Tedium

Design Deconstruction: Design is perhaps the software paradigm most wedded to the mouse and the GUI. But there’s no reason it can’t be text-driven.

https://feed.tedium.co/link/15204/17276365/text-based-design-mindset

Splitting Machines: How the virtual machine, a foundational element of cloud computing, found its modern footing after a couple of scientists proved a couple of theorems wrong.

https://feed.tedium.co/link/15204/17251925/vmware-virtualization-history

Em Dashes: Back In Style?: Cloudflare’s new attempt to win over the hearts of developers could help keep a few ancient WordPress sites from falling off the internet. That‘s a good thing.

https://feed.tedium.co/link/15204/17312777/emdash-cloudflare-wordpress-competitor

The Pancake Discussion: When every discussion feels flat, how do you fluff it up? The answer, to me, is to eat fewer pancakes.

https://feed.tedium.co/link/15204/17304313/social-media-flat-discussion

Paywalls For Minimalists: What’s the least you can do to build an effective paywall for creators that’s mostly open-source? If we can figure that out, that might make it easier to cut out the big platforms.

https://feed.tedium.co/link/15204/17295750/minimal-paywall-setup-idea

Betting Against Substack: I once turned down Substack because of their design limitations. As they emerge yet again in the news cycle, I thought I’d make my point with some of that design stuff they don’t do.

https://feed.tedium.co/link/15204/17288375/betting-against-substack

They’re Vibe-Coding Spam Now: The problem with making coding easier for more people is that it makes spam more conventionally attractive. Which is bad.

https://feed.tedium.co/link/15204/17283566/vibe-coded-email-spam

Postscript: Mass layoffs are a fact of life in journalism. Your favorite writers and editors have dealt with them. But they weren’t supposed to happen at The Post.

https://feed.tedium.co/link/15204/17272194/washington-post-layoffs-perspective

A Quiet Townhouse, A Great Gift: A mostly unknown townhouse in Manhattan was the site of a small but significant moment in the history of 20th-century American literature. It also gives insight into how modern society defines its history.

https://feed.tedium.co/link/15204/17271801/new-york-plaques-historic-moments

A Number Of Surprising Importance: The number 26, which gets back-burnered compared to numbers with neater divisibility, is an essential digit. And you’re gonna be hearing all about it in 2026.

https://feed.tedium.co/link/15204/17245690/tedium-trends-2026

The Accidental Blockbuster: The absurd comedy of errors that led to the year’s best feature story is almost too silly to be believed. But it happened.

https://feed.tedium.co/link/15204/17244623/best-feature-story-2025-white-house-signal-leak

Wayne’s World: As Apple hits its 50th anniversary this week, we got a chance to talk to its forgotten third founder: Ronald G. Wayne. Apple is honestly a footnote in his long life.

https://feed.tedium.co/link/15204/17311236/ronald-g-wayne-apple-interview

An Intention Upgrade: By ditching the Mac Pro so close to its 50th anniversary, Apple is making a statement of intent for its next 50 years.

https://feed.tedium.co/link/15204/17307620/apple-mac-pro-discontinued-anniversary

Self-Hosting: Still Worth It?: Once upon a time, self-hosting used to be a cost-effective thing. Is it still a good option for fending off SaaS as the prices keep creeping up?

https://feed.tedium.co/link/15204/17308221/self-hosting-platform-tools-guide

Last-Run Syndication: One of television’s most important business models—syndicating first-run content to TV stations looking to fill airtime—might be losing strea … er, steam.

https://feed.tedium.co/link/15204/17299183/television-first-run-syndication-decline

Markdown’s Moment: For some reason, a bunch of big companies are really leaning into Markdown right now. AI may be the reason, but I kind of love the possible side benefits.

https://feed.tedium.co/link/15204/17278321/markdown-growing-influence-cloudflare-ai

Project Code Name: Why do corporate restructuring plans get code names the way operating systems do? And why are the names often so bizarre?

https://feed.tedium.co/link/15204/17277502/corporate-turnaround-code-names-history

Slide Away: My favorite UX metaphor, the scrolling window manager, is having a moment—and it’s for pretty dank reasons.

https://feed.tedium.co/link/15204/17266116/niri-danklinux-scrolling-window-managers

Minus World: Rumors of OnePlus’ possible death are heating up, which would be a real shame, given how much the smartphone market has already contracted. It’s not true, but their grip is slipping.

https://feed.tedium.co/link/15204/17261173/oneplus-decline-shutdown-rumors-commentary

They Were Robbed: The tale of the Billboard Bubbling Under Hot 100 chart, the place where hits go to die—in some cases, over and over again. Let’s talk about the chart through the lens of its two most iconic artists.

https://feed.tedium.co/link/15204/17256459/billboard-bubbling-under-hot-100-chart-history

Pork & Puppetry: What inspired the semi-viral fake GIMP trailer that recently fluttered around FOSS circles? The creator and puppeteer behind Pork Johnson explains.

https://feed.tedium.co/link/15204/17315642/pork-johnson-gimp-parody-interview

Pressed For Options: I bought a USB fingerprint reader for my Linux laptop from Temu because it was the only one I could find that I knew would work.

https://feed.tedium.co/link/15204/17319282/linux-external-fingerprint-reader-challenges

The Solitaire Shuffle: A meditation on the game of Solitaire and its endless variations, which go well beyond what you can find in Windows 3.1.

https://feed.tedium.co/link/15204/17316812/solitaire-card-game-types-history