Resilience > efficiency. Any day.

There is a special circle in hell reserved for the smart-asses who came up with the circular customer support systems where a bad error message leads to an call to action that leads back to a system that just tells you the same wrong error message. They 100% work for one of the big 4 consultancies.

Let me just say: People who can type fast and/or well with a bandaid on their finger are true heroes.

The longer I work in this space, the more I think that the whole framing of this recent generation of technologies as "smart" or "artificially intelligent" was an astounding success for the companies making them. So much of this should much more aptly be labeled "reactive" tech, if anything.

Every time someone presses SKIP AD on a Youtube video, the advertiser knows *for sure* they just annoyed the hell out of a potential customer. If I was in their shoes, I'd wonder why I pay for those ads in the first place.

Has anyone, like EVER, intentionally subscribed to a newsletter in that pop-up sign-up window that pops up on every website these days? To me it feels like I'm being punished as a user, having to click first on the cookie banner(s) and then close all the extra sign-ups sheets.

Duden vs KI: Fight!

So OpenAI builds an AI browser and adds... a clock widget? Is this the 90s?

Anyone got an idea for how to get "SwiftoDo for todo.txt", the iOS app, on a phone in Europe when the app isn't listed in Europe? I'd prefer not to get into any region-spoofing shenanigans because they tend to mess with other subscriptions, settings, etc...?

Look, I know it's wrong BUT I DO IT ALL THE TIME! I'm an em-dash-spacer, I admit to the crime. To me, it just looks so right! www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/the...

Can anyone explain why Google Maps data quality has gone down so much? Or is that a Germany/Berlin specific thing?

Coming to believe that a sizeable chunk of society is held together by people doing favors to their deceased friends’ families and spouses.

In all the book reviews I ever read, this gem, hidden towards the end of a review, might be my favorite: "I'm biased because I've been married to the author for the last 5 years, but..."

People who describe talking to ChatGPT 4 felt "like talking to a grad student" and ChatGPT 5 "like talking to a PhD" know very different grad students and PhDs than me. To me it constantly feels like talking to an inept intern who will lie to your face to cover for their mistakes.

UPS truly has perfected the loop for sending customers from website to hotline to website and on and on. A true Computer Says No approach.

has anyone invented a travel pillow that lets its user keep some dignity?

Thank you, Wikipedia, for having archive the sounds of landline phones (ready to dial, ringing, etc.). I was just wondering how to demonstrate to my kid what all this sounds like. In unrelated news, I feel somewhat old right now.

I enjoy writing, but enjoy fact checking and editing a lot less. Using ChatGPT nudges me to write less but spend more time on fact checking. (The other way round isn’t feasible as ChatGPT isn’t reliable as a fact checker.) So this double sucks!

As a kid, I remember border controls across Europe. It was such a big step forward when the Schengen Zone made those border controls obsolete and it breaks my heart that we’re back in an age where it’s more and more common even within Schengen to see border controls reintroduced.

I’m hereby announcing my candidacy for German chancellor. I’ll run on a single issue, which is to either fix or completely disassemble Deutsche Bahn. Out of my last 8 connections, 3 were completely cancelled (some without as much as a notification in advance), & at least 3 more took hours too long

The immense joy of organizing something — a trip, an event, anything! — with people who are used to organizing stuff. Where you can just trust them to think things through without doubt or second-guessing. The best!

There should be a dedicated term for the specific frustration when you buy gorgeous, juicy-looking cherries and they taste like nothing at all.

We can't prompt our way out of the apocalypse.

Just realized I had been logged out of Threads for probably a month or more and never even noticed. So that's that, I guess.

MiniDisc had a very short future but I have to admit: Of all the outdated physical media, Minidisc are my favorite. So satisfying and gorgeous.

Is there a word for the very specific frustration of having to click away the newsletter signup pop-up on a website you're trying to read?

Train driver apologizes for the onboard displays that show the train as more delayed than it is: “sorry about that, the AI system shows wrong estimates. Again.” This is fine.

Last week, we had a panel at re:publica about the state of Openness. The video is now live, enjoy! www.youtube.com/watch?v=J9Zv... #rp25

As so often, @simonhoeher.com nails it 👇

I for one appreciate Lime’s efforts to support every Berlin teenager with a free bike by leaving their bike unlocked at all times, but I would suggest changing the theft alarm sound to a friendly bit of music instead of the strangled bird sound that has become so ubiquitous.

Software developers tend to get great tools, partially because they build them for themselves and their peers. Other tools approximate this by user research. But the feedback loops can never be quite as tight. Is there any research on effects and implications of this?

One of the most problematic issues I see with a whole lot of genAI, especially as it's used in search and adjacent fields is how it shifts the point of value capture: It rewrites the rules for who gets to earn a margin and who gets to lose it. So who builds the AI tools tends to get the business.

Since we just discussed it at #rp25, here’s the link to our report about the state of Openness again:

This is such a useful framework. Everyone in strategy knows very well those discussions where the results were there first, the reasoning (or a big surprise) came after

I’ll be at #rp25 these next couple of days (and have a session on Wed). If you want to meet up, ping me!

Over the last few months Henriette Litta (of @okfde.bsky.social‬) and I took a closer look at the state of Openness. The concept is super important but it's in a *weird place*! Anyway, the English version of the report is live now, would love to hear your thoughts! thewavingcat.com/2025/05/new-...

So the German stock market apparently just hit a new record high. I mean, geopolitics are in shambles, there's war on the European borders and political extremism is gaining traction every day. Surely, these all mean that the markets are A-OK, yes? This is a good indicator and not totally broken?

It feels almost illicit to have all tracking switched off when sending out a newsletter, but I'm here for it

Sooooo.... some thoughts on how democracy is under serious threat because the internet is broken in very specific ways. Settle in for a bit of a #longread? And then, let's get to work. Also, please point out all the ways I'm wrong, but... maybe be nice about it? thewavingcat.com/2025/05/demo...

My understanding is that Barcelona's experience since introducing Superblocks has been mainly good, yes? Why can Berlin's government not learn from this and *just for once* do the right thing rather than just repeat their eternal mantra "cars! cars! cars!"

I knew that Washington, DC, doesn't get representation in the Senate. But I just learned today that residents of Washington could not participate in presidential elections until 1961?!

wrote some notes the other day and then a couple of emails and had a conversation and suddenly things coalesced into something more coherent and now I accidentally have a 4.000 word document sitting here oh boy

Nice to hear both governing parties in Germany (CDU, SPD) talk about digital transformation as a priority. HOWEVER. We've been asking for this for 25 (!) years. In that time, CDU led the government for 15, SPD for 10. We lost 25 years *on your watch*! Fix it, yes, but take some responsibility!

Berlin's Regierung mal wieder schön im Rückwärtsgang in die 1950er www.spiegel.de/auto/kiezblo...

will meta's new AI-powered feed be chronological, tho

What can I say, I love a good em dash

When was the last time you saw something genuinely exciting online? Today? Last week? Last year?

The costume designers for Andor are *fantastic*

So, what, Altman now plans to launch a social network through his gen AI company? It's hard to see how it might be good, but it certainly might be interesting. What I find harder to believe, though, is that it serves any other purpose than pissing off M*sk.

Read this sentence about social media: "...but raises geopolitical and attention-span concerns." And that's just it, isn't it? The state of things right now is, collectively, HUGE PROBLEMS BUT CAN'T FOCUS