Seems unlikely that we’ll end up with a single unified social web platform. I like Mastodon’s focus on communities. I like Bluesky’s thinking on distributed moderation. I like the IndieWeb’s principles of ownership. I like Nostr’s private messaging. How will we tie all of this together? Blogs.

Western Digital has now tacitly admitted that its SanDisk Extreme Pro portable solid-state drives were critically broken after all — by issuing a firmware update that’ll hopefully keep the 4TB model from wiping your data all by itself. (Seriously.)

But as Ars Technica reports, there’s no mention of any fix for the 2TB model, and I think it’s time to sound the alarm — because this company has been downplaying the issue for months, all while it continues to sell these drives at a steep discount.

Over two months ago, my friend and Verge supervising producer Vjeran Pavic told...

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Dan Wood:

Core Image is a wonderful image-processsing toolkit in macOS and iOS, but it’s a bit clunky to use. Even after Apple added Swift APIs to many of the filters (CoreImage.CIFilterBuiltins), it’s still pretty tedious to chain filters to images.

The purpose of this package is to provide an easier way to chain multiple filters to CIImage instances and then render them into SwiftUI (or any other context — SwiftUI is not needed).

[…]

Similarly to how SwiftUI view modifiers each return a modified View instance, these modifiers on CIImage take care of the core image chaining by creating a corresponding CIFilter, hooking up the inputImage for you, and returning the resulting outputImage.

[…]

The contents of CIImage-Filters.swift are generated source code, using code that I’ve included in this repository (CIImage-Generation.swift, not included in the package import). This loops through the core image metadata that Apple provides (CIFilter.filterNames(inCategories: nil)). Unfortunately this list is somewhat out of date and contains a number of inconsistencies that I’ve done my best to overcome.

atopfourthwall:

chosenwads:

One time I heard a dude online compare new and obscure LGBT terminology to newspeak. This I think is one of the biggest examples I have seen of people with their whole chest ignoring the basic themes of 1984.

In 1984 the whole point of newspeak was that it shrinks. Ideas that could once be communicated now cannot. Everything is simplified as much as possible. You cannot explain complicated ideas of freedom or equality because the words no longer exist, or they don’t mean what they once did.

More specifically, there is canonically no word for “gay” in 1984. There are only two words for the entire spectrum of sexuality. “goodsex” and “sexcrime”. If you’re gay it’s the exact same as being a pedophile. And those are is the exact same as cheating on your wife, which is the exact same daring to fuck your wife just because you feel like it. Which is no different than literally any sex act that might offend big brother.

Do you see what’s happening? In 1984 can no longer ask your wife to peg you or something because the word for pegging is the exact same word for pedophile. And you can’t come out as gay because all you can say is that you did a criminal sex act, which means you cannot make a case for your rights either.

Inventing made up words to describe obscure things that previously lacked words would literally be a perfect remedy to newspeak. This language would counter every barrier to communicating the necessary concepts. Because it’s what literally every normal non-dystopian language does.

Keep this in mind especially in regards to what’s happening in Florida right now.

They associate LGBT+ content with grooming, define it as pedophilia or child abuse or sexual crimes or etc. Then they pass laws calling for sex offenders to be executed.

Bigots or morons claim “Oh, why are you against these anti-child abuse laws?!” Because the state is trying to redefine LGBT+ activity and individuals as being the same as child abuse. For all the bluster and anger over “Grrr, words don’t mean anything anymore! These terms I grew up with don’t matter anymore!” the truth is THEY are the ones trying to limits what words mean because they want to associate certain groups of people with evil people to make more innocent/ignorant individuals be okay with hurting those groups of people.

They say the DX7 is used on more hit songs than any other Synth. There’s a catch – almost all those records were in the 1980s.

Inspired by DX7 folklore, I sampled a legendary-sounding DX7II from a famous studio. Then I released an app called FM Player, packed with those samples. That was nearly six years ago, and the experience has been jaw-dropping.

The response from musicians? Stupidly incredible.

It blew me away when Herbie Hancock played it in the Studio. It left me speechless when Grammy-winning producers started using it in their sessions—producers for Drake, Jay-Z, Kendrick Lamar, and more are rocking the app. Songwriters for Alicia Keys and studio musicians for John Legend are all over it too.

More importantly, we’ve received literally thousands of emails from grateful musicians. One message read “This app filled my eyes with tears when I first played through the sounds. It brought back memories of my youth, I was transported to a time when anything and everything was possible.”

Now, for the first time ever, you can have these sounds on iPhone and Silicon Macs. (FM Player was only available on the iPad). Plus, King of FM is more stable as an iOS/iPadOS AUv3. Want to rock multiple instances of this app in GarageBand, AUM, Cubasis, BeatMaker or your favorite iOS DAW? Go for it!

We’re not just talking about the sound of the past here. This app is the sound of today.

BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE…

THE KING OF FM SYNTHESIZERS:
THE MIGHTY SY77!

The Yamaha SY77 is a legendary synthesizer from the golden age of synths, first unleashed upon the world in 1989. This little-known synthesizer kicked some serious ass in the world of FM synthesis, earning its title as the
“King of FM.”

Legendary musicians like Brian Eno, Vangelis, Tangerine Dream, Jean-Michel Jarre, and Vince Clarke couldn’t resist the allure of the SY series. They hopped on these synths and cranked out some of the most groundbreaking tunes of their time. Lost to history, it’s no exaggeration to say that the SY77 played a vital role in hundreds of artists’ musical success.

Listen, the Yamaha SY series had a hell of a run…

So, when I kicked off the King of FM project in 2020, I initially got my hands on an SY99. But it just didn’t have that raw, unfiltered magic I was looking for—it was too damn clean. I couldn’t bring myself to create an app if the tone wasn’t right, so I shelved the project for a bit.

Then, I stumbled upon an SY77, and let me tell you, it had the sound I’d been searching for. I spent the next two years sampling the hell out of it, racking up probably 10+ gigabytes of SY77 samples on my hard drive (You might say I have a sampling problem).

But I didn’t stop there. I painstakingly sifted through the samples and cherry-picked the top 100+ or so multi-sample sets—those with the most captivating character. In the end, this app boasts 2 gigs of SY77 samples, compressed into a sleek package weighing in at under 400 MB.

Trust me, it’s the real deal.

And now, you can have these DX7 & SY77 sounds in the palm of your hand. Free forever.

– AnalogMatthew

TELL ME MORE!

Visit the official KING OF FM page

Get KING OF FM now for iPhone iPad, & Silicon Mac:

COMPLETELY FREE, FOREVER!

Learn more and watch videos on the official KING OF FM page.