The Economist: The global crisis in conservatism
At its best conservatism can be a steadying influence. It is reasonable and wise; it values competence; it is not in a hurry. Those days are over. Today’s right is on fire and it is dangerous.
I’m not a conservative but I understand why some are. The Economist explains the damage the rise of the far right is inflicting on conservative politics and, by extension, effective democracy.
Lunchbox motivation.
Not a bad place to stop for a coffee meeting. Good weather for mid-winter, too.
Kerry O’Brien’s powerful Logies speech 2019 - YouTube
NetNewsWire is such a great app. Fast, responsive and nice to look at. Syncing with Inoreader can’t come fast enough. @brentsimmons
This is the first time I have ever put a sticker on one of my devices. @burk
I have both written about and noted upon the false value of busyness within our societal norms. One of my favourite independent writers, James Shelley has published an interesting take on the same topic. He cites many references, including one of my favourites, Thorstein Veblen, he of the famous Veblen Goods economic paradox. James puts a focus on busyness as status symbol: we need to appear busy because we all know that valuable people are busy people.
Big thanks to Jason @burk for sending micro.blog shwag all the way to Australia.
Thanks to David’s help at @blot I now have a cool tags view of my posts on that site.
A new look, logo, and website for Fastmail
Today, we launched a refreshed look for Fastmail, with a new logo, app icon, colors, and website.
I like the new typeface. The envelope keeps reminding me of a crown though, which is weird.
Micro.blog successfully imported my Instagram archive. This site is fast becoming my life stream. I’m owning my content.
Vocus’ share performance over 3 years Poor Vocus, it must be in bad shape. From Bill Bennett: Last week Australian energy company AGL withdrew its A$3 billion takeover offer for Vocus. This came only two weeks after Swedish private equity firm EQT halted its $3.3 billion transaction. Bill goes on to reflect that as currently structured, Australia’s broadband market may not enable companies to make a reasonable profit:
I’m experiencing the existential crisis that is all too familiar to many a blogger… what goes on this blog of mine and what goes on the other blog of mine? 🤔
Atlassian is an interesting company that possibly doesn’t get the kudos it might deserve. As an Australian, I have admiration for seeing one of ours hit it big internationally. Atlassian and Canva are probably the only two Australian companies that immediately spring to mind as having won big in the international IT space. I’m impressed that Atlassian continue to walk the walk in regard to their world-view and values. This is evident in their now public approach to mergers and acquisitions.
Thanks for your kind words, micro.bloggers. On a day when our dear pet left us, it’s nice to have positive responses. So different - and so much better - than the snark I might expect on other networks. I love this place.
Today we said goodbye to our gorgeous Airedale Terrier, Indi. Loyal friend for 14 years. She will be missed.
I’ve decided that I’m not going to renew my Lightroom subscription when it comes due. I’ve just gone through and brought all the photos that were on the Adobe Cloud back to my local NAS. I just don’t do enough photography anymore to justify the expense.
He’s almost over the flu now.
I have changed my DNS provider to OpenDNS. I have been using CloudFlare DNS and have nothing but praise for its speed and stability. However, with kids in the house, I need the additional network filtering and site-blocking that OpenDNS can deliver. For OpenDNS to work it needs to be kept abreast of my home’s IP address. My ISP doesn’t provide1 a static IP. While my dynamic IP doesn’t change often, any change that does occur prevents the OpenDNS filtering from working.