, Championship Season, and Postseason games.

It looks like we’ll have computerized umpires regularly calling balls and strikes before we see a full-time female umpire in the game.

From the “How It Works” section of the announcement:

If a pitcher, catcher, or batter disagrees with the umpire’s initial call of ball or strike, he can request a challenge by immediately tapping on his hat or helmet and vocalizing a challenge. The pitch location is compared to the batter’s strike zone, and if any part of the ball touches any part of the strike zone, the pitch will be considered a strike. The home plate umpire will announce the challenge to the fans in the ballpark and a graphic showing the outcome of the challenge will be displayed on the scoreboard and broadcast. The entire process takes approximately 15 seconds.

The system’s been used at the Triple-A level since 2022, and at the Major League level during this year’s Spring Training and All-Star Game.

Baseball has always been a game of inches. Part of the joy and pain of the game is knowing that an inch here or an inch there can dramatically alter the outcome of an at-bat, a game, or a season. While egregiously bad calls deserve to be challenged and overturned, I’d hate to see the game become a contest of constantly challenged calls of balls and strikes. My love of baseball has already been strained under rule changes I detest. I’m hoping this won’t be one more reason for me to stop caring.

‘As I Was Saying Before I Was Interrupted’: Jimmy Kimmel Echoes Jack Paar in His Return ⚙︎

Jimmy Kimmel, returning to his show on Tuesday after his suspension over a pointed joke, quotes Jack Paar upon his return to The Tonight Show 65 years earlier, after walking off in protest over a censored joke.

Different circumstances, of course, but I appreciate that Kimmel (or his people) knows and respects the history of late night talk shows enough to make the reference.

Kimmel’s monologue (6+ million viewers on TV, 18+ million on YouTube) struck exactly the right tone of defiance, conciliation, and emotion. He choked up during his “apology” for last week’s joke, and followed it up with this:

This show is not important. What is important is we get to live in a country that allows us to have a show like this.

I’ve had the opportunity to meet and spend time with comedians and talk show hosts from Russia, countries in the Middle East, who told me they would get thrown in prison for making fun of those in power, and worse […]. They know how lucky we are here. Our freedom to speak is what they admire most about this country. And that’s something I’m embarrassed to say I took for granted until they pulled my friend Stephen off the air, and tried to coerce the affiliates who run our show in the cities that you live in to take my show off the air. That’s not legal, that’s not American, that’s un-American, and it’s so dangerous.

He went hard after Brendan Carr and Donald Trump, and took a dig at Disney while he was at it, reading a “statement” that was one of the “conditions” of his return:

To reactivate your Disney+ and Hulu account, open the Disney app on your smart TV or TV-connected device.

I’ve very rarely paid attention to Kimmel. I have no particular issue with him, beyond not finding him especially entertaining, but I’m glad to see he’s not backing down from this fight.

(Be sure to stick around for a very De Niro appearance by Robert De Niro.)

Apple Store (and More) Locations from September’s ‘Awe Dropping’ Event

It started with my question to a group of retired Apple friends as we watched the Apple September event:

I missed which Apple Store Kaiann is at; anyone know?

One friend guessed Dubai, suggesting the establishing shots “looked like the Middle East,” but I was doubtful Apple would fly one of its VPs to the Middle East for a short video shoot.

Besides, those opening shots kind of looked like Miami Beach to me, if I could trust my years of watching Miami Vice and Burn Notice. So I went through that segment again and spotted two landmarks: The Carlyle and the Leslie Hotel. A search in Maps confirmed those were in Miami Beach (yay TV!), and a check on Apple’s Find a Store page narrowed it down quickly to Apple Aventura.

Apple Aventura, as seen in the video.
That scalloped roofline was unmistakable. Image courtesy of Apple.com.

Now I was curious: Could I identify all of the Apple stores shown in the video?

And just like that, a quest was born.

I expected it would be a chore—rewarding, but still. Finding Aventura involved scrubbing through that section of the video to identify landmarks, then combing through a list of possible stores until I found a matching photo.

As I was familiar with only a handful of Apple stores, and I wasn’t sure how many were shown during the event, it took a few days to properly motivate myself to do a full rewatch, dreading, as I was, the prospect of laboriously scrubbing through an hour-plus video, painstakingly identifying any tiny detail that would finally unlock the mystery of each location.

I needn’t have worried.

There were only a handful of stores Apple people spoke from. Some stores were gimmes. Others were either iconic enough or had easily discernible landmarks, making them (relatively) easy to find.

But the biggest reason this exercise was not the slog I anticipated was ChatGPT. In April, OpenAI released an update that added image analysis, giving ChatGPT the ability to deduce locations from images. I was impressed (and scared) by it then, and its performance here was remarkable, nailing 17 of 20 locations (85%) on the first try, and identifying the rest through extended prompting. (When it was wrong, though, it was hilariously wrong.)

Regardless of the ease or difficulty in finding the right store, once found, it was immediately identifiable: the architecture of each store was unique and unmistakable—and, of course, stunningly beautiful.

The process

The workflow for identifying locations was straightforward, if manual: I paused the video and took screenshots of each location, which I then fed into ChatGPT. For each location, I first tried using my own knowledge, plus landmark clues, to identify it.

A 6x3 grid of screenshots showing several locations.
Some of the screenshots used to identify each location.

There were four types of locations I identified (though I’d started this quest with only the first one in mind):

  1. Apple Store locations with presenters (five stores).
  2. Non-Apple Store locations with presenters (four spots).
  3. Apple Store locations in flyovers/beauty shots (seven stores).
  4. Apple Park locations (four locations).

I easily identified all of the Apple Park locations, having worked for several years in and around the campus. Likewise, I’ve spent countless hours at Apple Park Visitor Center in Cupertino and Union Square in San Francisco.

The Cube at Fifth Avenue is iconic, and the Chicago skyline and the Tribune building behind Michigan Avenue made that a quick find (I’ve also visited both).

(It turns out all of the Apple Store presentation locations were in major American cities: New York, San Francisco, Cupertino, Chicago, and Miami. Having seen those skylines or views hundreds of times helped narrow the field of search considerably.)

The flyovers and non-store locations were the toughest; I relied almost exclusively on ChatGPT here, validating each answer independently through online searches (including Apple’s Find a Store).

In some cases, ChatGPT identified stores confidently but incorrectly. Fortunately, it was easy enough to check and inform it when it was wrong. (It was fun watching it spin its wheels.)

The locations

I’ve timestamped each segment to the event video, and linked to the Apple Store where relevant. For non-Apple Store locations, I’ve linked to a reference site.

I’m about 99% confident in my results. If I got something wrong (or somehow missed a location), please let me know! I’m on Mastodon (preferred) and Bluesky, or you can email me.

On to the locations!

Flyovers

These are beauty shots, no Apple presenters. All are from the first few minutes and are on-screen for just a second or two; you can watch straight through from 1:17 until Tim Cook starts to speak.

Apple Stores

These are locations with an Apple presenter. I’ve included the person and their segment.

Apple Park

Spots in and around Apple Park, Cupertino with an Apple presenter. I’ve included the person and their segment.

Non-Apple Locations

Locations with an Apple presenter. I’ve included the person and their segment.

Final thoughts

To wrap this up, some thoughts on the Visitor Center, using ChatGPT, the one spot I can’t confidently pin down, and a brief note of thanks for a couple of the tools I used to put this together .

Staging Apple Park Visitor Center

This section caught my attention. Behind Stan Ng you can see product tables, a product wall, and a Genius-like bar with stools. None of that is normally there: that section of the store usually holds an Augmented Reality model of Apple Park and has a blank back wall. At first I thought it was a composite shot, but you can see the depth of the (physical) shelves at 23:04. The space was completely redressed just for this video.

This isn't how this section of the store normally looks.

ChatGPT

I’d rate ChatGPT’s performance highly, but when it failed, it failed hard. There are plenty of juicy nuggets in those failures, but in the interest of space, I’ll limit it to a few highlights:

  • It initially identified Apple Al Maryah Island in Abu Dhabi as Apple Dubai Mall, stating confidently: “The golden carbon-fiber roof, the dramatic water features cascading down both sides of the approach, and the positioning between the two massive hotel/office towers make it unmistakable. This store is famous for its kinetic ‘Solar Wings’ that open to provide shade and views of the Dubai Fountain. […] I’d put it at 95% confidence.” It assuredly noted that “The water-stepped plaza and the gold roof are signature features of Apple Dubai Mall.”
Apple Dubai Mall. It doesn’t have, as far as I can tell, “dramatic water features cascading down both sides.” Image courtesy of Apple.com.
Mumbai… Miami. Easily confused. Apple BKC image courtesy of Apple.com.
  • For Apple Downtown Brooklyn, it incorrectly guessed Tower Theatre (“wait no, wrong coast”), Williamsburg, Upper East Side, landing eventually on the right store, but the wrong address. When I pointed that out, it spiraled, again guessing Williamsburg, “Apple Upper West Side’s little sibling” (what?), a couple of seemingly nonexistent stores (“The triangular plan, diagonal steel supports, and the elevated plaza setting are unmistakable: this is Apple Store, Washington Heights” and Pittsburgh/Carnegie Mellon), before finally returning both the correct store and the correct address.
I guess all Brooklyn stores look alike. Apple Williamsburg image courtesy of Apple.com.

Black Diamond Mines Regional Preserve

This is the one spot I have very little confidence is right. I’m comfortable stating it’s in Northern California, in the East Bay hills… and that’s it. I’m relying 100% on ChatGPT’s assessment here, but it’s worth noting that it first suggested Mount Diablo State Park. Both seem plausible. If you know the spot, please get in touch!

Black Diamond Mines Regional Park… maybe?

Tools

Most of the process of putting this piece together was in the writing and verification, but I wanted to highlight two tools that made things easier: BBEdit and Retrobatch.

BBEdit was critical in creating the timestamped links, taking a list of times, locations, and URLs that looked like this:

1:17 - Pudong, China:  https://www.apple.com.cn/retail/pudong/

1:18 - Al Maryah Island, Abu Dhabi: https://www.apple.com/ae/retail/almaryahisland/
…

And converting it to Markdown (using grep) that looked like this:

- [1:17](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H3KnMyojEQU&t=1m17s) - [Pudong][pudong], China

- [1:18](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H3KnMyojEQU&t=1m18s) - [Al Maryah Island][AlMaryahIsland], Abu Dhabi
…

It also made it easy to sort the locations alphabetically and by timestamp so I could include the tl;dr below. I’ve been using BBEdit for most of its 30+ year history. It’s literally the first app I install on any new Mac.

The second tool that proved invaluable was Retrobatch. Each screenshot was taken from YouTube in full screen mode, which shows the video title at the top and playback controls at the bottom. As those elements never shift, Retrobatch could crop each image at specific coordinates to remove those areas (and to make grids, which I then further edited using Acorn, from the same developer).

Retrobatch workflow to crop screenshots.

BBEdit and Retrobatch (and Acorn) are created by small, indie developers, and are among the best apps on the platform.

TL;DR

If you’re just looking for a list of the stores featured in the video, here’s a handy, alphabetical list:

And here’s each location in the order they were in the video:

Jimmy Kimmel Returns to Most ABC Stations Not Controlled by Fascists ⚙︎

Brian Steinberg, Variety:

Disney and ABC will bring the comedian back to its schedule starting Tuesday night, after a decision to take his show, “Jimmy Kimmel Live,” off the air for an indefinite period of time. “Last Wednesday, we made the decision to suspend production on the show to avoid further inflaming a tense situation at an emotional moment for our country. It is a decision we made because we felt some of the comments were ill-timed and thus insensitive,” the company said in a statement. “We have spent the last days having thoughtful conversations with Jimmy, and after those conversations, we reached the decision to return the show on Tuesday.”

“We’ve lost more money than Scrooge McDuck has in his vault. Please boycott your local affiliates now.”

Kimmel won’t be back everywhere, though; both Sinclair Broadcast Group and Nexstar are preempting the show. Alex Weprin, The Hollywood Reporter:

“Beginning Tuesday night, Sinclair will be preempting Jimmy Kimmel Live! across our ABC affiliate stations and replacing it with news programming,” the company said in a statement Monday. “Discussions with ABC are ongoing as we evaluate the show’s potential return.”

“We’re negotiating how much ABC will pay us to broadcast the show.”

“In the meantime, we note that Jimmy Kimmel Live! will be available nationwide on multiple Disney-owned streaming products, while our stations will focus on continuing to produce local news and other programming relevant to their respective markets.”

“No matter how hard we try, we can’t stop the signal. Besides, local news is cheaper to produce; someone else writes it, and we just read it.”

Uber Offers Prepaid Discounts on Surge Pricing ⚙︎

Andrew J. Hawkins, The Verge:

Today, the company is launching prepaid passes, in which customers can pay a discounted price in advance on frequently taken trips. Passes will be offered in bundles of 5, 10, 15, or 20 rides, with the bigger bundle earning the bigger discount. Discounts range from 5–20 percent off the average cost of the ride, depending on the number of prepaid passes that are being purchased in advance.

So, Uber’s invented… transit passes?

Uber will market the passes to customers by comparing the single ride fare to a discounted fare when purchased in bulk. For example, a ride from Lower Manhattan to Midtown might cost around $19, but Uber will note that it can be as high as $30 with surge pricing. Customers who purchase passes in bulk won’t have to pay the inflated price, Uber says.

Quite the move from Uber, which controls surge prices, to offer “discounts” based on high surge prices.

Negroni Week, September 22–28 ⚙︎

It’s the most wonderful time of the year… for Negroni fans. From Imbibe magazine and Campari comes Negroni Week 2025:

For 1 week in September, bars and restaurants will mix classic negronis and negroni variations for a great cause.

That cause is (again) Slow Food:

Slow Food is a global movement of local communities and activists across more than 160 countries seeking to change the world through food and beverage. Slow Food envisions a world where everyone can enjoy food and beverage that is good for them, good for the people who produce it, and good for the planet.

No doubt there’s a participating venue near you—San Francisco offers 45 locations this year.

Last year I didn’t start until midweek, but I made sure it was on my calendar this year. This will be my tenth Negroni Week (at least!). As I noted last year:

[…] while I don’t need an excuse to tip a Negroni—it’s my favorite “daily drinker” cocktail—I welcome the opportunity.

I also remain an enthusiastic member of the Bitters and Bottles Negroni club. Over the years, they’ve crafted some unconventional concoctions, several of which I’ll revisit this week. To kick things off, I’ve selected their New Age Negroni.

An old fashioned glass filled with a New Age Negroni over a large sphere of ice stands in front of the three ingredients of the cocktail and a metal mixer.
A New Age Negroni. Suncliffe Gin, Cultivaro, and Carpano Bianco

One ounce each of:

  • Carpano Bianco Vermouth
  • Suncliff Gin
  • Suncliff Cultivaro

Combine with lots of ice, stir quickly, and strain into an old fashioned glass with a large sphere or block of ice. Garnish with a twist of orange or grapefruit if you have it.

Enjoy slowly.

Valuable Advice for Naming Your App, From a Former Apple Engineer ⚙︎

James Savage, in his developer blog, A Devlog, on the importance of choosing the right name for your Xcode projects:

For example, a name that can easily be changed doesn’t give me a lot of pause, and this fortunately covers most of the type, property, and method names in a project. It’s always great to choose good names upfront if possible, but sometimes things change, and that’s what refactoring is for. Similarly, names that exist within some sufficiently narrow scope (like a private repository) really only need to make sense to their author. It’s the names that can’t be changed that I worry about.

Xcode helpfully illustrates this duality by asking for both a product name and a bundle identifier as part of its new project form. While it’s tempting to think that the product name matters more here (that’s an app’s brand after all) it’s really the easier of the two to actually change. That’s because, unlike a marketing name, an app’s bundle identifier becomes permanent once submitted to the App Store.

Helpful guidance throughout for all Apple developers.

(In making his point about the immutable nature of bundle identifiers, Savage reminded me of something I’d completely forgotten: the official X/Twitter app was originally created by a third-party developer before being acquired by Twitter in 2010, which is why its bundle identifier remains com.atebits.Tweetie2, betraying its origins as an independent app.)

Fat Ham

I first heard about the Pulitzer Prize-winning Fat Ham back in March, from my friend and theatre critic Cathy Hammer, who recommended it based on my love of Shakespeare, my appreciation for modern retellings of familiar stories, and—I presume—a desire to highlight underrepresented creators making waves in the overwhelmingly white theatre establishment.

I missed it when it came to the San Francisco Playhouse, but learned recently there was an Audible Original Production—basically an audio play, featuring the original performers from the 2022–23 Off-Broadway and Broadway runs—available for free with my Audible Premium Plus membership.

Had I not otherwise heard about it, Audible’s blurb would not have inspired a listen:

The Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times Critic’s Pick that served Broadway “raucous comedy and nonstop pleasure” has made its way home to Audible. Juicy is a queer, Southern college kid already grappling with some serious questions of identity when the ghost of his father shows up in their backyard, demanding that Juicy avenge his murder. But here’s the rub! Revenge doesn’t come easy to Juicy, a sensitive and self-aware young Black man in search of his own happiness and liberation.

I mean, OK? That description doesn’t even begin to capture the inventiveness of the piece, which, at its core, is a reimagining of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, but goes well beyond its “murder most foul” origins. This is most definitely Not Shakespeare.

For one, it drips with distinct Southern Blackness (drawls, sass, and queerness in spades), centering its modern-day North Carolinian setting at a cookout in celebration of Juicy’s mother’s recent wedding to his uncle—not a week after his father’s murder, ordered by said uncle—with slow-cooked pork substituting for Hamlet’s “funeral bak’d meats” which “did coldly furnish forth the marriage tables.”

For another, it’s laugh-out-loud funny. There were several moments I guffawed, sometimes in recognition, others in shock. Naveen Kumar calls it in his 2023 Variety review “a total gas — the funniest and most invigorating new show on Broadway.” And while it’s often hilarious, it’s also steeped in pathos and melancholy, and at times vibrates with barely contained fury—the tragedy and violence of the source material remains ever-present.

Fat Ham, though, isn’t a beat-for-beat reskinning of Hamlet. It uses the play’s familiarity as a springboard to explore the possibility of an outcome other than (spoiler for a 400-year-old play) the death of almost every major character. Kumar, again:

“Fat Ham” recasts its source material to imagine what Shakespeare did not — how people might overcome circumstances, expectations and their own demons to forge new paths through life.

Jesse Green calls it a “gloss” in his The New York Times review (gift link)—

[…] and the best kind of challenge to it, asking the same questions but coming up with different answers.

This “gloss” allows for moments of cleverness. For example, several character names are artfully transformed: Juicy’s mother is Tedra, rather than Gertrude; his best friend is Tio (Horatio); Opal and Larry are the brother-and-sister duo Ophelia and Laertes. Juicy also recites Hamlet’s “what a piece of work is a man” after Larry unexpectedly comes on to him, and Hamlet’s play-within-a-play is replaced by an unsubtle game of charades (complete with a fourth-wall-breaking recitation of “the play’s the thing” wherein Juicy attempts to “catch the conscience of the king”—or rather, preacher).

I went into Fat Ham with few expectations and came out wanting to immediately experience it again (which, at a brisk 95 minutes, was not a burden). I found it joyous and jarring in equal measure, inducing some whiplash as it careened between thoughtful rumination and acidic remonstration. (A sudden outbreak of karaoke was especially incongruous, and yet it managed to work, as emotional outbursts on Broadway often do.)

Indeed, right up to the final moments, I was unsure whether or not there’d be bloody bodies bestrewing the barbecue. Lester Fabian Brathwaite in Entertainment Weekly described it as “probably the most delightful the story of the Danish prince has ever been.” I’m inclined to agree.

The Audible production is effectively a “cast album,” and like many cast albums, much nuance is undoubtedly lost from only hearing the performers’ voices, without the benefit of their body language and facial expressions—not to mention the absence of staging. Nevertheless, I found Fat Ham delightfully engrossing. Regardless of your familiarity with Shakespeare’s source material, I recommend Fat Ham highly.

(I think Shakespeare, too, would have thoroughly appreciated this retelling of his most famous story, considering the stiff upper lip productions we’re all familiar with do not properly represent the bawdy Bard. Not to mention, the American Southern accent may well be closer to what Shakespeare sounded like 400 years ago.)

Reviews

As I am not a theatre or (audio) book reviewer, I recommend reading an actual review of Fat Ham to get a better sense of the play:

💰
Fat Ham is available for free as part of Audible’s Premium Plus membership, or with a 30-day Audible membership trial if you’re not already a member. Audible is an Amazon company; if you click an Audible/Amazon link, your purchases cost you nothing extra, but make me fabulously wealthy, a few pennies at a time. Thanks!

Judge Tosses Trump’s $15 Billion NYT Lawsuit as ‘Improper,’ Citing ‘Abundant, Florid, and Enervating Detail’ ⚙︎

The main link is to the Reuters story about the summary dismissal of Donald Trump’s $15 billion lawsuit against The New York Times, but what I really wanted to highlight is the dismissal order itself. It’s just four pages and easily skimmed, and is a fantastic takedown of the bloated 85-page complaint Trump’s lawyers filed on his behalf.

Written by United States District Judge Steven D. Merryday, it opens:

As every member of the bar of every federal court knows (or is presumed to know), Rule 8(a), Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, requires that a complaint include “a short and plain statement of the claim showing that the pleader is entitled to relief.”

Civil rights lawyer Joshua Erlich commented on Bluesky:

The court sua sponte dismisses the case for violating Rule 8(a).

So that means the court, all on its own, looked at the complaint and said it’s too long, too scattershot, too arbitrary to even count as a complaint. Never seen this happen to a private party with counsel.

(Apparently, it’s hard to get a complaint struck sua sponte for a Rule 8 violation in federal court. Congratulations to Trump’s legal team on this momentous achievement.)

The order calls the complaint “decidedly improper and impermissible,” where readers “must labor through” the “many, often repetitive, and laudatory (toward President Trump) but superfluous allegations” that are filled with “abundant, florid, and enervating detail.”

It ends:

[…] a complaint remains an improper and impermissible place for the tedious and burdensome aggregation of prospective evidence, for the rehearsal of tendentious arguments, or for the protracted recitation and explanation of legal authority putatively supporting the pleader’s claim for relief. As every lawyer knows (or is presumed to know), a complaint is not a public forum for vituperation and invective — not a protected platform to rage against an adversary. A complaint is not a megaphone for public relations or a podium for a passionate oration at a political rally or the functional equivalent of the Hyde Park Speakers’ Corner.

Unsparing.

Trump was invited to refile his complaint (and will), but it’s clear that Judge Merryday was having none of Trump’s bullshit.

(The lawsuit itself, of course, is also utter bullshit. It’s a classic Trump maneuver: sue for an absurd amount of money, then settle for a smaller number to make the problem “go away.” It’s less direct than demanding a payoff, but equally obvious—a Trumpian lesson in “How to Structure a Bribe.”)

Anker Recalls 481,000 Power Banks ⚙︎

U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission:

This recall involves Anker Power Banks with model numbers A1647, A1652, A1257, A1681 and A1689.

And:

Consumers should immediately stop using the recalled power banks and visit Anker’s Recall Page at https://www.anker.com/rc2506 to verify the product serial number and register for the recall.

If you have recalled products, after registering them, dispose of them safely:

Note: Do not throw this recalled lithium-ion battery or device in the trash, the general recycling stream (e.g., street-level or curbside recycling bins), or used battery recycling boxes found at various retail and home improvement stores. Recalled lithium-ion batteries must be disposed of differently than other batteries, because they present a greater risk of fire.

Anker is offering a full refund or gift card for affected devices.

This is an expansion of 2024’s recall of 2,100 battery packs. Earlier this year, Anker also recalled over a million older PowerCore 10000 (A1263) power banks.

I’ve written of my Anker devotion previously, and I have at least six Anker battery packs. Fortunately, none of them are affected by these recalls (though I do have a smaller capacity variant of the recalled Zolo 20K (A1689); mine is the 10K (A1688) model—I’m using it with caution).

Despite the recalls, I still trust and prefer Anker products. I don’t expect this will dissuade me from buying them in the future.

I hope I’m not burned by that trust.

(If you’re curious about possible technology failures that may have led to these recalls, Alex Hao at LumaField uses the company’s CT scanner to answer “What Went Wrong Inside These Recalled Power Banks?”)

TV Tropes: The Easy Way or the Hard Way ⚙︎

FCC Chair Brendan Carr:

This is a very, very serious issue right now for Disney. We can do this the easy way or the hard way. These companies can find ways to take action on Kimmel or there is going to be additional work for the FCC ahead.

TV Tropes:

A Stock Phrase. The easy way is usually giving in, and the hard way usually involves some kind of violence or torment.

Carr is a cartoonish mob enforcer—and not even an original one.

‘Who Is the Next to Be Silenced?’ ⚙︎

Moira Donegan, The Guardian:

It is becoming dangerous – life-alteringly so – to tell the truth about the Trump regime, or even just to tell truths that the regime finds unflattering. Theirs is the dream of an insecure child: one of absolute power. They want to rule over us with malignant pettiness, to dispense favors and mercy to their allies and sycophants, and to dispense and encourage punishments to those who displease them. They want to control what we’re allowed to say, what we’re allowed to know. And they want to control what we are allowed to laugh at – certainly, never them.

In the era of absolute monarchy, European countries often had laws on the books banning the mockery of the king. So-called lèse-majesté laws made it treason to insult the “dignity” of the sovereign. The Trump administration seems to have taken this principle – that to mock is serious and punishable – and expanded it, extending the protective circle of the king’s authority outward until it encompasses all of his allies, too.

Jimmy Kimmel, Stephen Colbert, Karen Attiah, Terry Moran, Matt Dowd… all punished for daring to criticize Trump and his regime. Yet Fox News host Brian Kilmeade—who said of mentally ill homeless people, “Just kill ’em”—still has a job.[1] We are witnessing government sponsored censorship via mob-style intimidation.

  1. Kilmeade “apologized,” saying “I wrongly said they should get lethal injections,” which is an apology for the method, not the result. ↩︎

Austin Mann’s iPhone 17 Review ⚙︎

Austin Mann’s camera-focused iPhone review is the only one I eagerly anticipate each year. As always, both his location (Dolomite Mountains in northeastern Italy) and the photos (and video) he captures are simply stunning.

(Mann has a perspective on Cosmic Orange that caused me to briefly reconsider my color choice. He also mentions one iOS 26 feature I missed: using AirPods as a camera remote.)

Robert Redford Dies at 89 ⚙︎

Brooks Barnes, The New York Times (gift link):

Robert Redford, the big-screen charmer turned Oscar-winning director whose hit movies often helped America make sense of itself and who, offscreen, evangelized for environmental causes and fostered the Sundance-centered independent film movement, died early Tuesday morning at his home in Utah. He was 89.

Everyone has their own, but my two favorite Robert Redford movies are The Sting and The Natural. I love both unreservedly.

The Sting very well may be my first “heist”/“caper” movie, and thus the basis for my love of the entire genre.

The Natural competes with A League of Their Own and Field of Dreams for my favorite baseball movie, but nothing can compete with Redford’s iconic final swing. Gets me every time.

Beyond his unforgettable and illustrious acting career, I’m also grateful for Redford’s Sundance Film Festival, which brought to the world a new generation of filmmakers, several of whom—Quentin Tarantino, Jordan Peele, Rian Johnson, and Ryan Coogler, for example—have made some of my favorite movies.

RIP to “the best there ever was.”

Former Apple Intern Rebuilds 25-Year-Old Sample Code Using AI ⚙︎

Karl Groethe:

Twenty-five years ago I was an intern at Apple, reviving hundreds of sample code projects and writing new ones to help illustrate how to write programs and use various APIs for Mac OS X developers. […] My favorite creation I called PThreadSorts, a demo that visualized sorting algorithms by scrambling and sorting image pixels. This weekend, with Claude as my AI assistant, I brought it back from the dead.

Karl was on his (I think) third internship at Apple when I started there in 2001—technically he was my first intern, though I hadn’t hired him.

I vividly recall his efforts to modernize sample code then, and I love that he’s doing it again, this time with the help of AI to do the “heavy lifting.” This was a fun read—slightly technical, but very approachable.

(One interesting tidbit: The sample project originally included several Apple marketing images to exercise the sorting algorithms. Today’s Apple includes images created especially for sample code usage—it does not allow the use of any of its copyrighted or trademarked imagery, out of concern for losing legal protection. Apple was a very different company back then.)

Washington Post Fires Karen Attiah After Social Media Posts About Charlie Kirk’s Killing ⚙︎

Karen Attiah:

Last week, the Washington Post fired me.

The reason? Speaking out against political violence, racial double standards, and America’s apathy toward guns.

Attiah was with the Post for eleven years, where she was their Global Opinions editor and their “last remaining Black full-time opinion columnist.”

Her firing comes after several social media posts where she criticized the “ritualized responses” following Charlie Kirk’s killing:

“the hollow, cliched calls for “thoughts and prayers” and “this is not who we are” that normalize gun violence and absolve white perpetrators especially, while nothing is done to curb deaths.”

Her posts were restrained, and condemned “violence and murder without engaging in excessive, false mourning.”

And yet, the Post accused my measured Bluesky posts of being “unacceptable”, “gross misconduct” and of endangering the physical safety of colleagues — charges without evidence, which I reject completely as false. They rushed to fire me without even a conversation. This was not only a hasty overreach, but a violation of the very standards of journalistic fairness and rigor the Post claims to uphold.

“Democracy Dies in Darkness”—and the Post itself is dousing the light.

(You may recall that Columbia University cancelled Attiah’s course on Race, Media and International Affairs, leading her to launch Resistance Summer School to teach it anyway. The classes (which I attended) were terrific (and will be repeated and expanded—I’m again signed up, for 102). I’m hopeful she’ll now be able to expand further.)

Photos and Lightboxes

I’ve been meaning to add a “lightbox” to this site since it launched so images can be clicked or tapped on to view them at a larger size, but because I don’t post photos here very often, I haven’t had much of an incentive.

A few days ago, we were wandering through the Marina District, taking photos and enjoying one of San Francisco’s warm, early September afternoons. We strolled along Marina Green and Yacht Harbor, then past the Palace of Fine Arts.

After getting home, I was pleased enough with a handful of the shots that I wanted to share, but I felt they were best appreciated at larger sizes.

I finally had an excuse to solve my lightbox situation!

There were several options, but I landed on Fullscreen Lightbox (fslightbox.js), primarily because it was lightweight, had minimal configuration, and was self-contained: no jQuery or other dependencies needed.

Installing it on my self-hosted Ghost blog was easy enough. Here’s what I did:

  1. downloaded the script;
  2. copied it to my theme’s assets/js/ directory;
  3. edited my default.hbs to load the script (see below);
  4. made a few minor styling changes to the CSS.

Here’s the code I added to default.hbs:

<script>
  // Find all images on the page that match one of these selectors.
  const images = document.querySelectorAll('.kg-image-card img, .kg-gallery-card img');

// Iterate over each image and wrap it in an `<a>` tag
// with a unique `data-fslightbox` attribute.
  images.forEach((image, index) => {
    const a = document.createElement('a');
    a.setAttribute('data-fslightbox', 'img-' + index);
    a.href = image.src;
    image.parentNode.insertBefore(a, image);
    a.appendChild(image);
  });
</script>

<script defer src="{{asset 'js/fslightbox.js'}}"></script>

One note on this code. By default, fslightbox finds all images on the page and loads them into a single gallery. On a photography-focused site, that makes sense, but not so much here, where photos are specific to the articles they’re in.

Fortunately, it was an easy enough change. fslightbox groups together all elements with the same data-fslightbox attribute. If they all have a unique identifier, each is considered a single-image gallery. So, instead of this:

images.forEach((image) => {
…
a.setAttribute('data-fslightbox', '');
…
}

I have this:

images.forEach((image, index) => {
…
a.setAttribute('data-fslightbox', 'img-' + index);
…
}

Et voilà! Every image on the page now has a unique identifier (data-fslightbox="img-0", data-fslightbox="img-1", etc.) so each image opens individually.

Here are three photos from our San Francisco stroll; click or tap on each one to expand it for better viewing.

The late afternoon sun peeks out behind the columns of the Palace of Fine Arts, illuminating it from the rear and reflecting off the lake in front. A green tree to the right contrasts with the blue sky and orange glow.
The Fort Mason Center glows yellow beneath the bright blue San Francisco sky. Brown mooring stakes with white tips rise from the blue water of the marina beneath it.
The Golden Gate Bridge and the hills of Marin County in the distance, taken from Crissy Field. The bridge is silhouetted against a bright blue sky above and a streak of yellow and orange behind it. The darker blue of the water and the deep shadows of the sand in the foreground provide contrast.

Encyclopædia Britannica and Merriam-Webster Sue Perplexity ⚙︎

The AI infringement hits keep coming, reports Blake Brittain of Reuters:

Perplexity AI is the latest artificial intelligence company to be hit with a lawsuit by copyright holders alleging infringement after Encyclopedia Britannica and Merriam-Webster accused it of misusing their content in its “answer engine” for internet searches.

The reference companies alleged in New York federal court on Wednesday that Perplexity unlawfully copied their material and diminished their revenue by redirecting their web traffic to its AI-generated summaries.

Elissa Welle at The Verge:

In the lawsuit, the companies allege that Perplexity’s “answer engine” scrapes their websites, steals their internet traffic, and plagiarizes their copyrighted material. Britannica also alleges trademark infringement when Perplexity attaches the two companies’ names to hallucinated or incomplete content.

The 55-page filing (in which the company delightfully spells its name Encyclopædia) is filled with confusing, sometimes circular contentions. For example,

7. Perplexity’s so-called “answer engine” eliminates users’ clicks on Plaintiffs’ and other web publishers’ websites—and, in turn, starves web publishers of revenue […]

That ship has long sailed. People want answers, not just links. Is this much different than me reading an Encyclopedia Britannica article and then summarizing it in a post here? Am I stealing their content and revenue if my page ranks higher than Britannica’s?

That paragraph continues:

[…] To build its substitute product, Perplexity engages in massive copying of Plaintiffs’ and other web publishers’ protected content without authorization or remuneration.

Ah, there’s the rub! Wholesale copying of content is certainly not acceptable. If that’s the complete complaint, consider me convinced.

Welle’s Verge article also notes:

Perplexity plagiarized Merriam-Webster’s definition of the word plagiarize, the lawsuit alleges.

Plagiarizing “plagiarize” is funny. But after reading the actual allegation, I found it—to be kind—rather specious:

74. For example, when a user asked Perplexity, “How does Merriam Webster define plagiarize,” Perplexity spit back the exact definition of the term from Merriam Webster, which is identical to the definition in the print Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary.

What is it they expect to happen here? Should Perplexity not answer? Link to the Merriam-Webster site?

If you asked me this question, and I pulled out a copy of the Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary and read the definition to you, am I in violation of copyright? Should I be expected to open the dictionary to the definition and slide the book across the table for you to read yourself?

At best it’s a leading question. At worst, it’s contrived—and the allegation contains several such examples.

What if Perplexity returned a different answer? Well, they’d then be accused of providing inaccurate information while attaching Merriam-Webster’s name:

93. […] Perplexity sometimes generates hallucinations in its outputs and attributes that text to Plaintiffs using Plaintiffs’ trademarks. Perplexity’s use of these marks alongside hallucinations is likely to cause dilution by blurring and/or tarnishing Plaintiffs’ famous marks. In addition, Perplexity’s use of these marks alongside hallucinations constitutes false designations of origin and confuses and deceives Perplexity users into believing (falsely) that the hallucinations are associated with, sponsored by, or approved by Plaintiffs.

In addition to complaining about exact reproductions, and “hallucinations” with their name on it, Britannica also complains that Perplexity’s answers aren’t exactly what Britannica wrote, actually:

94. It omits content from Britannica’s articles that it purports are exact reproductions of such articles.

So Perplexity is wrong for reproducing content exactly, inexactly, and inaccurately. In other words, for reproducing the content at all. Got it.

What’s unclear is whether Britannica would allow any of this behavior if Perplexity were to pay a licensing fee, because it seems Perplexity was happy to do so:

86. In May 2025, Perplexity reached out to Plaintiffs to discuss a potential partnership. The parties had an initial phone call on May 9, 2025 during which Perplexity did not provide any material information regarding the requested partnership, financial or otherwise. After the call, Perplexity requested multiple times that the parties negotiate a non-disclosure agreement before engaging in further substantive discussions. Neither Plaintiff ultimately executed a non-disclosure agreement or participated in any partnerships with Perplexity.

I’m all for Perplexity compensating Encyclopedia Britannica to gain access to its valuable content. And stealing content should be properly punished. Yet this lawsuit is filled with such scattershot arguments, it comes across as more a negotiation ploy than a legitimate complaint.

Robin Williams and John Ritter Improvise ⚙︎

Robin Williams calls John Ritter up on stage during his first HBO special in 1978. Hilarity ensues.

Charlie Kirk and Political Violence

I’ve been debating how to acknowledge the killing of a prominent political figure, especially one who stood opposed to my rights as a human being. One who suggested Black pilots are unqualified, called the passage of the Civil Rights Act “a huge mistake,” and said that Black women like Michelle Obama and Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson “do not have the brain processing power” to be taken seriously.

Yet I’m told I must mourn the death of a son, husband, and father of two. I’m reminded at every turn that “there is no place for violence in America, political or otherwise.”

Kirk is being hailed as a hero and martyr. The New York Yankees held a moment of silence for him. Ezra Klein wrote a truly awful piece claiming Kirk was “practicing politics the right way.” And Donald Trump ordered the flag of the United States of America to be flown at half-staff for Kirk—a courtesy he tried to deny John McCain and railed against for Jimmy Carter—and will award Kirk the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Meanwhile, as I’m called on to denounce political violence, Trump also said “we just have to beat the hell” out of “radical left lunatics,” while the far right calls for retribution, so apparently political violence is acceptable, as long as it targets the left.

Erin Reed, in her Erin in the Morning newsletter, wrote this:

Quickly, political figures and pundits rushed to denounce the killing, as they should. But some went further, valorizing and lionizing a man who built his career on contempt of people he viewed as lesser. Political violence is corrosive and we must not excuse it—killing Charlie Kirk was horrific. But we also must not sanitize the memory of a man who wished harm on those he disagreed with, and who spread a message of hate to anyone willing to listen or pay him to do so. We can denounce the violent killing of Charlie Kirk without praising his abhorrent legacy.

And closes:

You can stand against political violence, as anyone with a conscience does. You can call for a politics rooted in kindness—something we desperately lack today, and something I know the absence of intimately as a transgender person who has lived under the weight of rhetoric like Kirk’s. You can and should condemn killing over speech. But to ask that people carry on Kirk’s “work” is a bridge too far. We must not valorize his life. We must not sanitize his hate. Not now. Not ever.

I wrote of Trump’s assassination attempt last July (“A Sad American Legacy Continues”):

This abhorrent act against a former president and current presidential candidate must serve as a reminder that political violence is never acceptable, no matter the target, and that violent rhetoric has real-world repercussions. Yet we must not mistake from where that rhetoric often comes.

I’ll reiterate that sentiment for Charlie Kirk—but I won’t mourn him.

First OS 26 Release Candidates Available, App Store Submissions Now Open ⚙︎

Release candidates for iOS 26, iPadOS 26, macOS 26, tvOS 26, visionOS 26, watchOS 26, and Xcode 26 now are available, and App Store submissions are now open. (Whew!)

They’ll be available to the public on September 15.

Apple’s ‘Can’t Decide Guide’ ⚙︎

I absolutely love this guy, and I really want to believe he’s an actual Apple Store employee—please don’t shatter my illusions, ThankYouVeryMuch. But, is there anyone unsure about which new iPhone they’re going to buy? (I know, I know. Not the point. “A Guided Tour of the New iPhone Family” gives away the game.)

(I would normally embed the video here, but for reasons unknown, Apple has blocked that option for this video. You’ll have to click through to YouTube.)

I also love the video’s production style. The physical interactions with (seemingly) digital titles is clever, and the kinetic text for the product specs are captivating. Makes me want to try reproducing it in Apple Keynote.

Also, for a brief moment I thought they got Andy Samberg to do a cameo. The character breakdown definitely called for Samberg–esque.

A Few Thoughts on Apple’s September Event—iPhones, Headphones, and Watches (Oh My)

Apple’s annual September product fest was Tuesday, and the main thing that surprised me was how short it was: a fast-moving 71 minutes. (Don’t have time for even that? Here’s Apple’s two-and-a-half minute recap.)

While technically speaking eight new products were introduced, it really comes down to this: updates to AirPods Pro, the Apple Watch family, and the iPhone 17 family, plus a new iPhone Air.

(Yes, Apple stuck with its increment-by-one iPhone naming, thank goodness, choosing to avoid a jarring jump to “iPhone 26.” We can continue to excitedly anticipate an “iPhone 20” in a few years.)

iPhone 17

The iPhone 17 exists so Apple can advertise a “from $799” starting price. It’s the iPhone you buy when your five-year-old phone dies and you don’t want to spend a lot of money on that muffler its replacement—which is not to say it’s not a worthy phone. It’s the smallest iPhone (by a smidge), comes in the widest range of colors (five), and offers most of the features of its more expensive siblings. This year, that includes a 6.3-inch “Super Retina XDR ProMotion” screen that was previously reserved for Pro-level devices, two remarkable 48MP Fusion rear cameras (covering .5x, 1x, and 2x optical ranges), an A19 chip, and a new 18MP “Center Stage” front camera (more in a bit). For many people, iPhone 17 will satisfy all of their iPhone desires for years to come.

iPhone Air

The newest new phone is iPhone Air (not, as we might have assumed, the iPhone 17 Air). At an awe-dropping 5.6mm, I’m terribly tempted by its thinness—it’s beautiful to look at, and I’m guessing it feels equally fantastic in the hands. Carved from titanium, it also has a “Super Retina XDR display with ProMotion,” this one stretching to 6.5 inches. The front has the new Center Stage camera and the rear camera—yes, singular—is a 48MP Fusion Main camera (1x and 2x optical zoom; no macro or ultra-wide). It’s powered by an A19 Pro chip, along with a new cellular modem, the C1X (“the most power-efficient modem in an iPhone”) which no doubt contributes to its great/fantastic/remarkable “all-day battery life.” (Oh, Apple.)

The word “AIR” in a tall, thin font, with the iPhone Air in edge view, acting as the “I”.
Image courtesy of Apple.

As tempting as this beauty is, I buy a new iPhone for the cameras, and the best cameras Apple offers are always in the iPhone Pro and Pro Max. I’ll have to lust after the Air from afar.

About that name, iPhone Air: I suspect, like the iPhone X, this is a “technology transition” phone. iPhone X introduced a bezel-less design and eliminated the Home button, features which eventually became standard in all new iPhones. The successor to iPhone Air will likely be the next flagship iPhone, incorporating everything Apple learned in making a thin phone—certainly the much-rumored folding phone for sure, but considering the similar form factors, perhaps also a radically thinner iPad or iPad mini is a possibility.

iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max

Let’s get this out of the way: I plan to buy the iPhone 17 Pro in the stunning new “Cosmic Orange.” It looks gorgeous, almost Hermès-esque.

A pair of iPhone 17 Pro devices in Cosmic Orange, back and front.
Image courtesy of Apple.

My wife, however, tells me I’m “not an orange phone person”—too loud for this grays-and-blacks esthete, apparently—but I think she’s angling to claim this color for herself. I may have to settle for Deep Blue to preserve marital harmony.

One design concern: these phones have a “Ceramic Shield” on the back to make them more scratch-resistant. It’s a different shade from the surrounding area, and looks like a cutout with a groove. I worry this groove will catch my fingers—and capture grunge. The iPhone Air, which also has a Ceramic Shield back, does not seem to have this issue: its back looks completely smooth. It’s a minor thing, sure, but the wonderful, smooth tactility of the iPhone is one reason I never add a case or other protection to it.

Close-up of the back of iPhone 17 Pro in Cosmic Orange
Image courtesy of Apple.

Beyond aesthetics, iPhone 17 Pro and Pro Max both sport a new A19 Pro chip (“the most powerful and efficient chip” in an iPhone), an improved cooling system (which I can only hope prevents it from overheating after 20 minutes in the sun), and a significantly improved camera system, with three 48MP Fusion rear cameras:

  • 24/48mm ƒ/1.78 Main camera
  • 13mm (and .5x macro) ƒ/2.2 Ultra Wide
  • 100/200mm ƒ/2.8 Telephoto

Optical zoom from .5x to 8x? Oh yeah, that’s the good stuff. And, now that all three lenses have the same resolution, video shooters can finally switch between them while recording without a loss in quality. Hurrah.

Shared iPhone features

As you’ve likely gathered, all of the new iPhones share very similar guts. The iPhone Air, for example, is basically an iPhone 17 Pro with a slightly bigger screen, one rear camera, and a daily gym routine. This shared DNA includes new Apple silicon, the Center Stage camera, faster charging, and better screen durability.

A19 (Pro) (Asterisk)

At the heart of all of the phones is the new 3-nanometer A19 (iPhone 17) and A19 Pro (everything else). However, while the Air and Pro phones both have an “A19 Pro” inside, they’re not the same “A19 Pro”—the one in the iPhone Air is a 5-core GPU, while the Pro phones have a 6-core GPU. Worth noting in case you desperately need that one extra GPU core.

N1 Wireless Networking

All the phones also have a new wireless networking chip Apple’s dubbed N1, which combines the latest standards (Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6, and Thread) for improved performance. (One promised but detail-free feature of the N1: improvements to Personal Hotspot. I hope this means fewer dropped connections and faster reconnections, the biggest frustrations I have with using it, and the main reason I continue to hope for a cellular MacBook.)

Center Stage camera

The 18MP Center Stage front selfie camera that’s present on all of the phones is now a square sensor instead of the traditional 4:3 rectangle we’ve gotten used to. Now you can capture both portrait and landscape photos without needing to rotate the phone. (I love square photos; perhaps we’ll see a resurgence.) It also captures “ultra-stabilized” 4K HDR video, and enables Dual Capture video: recording both the rear- and front-facing camera together. Content creators rejoice.

Charging, Ceramic Shield

All of the phones come with super-fast charging (50 percent in 20 minutes with a high-wattage power adapter) and the screen is more scratch-resistant than before, thanks to an improved “Ceramic Shield.” iPhone Air and Pro models also have a Ceramic Shield on the back.

AirPods Pro 3

The new headphones bring improved Active Noise Cancellation, heart rate sensing during workouts, and better battery life, but for me, the headline feature is Live Translation:

When enabled, Live Translation helps users understand another language and communicate with others by speaking naturally with AirPods.

With both speakers using AirPods Pro 3 and Live Translation, it’s like having an early prototype universal translator—assuming both people speak one of the five (soon nine) supported languages. Next challenge: make them smaller, replicate the speakers’ voices, and handle every language in the universe.

Maybe next year?

Apple Watch Ultra 3, SE, Series 11

Two years ago I switched to an Apple Watch Ultra, mainly because of the larger screen and lighter weight. When the Ultra 2 in black came out last year, I was tempted but held off because there weren’t enough improvements to justify upgrading. Apple Watch Ultra 3 increases the screen size (without increasing the case), improves battery life, adds 5G cellular, super-fast charging (15 minutes gets you up to 12 hours), a new S10 chip, and—most importantly, as someone with a monthly Popeyes Tuesday appointment—hypertension notifications:

Apple Watch Ultra 3 introduces groundbreaking hypertension notifications, which can alert users if signs of chronic high blood pressure — or hypertension — are detected. […]

Hypertension notifications on Apple Watch use data from the optical heart sensor to analyze how a user’s blood vessels respond to the beats of the heart.

Hypertension “impacts approximately 1.3 billion adults globally,” notes Apple, and the notification feature “is expected to notify over 1 million people with undiagnosed hypertension within the first year.” That’s a lot of lives potentially saved.

The feature is also available on Apple Watch Ultra 2 and Apple Watch Series 9 and later—including the new Apple Watch Series 11. It’s not available on the new Apple Watch SE 3.

Apple Watch Series 11 gets 24-hour battery life and a thinner design, while Apple Watch SE 3 gains an always-on display and fast charging.

For all watches supporting an always-on display, watchOS 26 also adds one other very important feature:

[…] over 20 watch faces are updated so users can see a ticking seconds hand without raising their wrist.

Finally.

Federal Judge Postpones Approval of Anthropic’s $1.5 Billion Book-Stealing Settlement ⚙︎

Annelise Levy, reporting for Bloomberg Law:

The federal judge overseeing Anthropic PBC’s proposed $1.5 billion copyright settlement is concerned class lawyers are striking a deal behind the scenes that will be forced “down the throat of authors.”

Judge William Alsup at the hearing said the motion to approve the deal was denied without prejudice, but in a minute order after the hearing said approval is postponed pending submission of further clarifying information.

Several sites (including Bloomberg Law) originally reported this as Judge Alsup flat out denying the proposed settlement rather than postponing approval. Still, things aren’t looking great:

During the first hearing since the deal was announced on Sept. 5, Alsup said he felt “misled” and needs to see more information about the claim process for class members. “I have an uneasy feeling about hangers on with all this money on the table,” he said.

It’s never good when the judge overseeing your case feels “misled.” He also said he was “disappointed” and called the settlement “nowhere close to complete.”

There may also be some very disappointed lawyers:

Alsup admonished class counsel for enlisting an “army” of attorneys to work on the settlement disbursement, including some from the Authors Guild and Association of American Publishers. “Add-on” attorneys won’t be paid from the settlement funds and attorneys fees will be based on how much is paid to class members, he said.

I also foresee this as being a sticking point for some authors:

Alsup instructed the parties to design a claim form that requires anyone with copyright ownership to opt-in to the settlement. If one owner opts out, the work won’t be covered by the settlement.

I doubt authors are willing to lose their rights to a settlement simply because one of their co-authors (or possibly their publisher?) opts out of (or perhaps never opts in to) the claim.

The ‘Department of Defense’ was never the ‘Department of War’ ⚙︎

Journalist Nicholas Slayton (New Republic, The Prospect, Motherboard) took NPR to task for writing that a name change to the Department of Defense “will return the department to a name that it carried for much of its history”:

This isn’t correct. The Department of War, for nearly 150 years, was just the Army. There was no unified military cabinet level post overseeing both the Army and Navy until DOD. That umbrella was created in 1947. The Dept of war became the departments of the Army and Air Force.

Clarifying for those who were confused:

Did it carry that name for much of its history as NPR and other outlets are saying? No.

Further:

Yes this is pedantic but the body known as DOD was not widely known as the department of war for much of its history as NPR says.

NPR now has this correction at the bottom of its article:

Correction

Sept. 6, 2025

An earlier version of this story incorrectly said that prior to 1949 the military was overseen by the Department of War. The Army was overseen by the Department of War, but the Department of the Navy oversaw the U.S. Navy and the Marines.

(The Guardian, whose similar language I quoted this weekend—“a callback to the department’s original name used from 1789 to 1947”—has not yet offered a correction, nor have most news outlets reporting the name change as a “return” to a previous name.)

I appreciate both Slayton’s pedantry and NPR’s correction.

Davey Johnson, Winningest Manager in New York Mets History, Dies at 82 ⚙︎

Heartbreaking news over the weekend for baseball fans—especially New York Mets fans. Bruce Weber at The New York Times (gift link):

Davey Johnson, one of baseball’s notable iconoclasts, who played in four World Series in six seasons as a second baseman for the Baltimore Orioles and who later managed the Mets to their remarkable Series victory in 1986, died on Friday in Sarasota, Fla. He was 82.

Joe Trezza, MLB:

The Mets turned into a perennial winner under Johnson’s leadership, with Johnson becoming the first National League manager to win at least 90 games in each of his first five seasons.

Davey Johnson was my manager just as I was starting to really pay attention to—and fall in love with—the game. He joined my beloved Mets in 1984, and in ’86 led them to a 108-win season, a heart-stopping NLCS, and what is unquestionably the most memorable World Series ever played.

Johnson was also a decade ahead of his time in his use of computers and statistics to manage. The Times, again:

He was among the first — if not the first — to recognize that computers could be utilized in marshaling baseball’s statistics to have an impact on team building, lineup construction and game strategy.

In an oft-reported story, Johnson took a computer class at Johns Hopkins University between the 1968 and 1969 seasons and, using his teammates’ batting statistics as his data, created a program entitled “Optimization of the Orioles Lineup.” The result suggested that if specific changes were made in the preferred lineup of the Orioles’ decidedly old-school manager, Earl Weaver, the offense would be stronger. This was precisely the kind of analysis that in the intervening years has made sabermetrics, as the study of baseball statistics has come to be known, a crucial element of administering a major league ball club.

His analytical approach gave him the most wins and highest win percentage of any Mets manager.

Alvin Garcia, Heavy.com:

Davey Johnson leaves behind more than numbers. He leaves behind the memory of a manager who embodied swagger, spoke his mind, and gave the Mets their ultimate championship. For fans in Queens, his death marks the end of an era, but also a reminder that his place in Mets lore will never be forgotten.

My friend, former colleague and fellow Mets fan Tom Clark:

He was the real deal. A real baseball guy.

If there’s an afterlife baseball team, Johnson’s my pick to manage it.

RIP.

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