La mia generazione, la Generazione X (1964-1984) quando fa attività lavorative di tipo creativo (incluso il giornalista freelance, ma ovviamente non solo) paga pegno perché è nel mezzo tra due mondi, schiacciata da una serie di trasformazioni epocali. Tanta roba davvero, forse troppa.
Money quote: "Pam Morris, 54, a freelance prop stylist, noticed another unsettling trend a few years ago, when a U.S. client asked her to art-direct a crew in Asia remotely for a shoot. “They’re just outsourcing,” she said. “It must be cheaper.”
Ms. Morris added that, in her group chats with colleagues, the main topic lately has been the effect of A.I. and computer generated imagery on ad campaigns. “If an art director can say, ‘Give me an image of X, Y, Z,’ what does that mean for our jobs, if they don’t need to have actual photo shoots anymore?” she said.
Similar shifts have taken place in music, television and film. Software like Pro Tools has reduced the need for audio engineers and dedicated recording studios; A.I., some fear, may soon take the place of actual musicians. Streaming platforms typically order fewer episodes per season than the networks did in the heyday of “Friends” and “ER.” Big studios have slashed budgets, making life for production crews more financially precarious.
Typically, workers in their 40s and 50s are entering their peak earning years. But for many Gen-X creatives, compensation has remained flat or decreased, factoring in the rising cost of living. The usual rate for freelance journalists is 50 cents to $1 per word — the same as it was 25 years ago.
The precariousness has affected even those who have risen to corporate posts in the media industry. For nearly 20 years, Liza Demby managed writers in the marketing department at Nickelodeon, the children’s cable network. She started there in 2005, the year YouTube went live."
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2025/03/28/style/gen-x-creative-work.html
archivio: https://archive.is/WeoPj
Money quote: "Pam Morris, 54, a freelance prop stylist, noticed another unsettling trend a few years ago, when a U.S. client asked her to art-direct a crew in Asia remotely for a shoot. “They’re just outsourcing,” she said. “It must be cheaper.”
Ms. Morris added that, in her group chats with colleagues, the main topic lately has been the effect of A.I. and computer generated imagery on ad campaigns. “If an art director can say, ‘Give me an image of X, Y, Z,’ what does that mean for our jobs, if they don’t need to have actual photo shoots anymore?” she said.
Similar shifts have taken place in music, television and film. Software like Pro Tools has reduced the need for audio engineers and dedicated recording studios; A.I., some fear, may soon take the place of actual musicians. Streaming platforms typically order fewer episodes per season than the networks did in the heyday of “Friends” and “ER.” Big studios have slashed budgets, making life for production crews more financially precarious.
Typically, workers in their 40s and 50s are entering their peak earning years. But for many Gen-X creatives, compensation has remained flat or decreased, factoring in the rising cost of living. The usual rate for freelance journalists is 50 cents to $1 per word — the same as it was 25 years ago.
The precariousness has affected even those who have risen to corporate posts in the media industry. For nearly 20 years, Liza Demby managed writers in the marketing department at Nickelodeon, the children’s cable network. She started there in 2005, the year YouTube went live."
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2025/03/28/style/gen-x-creative-work.html
archivio: https://archive.is/WeoPj
Nytimes
The Gen X Career Meltdown
Just when they should be at their peak, experienced workers in creative fields find that their skills are all but obsolete.
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Ok, mettete che stamattina vi siete svegliati con la voglia di studiare l'algebra lineare. Ecco, questa è la risorsa che fa per voi, gratuita e online
Money quote: "A concise, beginner-friendly introduction to the core ideas of linear algebra."
https://github.com/little-book-of/linear-algebra
Money quote: "A concise, beginner-friendly introduction to the core ideas of linear algebra."
https://github.com/little-book-of/linear-algebra
GitHub
GitHub - little-book-of/linear-algebra: A concise, beginner-friendly introduction to the core ideas of linear algebra.
A concise, beginner-friendly introduction to the core ideas of linear algebra. - little-book-of/linear-algebra
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Insomma, l'AI per parlare con i morti. Come no.
Money quote: "The potential risks of A.I. tools for grieving are significant, not least because the companies producing them are driven by profit — incentivized to exploit desires and delusions that may be unhealthy for their users. A recent study from the University of Cambridge, for instance, evaluated the ethics of “the digital afterlife industry” and posited that these businesses may soon realize there’s even more money to be made by requiring people to pay subnoscription fees or watch advertisements in order to continue interacting with their dead loved ones’ avatars, especially after hooking them on the ability to converse. They might also have the deadbot make sponsored suggestions — like ordering a dead loved one’s favorite food via a specific delivery service."
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/30/opinion/grief-tech-ai-optimized.html
archive: https://archive.is/1KyVo
Money quote: "The potential risks of A.I. tools for grieving are significant, not least because the companies producing them are driven by profit — incentivized to exploit desires and delusions that may be unhealthy for their users. A recent study from the University of Cambridge, for instance, evaluated the ethics of “the digital afterlife industry” and posited that these businesses may soon realize there’s even more money to be made by requiring people to pay subnoscription fees or watch advertisements in order to continue interacting with their dead loved ones’ avatars, especially after hooking them on the ability to converse. They might also have the deadbot make sponsored suggestions — like ordering a dead loved one’s favorite food via a specific delivery service."
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/30/opinion/grief-tech-ai-optimized.html
archive: https://archive.is/1KyVo
NY Times
Opinion | We’re in a New Age of Techno-Spiritualism
A.I. “deadbots” and avatars are ushering in a new era of techno-spiritualism.
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La Silicon Valley abbraccia Trump, l’illusione collettiva si fa norma e la cultura digitale ci racconta come ci abituiamo al crollo dei sistemi. L'anteprima di Mostly Weekly 344 è online.
https://antoniodini.com/weekly/344/
https://antoniodini.com/weekly/344/
Letture per la domenica
Questa è una analisi di un po' di tempo fa, ma la trovo molto utile sia per quello che dice (come misurare la bontà dei modelli di intelligenza artificiale) che per il metodo (distingue bene cose che facciamo confusione anche solo a capire che ci sono). Insomma, bravo Ben Evans.
Money quote: "Hence, the two fields where generative AI has clear, early and strong product-market fit are software development and marketing: mistakes are generally easy to see (or test for) and there aren’t necessarily wrong answers. If I ask for a few hundred words of copy about a new product or brand, there might not be a ‘wrong’ answer, and if it’s your product then you can spot the mistakes - this is still hugely useful. I always used to compare the last wave of machine learning to ‘infinite interns.’ If you have 100 interns, you can ask them to do a bunch of work, and you would need to check the results and some of the results would be bad, but that would still be much better than having to do all of the work yourself from scratch.
However, there is also a broad class of task that we would like to be able to automate, that’s boring and time consuming and can’t be done by traditional software, where the quality of the result is not a percentage, but a binary. For some tasks, the answer is not better or worse: it's right or not right."
https://www.ben-evans.com/benedictevans/2025/1/the-problem-with-better-models
Questa è una analisi di un po' di tempo fa, ma la trovo molto utile sia per quello che dice (come misurare la bontà dei modelli di intelligenza artificiale) che per il metodo (distingue bene cose che facciamo confusione anche solo a capire che ci sono). Insomma, bravo Ben Evans.
Money quote: "Hence, the two fields where generative AI has clear, early and strong product-market fit are software development and marketing: mistakes are generally easy to see (or test for) and there aren’t necessarily wrong answers. If I ask for a few hundred words of copy about a new product or brand, there might not be a ‘wrong’ answer, and if it’s your product then you can spot the mistakes - this is still hugely useful. I always used to compare the last wave of machine learning to ‘infinite interns.’ If you have 100 interns, you can ask them to do a bunch of work, and you would need to check the results and some of the results would be bad, but that would still be much better than having to do all of the work yourself from scratch.
However, there is also a broad class of task that we would like to be able to automate, that’s boring and time consuming and can’t be done by traditional software, where the quality of the result is not a percentage, but a binary. For some tasks, the answer is not better or worse: it's right or not right."
https://www.ben-evans.com/benedictevans/2025/1/the-problem-with-better-models
Benedict Evans
Are better models better? — Benedict Evans
Every week there’s a better AI model that gives better answers. But a lot of questions don’t have better answers, only ‘right’ answers, and these models can’t do that. So what does ‘better’ mean, how do we manage these things, and should we change what we…
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Filosofia o psicologia? La ricetta della felicità o il segreto contro l'infelicità?
Money quote: "A difficult truth about being human is that our brains aren’t ‘wired’ to make us feel content, or even to intuit what’s most likely to bring us contentment. However, as Laurie Santos, professor of psychology at Yale, explains in this short video for The Well, this doesn’t mean we’re doomed to spend our lives churning away on the hedonic treadmill. Drawing on relevant research, she highlights the wide gap between what many people believe will make them happy – improvements to their finances and social status – and what’s actually been shown to increase happiness over time – being ‘other-oriented’, practising gratitude, and moving one’s body. Further, Santos lays out a comprehensive, data-backed plan for readjusting one’s sails to better navigate these ‘evolutionary biases’."
https://psyche.co/videos/were-naturally-bad-at-predicting-what-will-make-us-happy-heres-how-to-adjust
Money quote: "A difficult truth about being human is that our brains aren’t ‘wired’ to make us feel content, or even to intuit what’s most likely to bring us contentment. However, as Laurie Santos, professor of psychology at Yale, explains in this short video for The Well, this doesn’t mean we’re doomed to spend our lives churning away on the hedonic treadmill. Drawing on relevant research, she highlights the wide gap between what many people believe will make them happy – improvements to their finances and social status – and what’s actually been shown to increase happiness over time – being ‘other-oriented’, practising gratitude, and moving one’s body. Further, Santos lays out a comprehensive, data-backed plan for readjusting one’s sails to better navigate these ‘evolutionary biases’."
https://psyche.co/videos/were-naturally-bad-at-predicting-what-will-make-us-happy-heres-how-to-adjust
psyche.co
We’re naturally bad at predicting what will make us happy. Here’s how to adjust | Psyche Videos
There‘s no ‘one weird‘ happiness trick. Instead, here are five practices that are proven to help attain this elusive goal
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Si avvicina la stagione dei vaccini (antinfluenzali, covid). Negli Usa, dove si vaccina molta più gente che da noi (perché sono molti di più) adesso girano articoli che spiegano come prepararsi a questi vaccini: cosa bere e mangiare prima e dopo.
Money quote: "One of the best ways to "feed" your immune system is to lean into more anti-inflammatory foods. Beyond acting as part of your immunity Rx, this will also help reduce inflammation in the body pre- and post- shot, Ehsani says. Over time, following an anti-inflammatory diet can help reduce your risk for other chronic diseases like heart disease and diabetes, too. Anti-inflammatory foods may also help decrease feelings of fatigue and possibly reduce your risk for headaches.3
Our anti-inflammatory comfort food meal plan is packed with fresh fruits and vegetables, healthy fats like fish and nuts, hearty whole grains and protein-packed beans, lentils and more. The comfort food factor will help calm any pre-shot stress, and the cozy recipes are ideal to savor as temperatures begin to dip."
https://www.eatingwell.com/what-to-eat-and-drink-before-and-after-the-flu-shot-11815468
Money quote: "One of the best ways to "feed" your immune system is to lean into more anti-inflammatory foods. Beyond acting as part of your immunity Rx, this will also help reduce inflammation in the body pre- and post- shot, Ehsani says. Over time, following an anti-inflammatory diet can help reduce your risk for other chronic diseases like heart disease and diabetes, too. Anti-inflammatory foods may also help decrease feelings of fatigue and possibly reduce your risk for headaches.3
Our anti-inflammatory comfort food meal plan is packed with fresh fruits and vegetables, healthy fats like fish and nuts, hearty whole grains and protein-packed beans, lentils and more. The comfort food factor will help calm any pre-shot stress, and the cozy recipes are ideal to savor as temperatures begin to dip."
https://www.eatingwell.com/what-to-eat-and-drink-before-and-after-the-flu-shot-11815468
EatingWell
What to Eat and Drink Before and After Getting the Flu Shot, According to Doctors, Nurses and Dietitians
Learn what to eat before a flu shot and what to eat after a flu shot—plus how much water to drink to reduce your risk for any possible flu shot side effects.
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Il colore dell'anima? Eheheh
Money quote: "An extraordinary experiment on mice and leaves from two different plant species has uncovered direct physical evidence of an eerie 'biophoton' phenomenon ceasing on death, suggesting all living things – including humans – could literally glow with health, until we don't.
The findings might seem a little fringe at first glance. It's hard not to associate scientific investigations into biological electromagnetic emissions with debunked and paranormal claims of auras and discharges surrounding living organisms."
https://www.sciencealert.com/we-emit-a-visible-light-that-vanishes-when-we-die-says-surprising-study
Money quote: "An extraordinary experiment on mice and leaves from two different plant species has uncovered direct physical evidence of an eerie 'biophoton' phenomenon ceasing on death, suggesting all living things – including humans – could literally glow with health, until we don't.
The findings might seem a little fringe at first glance. It's hard not to associate scientific investigations into biological electromagnetic emissions with debunked and paranormal claims of auras and discharges surrounding living organisms."
https://www.sciencealert.com/we-emit-a-visible-light-that-vanishes-when-we-die-says-surprising-study
ScienceAlert
We Emit a Visible Light That Vanishes When We Die, Says Surprising Study
Then again, so does your houseplant.
Se vi interessa, una guida per fare a meno del software statunitense, forse questa dovreste evitarla perché mi sembra di una approssimazione notevole. Azzera moltissime delle conquiste di altri tipi di software e servizi, e confonde un po' tutto, facendo un minestrone che ha poco senso. Comunque, eccola qua: tenete conto che chi l'ha scritta è la persona senza grandi conoscenze tecnologiche.
Money quote: "In questo articolo metterò insieme tutto quello che ho imparato negli ultimi mesi, così da darvi un’idea di quali siano le opzioni disponibili per cominciare il vostro allontanamento dalle aziende tecnologiche statunitensi.
Prima di cominciare, voglio mettere in chiaro una cosa: questa guida è pensata per le persone che non hanno grandi conoscenze tecnologiche. Non ho intenzione di proporre alternative impossibili per chi non sa programmare, anche se ogni tanto cercherò di citare anche opzioni del genere.
Inoltre, la mia non è una lista esaustiva, ma solo una rapida panoramica delle possibilità che ho sperimentato personalmente e che ritengono valide, anche se alcune hanno piccoli svantaggi. Alla fine dell’articolo trovate altri suggerimenti, nel caso voleste approfondire la questione."
https://www.internazionale.it/notizie/paris-marx/2025/08/08/tecnologie-app-programmi-non-americani
Money quote: "In questo articolo metterò insieme tutto quello che ho imparato negli ultimi mesi, così da darvi un’idea di quali siano le opzioni disponibili per cominciare il vostro allontanamento dalle aziende tecnologiche statunitensi.
Prima di cominciare, voglio mettere in chiaro una cosa: questa guida è pensata per le persone che non hanno grandi conoscenze tecnologiche. Non ho intenzione di proporre alternative impossibili per chi non sa programmare, anche se ogni tanto cercherò di citare anche opzioni del genere.
Inoltre, la mia non è una lista esaustiva, ma solo una rapida panoramica delle possibilità che ho sperimentato personalmente e che ritengono valide, anche se alcune hanno piccoli svantaggi. Alla fine dell’articolo trovate altri suggerimenti, nel caso voleste approfondire la questione."
https://www.internazionale.it/notizie/paris-marx/2025/08/08/tecnologie-app-programmi-non-americani
Internazionale
Una guida per fare a meno della tecnologia statunitense - Paris Marx
Dalle email ai social media, passando dalle piattaforme di streaming: essere puristi è impossibile, ma ci sono molte alternative. Leggi
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Ha vinto il premio Nobel per la letteratura l'ungherese László Krasznahorkai
https://elpais.com/cultura/2025-10-09/premio-nobel-de-literatura.html
https://elpais.com/cultura/2025-10-09/premio-nobel-de-literatura.html
El País
El húngaro László Krasznahorkai, Premio Nobel de Literatura 2025
La Academia Sueca premia al escritor “por su obra cautivadora y visionaria que, en medio del terror apocalíptico, reafirma el poder del arte”
Stanno andando di moda gli anni Novanta. A un certo punto temo andranno di moda anche gli anni Venti del Duemila. Sigh.
Money quote: "Nostalgia Cat is not alone. Video creators throughout social media are using tools like Midjourney and DaVinci Resolve to make increasingly impressive movies. And to thousands of people who aren’t looking closely, and don’t know better because they had yet to be born in the 1990s, these nostalgia posts might as well be the genuine article.
“There’s a real curiosity about a time before phones dominating social life,” said the trend forecaster Sean Monahan. “A.I., weirdly, is a backward-looking technology,” he added. “All these large language models are ultimately composites of information from the past.”"
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/09/style/ai-nostalgia-tiktok-90s-80s.html
archivio: https://archive.is/2QEEO
Money quote: "Nostalgia Cat is not alone. Video creators throughout social media are using tools like Midjourney and DaVinci Resolve to make increasingly impressive movies. And to thousands of people who aren’t looking closely, and don’t know better because they had yet to be born in the 1990s, these nostalgia posts might as well be the genuine article.
“There’s a real curiosity about a time before phones dominating social life,” said the trend forecaster Sean Monahan. “A.I., weirdly, is a backward-looking technology,” he added. “All these large language models are ultimately composites of information from the past.”"
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/09/style/ai-nostalgia-tiktok-90s-80s.html
archivio: https://archive.is/2QEEO
NY Times
Remember When Things Were Better in the ’90s? A.I. Does Too.
Dubious videos about the glory of bygone eras are creating nostalgia for those too young to fact check them.
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Tecnologia, memoria e responsabilità: tre fili che si intrecciano per raccontare un caso che continua a pesare sul presente. L’anteprima di Mostly Weekly 345 è online
https://antoniodini.com/weekly/345/
https://antoniodini.com/weekly/345/
Articoli pericolosi: le ragioni contrapposte secondo le quali è meglio fare la doccia la sera o la mattina.
Money quote: "The benefits of a nighttime shower also only apply if you regularly wash your bed linen. Bacteria can survive on duvets, sheets and pillows for weeks. Dust mites also can accumulate over time, as can fungi, especially on moist areas such as your pillows. While people with a fully functioning immune system can cope with this microbial assault, up to 76% of people with severe asthma are allergic to at least one fungal species. Exposure to A. fumigatus can cause chronic lung disease in people suffering from TB or smoking-related lung disease."
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20250919-is-it-better-to-shower-in-the-morning-or-at-night
Money quote: "The benefits of a nighttime shower also only apply if you regularly wash your bed linen. Bacteria can survive on duvets, sheets and pillows for weeks. Dust mites also can accumulate over time, as can fungi, especially on moist areas such as your pillows. While people with a fully functioning immune system can cope with this microbial assault, up to 76% of people with severe asthma are allergic to at least one fungal species. Exposure to A. fumigatus can cause chronic lung disease in people suffering from TB or smoking-related lung disease."
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20250919-is-it-better-to-shower-in-the-morning-or-at-night
Bbc
Is it better to shower in the morning or at night?
Some people prefer to shower in the morning, others in the evening. Who is doing it the right way?
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Philip José Farmer, il maestro del pastiche che ha rivoluzionato la fantascienza - finalmente ho potuto raccontare la storia di uno dei miei autori preferiti di sempre su Fumettologica
https://fumettologica.it/2025/10/philip-jose-farmer-fantascienza-libri/
https://fumettologica.it/2025/10/philip-jose-farmer-fantascienza-libri/
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Letture per la domenica
Avete presente il New Yorker? Bene, il suo stile è stato modellato per oltre un secolo da Henry W. Fowler e dal suo manuale di lingua.
Money quote: "Despite the manual’s exalted reputation, the magazine’s style sometimes diverged from its prenoscriptions. In spelling, Fowler favored “judgement”; The New Yorker has “judgment.” And, whereas The New Yorker’s most famous style choice is probably the diaeresis in a word like “coöperate,” Fowler was against it, preferring the clean “cooperate.” But the magazine fell in line on other matters, including doubling the “l” in “travelled” and “marvellous,” banning the word “transpire” to mean “happen,” and placing a comma after the penultimate item in a series. (Fowler wanted a comma after the final item as well, giving the example “Every man, woman, & child, was killed.” Neither The New Yorker nor, as far as I know, any other publication followed him there.)"
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2025/09/29/the-autocrat-of-english-usage
archivio: https://archive.is/gkkhp
Avete presente il New Yorker? Bene, il suo stile è stato modellato per oltre un secolo da Henry W. Fowler e dal suo manuale di lingua.
Money quote: "Despite the manual’s exalted reputation, the magazine’s style sometimes diverged from its prenoscriptions. In spelling, Fowler favored “judgement”; The New Yorker has “judgment.” And, whereas The New Yorker’s most famous style choice is probably the diaeresis in a word like “coöperate,” Fowler was against it, preferring the clean “cooperate.” But the magazine fell in line on other matters, including doubling the “l” in “travelled” and “marvellous,” banning the word “transpire” to mean “happen,” and placing a comma after the penultimate item in a series. (Fowler wanted a comma after the final item as well, giving the example “Every man, woman, & child, was killed.” Neither The New Yorker nor, as far as I know, any other publication followed him there.)"
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2025/09/29/the-autocrat-of-english-usage
archivio: https://archive.is/gkkhp
The New Yorker
The Autocrat of English Usage
Henry W. Fowler believed he knew how sentences should read—and his judgments have shaped The New Yorker’s style for a century.
La tesi di laurea di Italo Calvino? Su Joseph Conrad.
Money quote: "Nel suo lavoro giovanile Calvino, dopo essere partito dagli studi di Emilio Cecchi sullo scrittore anglo-polacco (in Scrittori inglesi e americani), giunge poi a valutazioni critiche del tutto personali. Cecchi, ad esempio, aveva sottovalutato Robert Louis Stevenson, giudicandolo leggero rispetto alla profondità del pensiero di Conrad. Calvino invece esalta la fluidità e la capacità evocativa di Stevenson e, dopo averlo accostato a Conrad per qualità letteraria, contrappone la nitida linearità del primo a certe disarmonie della macchina narrativa conradiana. Nella tesi, nonostante l’evidente e spesso esplicita ammirazione per lo scrittore, Calvino vuole comunque perseguire l’obiettività e il giusto distacco propri del lavoro di ricerca e critica letteraria."
https://www.doppiozero.com/calvino-legge-conrad
Money quote: "Nel suo lavoro giovanile Calvino, dopo essere partito dagli studi di Emilio Cecchi sullo scrittore anglo-polacco (in Scrittori inglesi e americani), giunge poi a valutazioni critiche del tutto personali. Cecchi, ad esempio, aveva sottovalutato Robert Louis Stevenson, giudicandolo leggero rispetto alla profondità del pensiero di Conrad. Calvino invece esalta la fluidità e la capacità evocativa di Stevenson e, dopo averlo accostato a Conrad per qualità letteraria, contrappone la nitida linearità del primo a certe disarmonie della macchina narrativa conradiana. Nella tesi, nonostante l’evidente e spesso esplicita ammirazione per lo scrittore, Calvino vuole comunque perseguire l’obiettività e il giusto distacco propri del lavoro di ricerca e critica letteraria."
https://www.doppiozero.com/calvino-legge-conrad
Doppiozero
Calvino legge Conrad
Italo Calvino apre e chiude la sua attività letteraria con Joseph Conrad. Risale infatti al 1947 il suo primo vero saggio di letteratura, la tesi di laurea sullo scrittore anglo-polacco, e nell’ultimo, Lezioni americane, uscito postumo nel 1988, compare nuovamente…
Il creatore del world wide web, Tim Berners Lee, nel tempo aveva provato a far evolvere la sua creatura, ma è stato superato da destra e da sinistra. Solo che l’uomo ha idee abbastanza chiare su come non dovrebbe essere la parte abitata della rete, e sta cercando di fare in modo che torni a essere aperta a tutti.
Money quote: "Part memoir, part manifesto, Berners-Lee's chirpy book *This Is For Everyone*is both an engaging history of the origins and evolution of the web and an ingenious road map for how we can reclaim control over our digital lives. His big idea, which has now become his latest personal obsession, is to restore data sovereignty to every individual by redesigning the web. To that end, he has launched a new protocol and founded a start-up to help return ownership of data to users"
https://www.ft.com/content/13e4fad3-9fa1-4534-b84e-aafed97ae073
archivio: https://archive.is/yOoAh
Money quote: "Part memoir, part manifesto, Berners-Lee's chirpy book *This Is For Everyone*is both an engaging history of the origins and evolution of the web and an ingenious road map for how we can reclaim control over our digital lives. His big idea, which has now become his latest personal obsession, is to restore data sovereignty to every individual by redesigning the web. To that end, he has launched a new protocol and founded a start-up to help return ownership of data to users"
https://www.ft.com/content/13e4fad3-9fa1-4534-b84e-aafed97ae073
archivio: https://archive.is/yOoAh
Ft
This is for Everyone — Tim Berners-Lee’s manifesto for a better online world
The World Wide Web inventor criticises the ‘rage bait’ of algorithms and social media — and advocates tighter user control of personal data
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Il web semantico e la ricerca semantica. Un tuffo nel passato?
Money quote: "Semantic search addresses the problem by using techniques that model relationships between words, concepts, and contexts. Instead of treating queries as bags of keywords, it analyzes intent and contextual clues. For instance, modern approaches use embeddings (vector representations of text) to map words or phrases into a mathematical space where similar meanings are positioned closer together. A model trained on large datasets might recognize that "canine" and "dog" are semantically related, even if they don't share letters. Transformer-based architectures like BERT go further by evaluating entire sentences, allowing the system to disambiguate phrases like "Java developer" (programming language) versus "Java coffee" (island/coffee bean). These models can also handle paraphrases--for example, returning results for "affordable wireless earbuds" when a user searches for "cheap Bluetooth headphones.""
https://milvus.io/ai-quick-reference/what-is-the-semantic-gap-problem-and-how-does-semantic-search-address-it
Money quote: "Semantic search addresses the problem by using techniques that model relationships between words, concepts, and contexts. Instead of treating queries as bags of keywords, it analyzes intent and contextual clues. For instance, modern approaches use embeddings (vector representations of text) to map words or phrases into a mathematical space where similar meanings are positioned closer together. A model trained on large datasets might recognize that "canine" and "dog" are semantically related, even if they don't share letters. Transformer-based architectures like BERT go further by evaluating entire sentences, allowing the system to disambiguate phrases like "Java developer" (programming language) versus "Java coffee" (island/coffee bean). These models can also handle paraphrases--for example, returning results for "affordable wireless earbuds" when a user searches for "cheap Bluetooth headphones.""
https://milvus.io/ai-quick-reference/what-is-the-semantic-gap-problem-and-how-does-semantic-search-address-it
milvus.io
What is the "semantic gap" problem and how does semantic search address it?
The semantic gap refers to the disconnect between how computers process data and how humans understand meaning. Computer
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Se siete utenti Mac e siete passati a macOS 26 Tahoe (come spero abbiate fatto, perché è ottimo) ci sono alcune cose insopportabili. Ad esempio, in Safari, con il nuovo default che cambia il colore della barra in alto a seconda dello sfondo del sito che si visita. Ecco, si può disabilitare.
Money quote: "Se non gradite la colorazione mostrata nella barra dei pannelli con alcuni siti, potete disattivare questa funzionalità. Ecco come fare:
- Aprite Safari
- Selezionate dal menu “Safari” la voce “Impostazioni”
- Selezionate la sezione “Pannelli” e da qui deselezionate la voce “Mostra colore nella barra dei pannelli”."
https://www.macitynet.it/disattivare-colori-barra-pannelli-safari/
Purtroppo, il Launchpad invece è andato. Ma forse c'è ancora un po' di speranza.
https://www.macitynet.it/ripristinare-launchpad-macos-26-tahoe/
Money quote: "Se non gradite la colorazione mostrata nella barra dei pannelli con alcuni siti, potete disattivare questa funzionalità. Ecco come fare:
- Aprite Safari
- Selezionate dal menu “Safari” la voce “Impostazioni”
- Selezionate la sezione “Pannelli” e da qui deselezionate la voce “Mostra colore nella barra dei pannelli”."
https://www.macitynet.it/disattivare-colori-barra-pannelli-safari/
Purtroppo, il Launchpad invece è andato. Ma forse c'è ancora un po' di speranza.
https://www.macitynet.it/ripristinare-launchpad-macos-26-tahoe/
macitynet.it
macOS Tahoe, come disattivare in Safari il colore di sfondo nella barra dei pannelli
macOS Tahoe, Tutorial Mac
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A quanto pare vietare l'uso degli smartphone negli Usa ha un sottoprodotto interessante: fa leggere più libri agli studenti. Io comincerei a riflettere sul significato del tempo libero e del tempo occupato delle persone e di come si costruisce il loro consumo, perché mi pare che il marketing dei social media ce l'ha chiarissimo, gli educatori e i legislatori molto meno.
Money quote: "The Jefferson County Public Schools in Kentucky this month announced a surprising unintended consequence of a new statewide cellphone ban. In many of the district’s schools, the number of books checked out in the first few weeks of class had skyrocketed compared with last year, before the ban was instituted.
In just the first 17 days of the school year at Pleasure Ridge Park High School in Louisville, where only 17 percent of students are proficient in reading according to state assessments, the district said that “students have checked out more than 1,200 books, nearly half the total number borrowed during the entire 2024-25 school year.” At other schools in the district, Kentucky’s largest, the results are even more impressive: 40 percent of students at one high school have checked books out of the library, “double the number who borrowed books all last year.”"
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/17/opinion/phone-bans-schools-kids.html
archivio https://archive.is/5lyFw
Money quote: "The Jefferson County Public Schools in Kentucky this month announced a surprising unintended consequence of a new statewide cellphone ban. In many of the district’s schools, the number of books checked out in the first few weeks of class had skyrocketed compared with last year, before the ban was instituted.
In just the first 17 days of the school year at Pleasure Ridge Park High School in Louisville, where only 17 percent of students are proficient in reading according to state assessments, the district said that “students have checked out more than 1,200 books, nearly half the total number borrowed during the entire 2024-25 school year.” At other schools in the district, Kentucky’s largest, the results are even more impressive: 40 percent of students at one high school have checked books out of the library, “double the number who borrowed books all last year.”"
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/17/opinion/phone-bans-schools-kids.html
archivio https://archive.is/5lyFw
NY Times
Opinion | The Unexpected Upside of Phone Bans in Schools
Turns out kids check out more books when they can’t doom scroll.
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Il giorno in cui il tasto Return è diventato Enter e altre cose carine da sapere sulle tastiere, scritte dall'irraggiungibile Marcin Wichary
Money quote: "The carriage return lever was similar to all the other mechanical functions of the typewriter, starting as simple as humanly (and inhumanly) possible. Tab added a few spaces or mechanically zipped the carriage to the next predetermined point. The Shift key moved the carriage up or the key basket down, applying its simple operation to every key equally. Shift Lock was a literal tooth holding Shift in place, placed right next to it for manufacturing convenience first, and ergonomics a distant second. It affected letters, digits, and punctuation in equal measure, in contrast to the later Caps Lock."
https://aresluna.org/the-day-return-became-enter/
Money quote: "The carriage return lever was similar to all the other mechanical functions of the typewriter, starting as simple as humanly (and inhumanly) possible. Tab added a few spaces or mechanically zipped the carriage to the next predetermined point. The Shift key moved the carriage up or the key basket down, applying its simple operation to every key equally. Shift Lock was a literal tooth holding Shift in place, placed right next to it for manufacturing convenience first, and ergonomics a distant second. It affected letters, digits, and punctuation in equal measure, in contrast to the later Caps Lock."
https://aresluna.org/the-day-return-became-enter/
aresluna.org
The day Return became Enter
A deep dive into the convoluted and fascinating story of one of the most important keys on the keyboard
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