A Small and Simple Update – Ethical Tech, Etc.
A quick update with interesting links, a quick recap, and some personal news.
Well, it’s been a minute. Or 953 days. Whoa.
I hope you’re doing well. There’s a lot going on, and mostly I wish you peace, love, and some space to breathe and rest.
In this humble newsletter, I share insights on simplifying life, using small and ethical technology, and occasional bits of randomness I find interesting or useful.
Substack, the platform I’m using here, began as a simple newsletter tool but has expanded its features, though thankfully not to Mailchimp's overwhelming degree. Having just logged in for the first time in ~30 months, I'll need time to review the new options. However, I appreciate Substack enabling subscriber conversations and hope you'll use this channel to connect.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) has been a prominent topic in technology recently. As an early adopter of new tech, I'm currently testing tools like ChatGPT and Claude. I used them for some light editing of this newsletter and will share more substantial reviews later that could help determine if they'd be useful for you. Claude comes from an ethical AI company called Anthropic.
“We do not know how to train systems to robustly behave well.”
Read more about Anthropic’s core views on AI safety.
ChatGPT 4 can now generate alt text for images, improving accessibility. This functionality removes any excuse for excluding alt text, which describes non-text content. If you're unsure how to write effective alt text, consult this handy decision tree.
A personal and professional update:
Since you last read something from me (unless you’re also subscribed to Drifter Life, which I highly recommend), I've embarked on a dynamic journey: pursuing a Masters in Social Work, leaving my job at 10up, embarking on a 6,000-mile road trip with teenagers, working various roles from RideShare2Vote driver to Major League Rugby assistant referee, and relocating twice—from Austin for a policy analyst role in the Texas Legislature to Olympia, Washington, for its serene nature (and to get the fuck outta Texas). Amidst applying for numerous jobs across various sectors, including AmeriCorps VISTA, I've now settled into a remote position as a Senior Instructional Designer at a startup healthcare company focusing on kidney disease.
Whew!
Worth your time:
The Trevor Project leaves Twitter/X – I left a few weeks after Musk took over. What a waste of great potential (both the platform and the man).
Everything is fracturing – Sean Blanda
“If you started your career in 2010, you wouldn't have experienced a down market until you were 33. As a result, tech companies are staffed (and often led) by people who have no idea how to navigate a market where making money is important.”Mint, one of the early budgeting and link all your accounts tools, shuts down.
Books:
Tools I’m curiously exploring:
Fabric: AI – trying to answer the question, “Can AI provide a better filesystem and workspace for personal productivity?” Oh, I hope so, especially for early adopters and scatterbrains!
Figma (and their new AI tools)
LazyApply – wish I’d known about this six months ago!
Callsheet: “Callsheet, in short, allows you to look up movies, TV shows, cast, and crew. You can think of it as similar to the IMDb app but… with respect for its users. Which, actually, makes it not like IMDb at all. 🙃”
beautiful.ai – used this for a class presentation over the summer. Easy, useful. Currently testing accessibility.
Raindrop for managing bookmarks. I’ve used Pinboard for the last decade or so. Not sure I can switch. But this is interesting if you’re a power bookmarker.