Tom MacWright

tom@macwright.com

Recently

I’ve been watching Game Developer Conference talks as a slightly-more-productive alternative to trash content. They’re consistently more thoughtful and interesting than most ‘tech talks’ - for example, How to Write Games for the Internet without Embarrassing Yourself. Or Physics Animation in Uncharted 4.

I started keeping photos on this site, instead of Instagram, and wrote about it. I’ve also been carrying around the camera more often and trying out Capture One as a replacement for Pictures.app, which I’ve been using for a few years. Shooting raw seems more and more essential – pulling blown-out shadows and highlights back just seems to make every photo better, without entering HDR hell.

I’ve been playing chess. I’m terrible, and only getting worse. It reminds me that I have an occasionally unhealthy relationship with hobbies that can be quantified (e.g. running), and as a result, I’m going to take some advice and play without Elo rated games.

I’ve been listening to Mount Eerie’s Now Only recently. It’s a shattering, tragic album that’ll make you sad and I don’t recommend it if you’re already feeling a little sad.

Speaking of downers, Here’s Why So Many Americans Feel Cheated By Their Student Loans made the rounds in February and is a – I hate the term – required reading. The gist is that we should have zero patience for older people talking about how they paid their way through college.

I had something of a ‘hit’ notebook on Observable (where I work), called Cocktail similarity. It got on Hacker News (almost entirely snarky comments) and Metafilter (some very nice comments, some snarky ones). It also received a bunch of really cool and constructive additions from the Observable community – there’s an Observable community!.