I am literally powered by Magic Mind right now. It's helping me focus and keep going in some tough weeks of poor sleep and too much to do. If you also need that helping hand, head over to magicmind.com/chinchillasqueaks and use the code "CHINCHILLASQUEAKS20" for 48% of subscriptions or 20% off one time purchases.
Like what you’re reading?
It’s a tough time for content creators right now. If you enjoy what you read, then consider a contribution. Here’s the ways you can help me out.
Or please share or review the newsletter!
Thanks :)
‘The first few nights were punishing’: how sleep restriction cured my lifelong insomnia
I am an on/off long-suffering poor sleeper. The middle-of-the-night insomnia is better than it used to be, but I still find it hard to stay in a deep sleep and wake up too early most of the time. I have also been trying to stay up later, hoping it might mean I wake up later, but it’s not working especially in summer. I am not sure I want to push things to this extreme, but maybe it’s worth trying.
Managing Your Mac Menu Bar: A Roundup of My Favorite Bartender Alternatives
I love macOS’s menu bar, but it can get cluttered quite quickly. Thanks to Setapp I’ve been using Bartender for some time to keep mine tidy. Recently, the developer sold the company to a new owner who, shall we say, didn’t handle the transition well. Most people’s concerns around security and privacy seem to now be resolved, but it still gave developers of alternative applications a great opportunity, and this list summarises some of the best.
Training AI music models is about to get very expensive
Did I mention before I used to be a professional musician? I think I did 😅. Anyway, as I still make some money from that part of my life, it makes me more sensitive to those exploiting musicians’ work. Oddly, AI-generated music is one of the rare cases where the archaic archaeology of the music business works in favour of artists. They are not an industry with a reputation for taking a hit to their bottom line lightly, and now the AI companies are firmly in their sights.
While some companies are still beginning their journey with cloud-native, some of the early adopters are already moving to the next thing, which seems to be back to running your own servers. The promise of flexible costs hasn’t been the reality for many, and the loops and hoops providers make you jump through too much work. 37signals (and isn’t it great to hear from them again!?) are one of many recent examples of this trend. While I don’t think we need to worry about the big three providers yet, what’s next?
20:30
38:46