I really enjoyed Tom Critchlow's post Small b blogging.
Author Archives: Matt
Commuting Time Saved
On Automattic's internal BuddyPress-powered company directory, we allow people to fill out a field saying how far their previous daily commute was. 509 people have filled that out so far, and they are saving 12,324 kilometers of travel every work day. Wow!
No Office Workstyle
Reed Albergotti has a great article titled Latest Amenity for Startups: No Office. You can put in your email to read I believe but it's behind a paywall otherwise. The Information is a pretty excellent site that alongside (former Automattician) Ben Thompson's Stratechery I recommend subscribing to. Here are some quotes from the parts of the […]
Kinsey Joins Automattic
Kinsey Wilson is joining Automattic to run WordPress.com. Poynter covers the news and has a great interview with Kinsey.
The Laity
In the last analysis, every profession is a conspiracy against the laity. The Sir Patrick Cullen character in George Bernard Shaw’s play The Doctor’s Dilemma
National Magazine Award Nomination
Longreads was nominated today for its first-ever National Magazine Award, in the category of columns and commentary, alongside ESPN The Magazine, BuzzFeed News, Pitchfork, and New York magazine. Laurie Penny's Longreads columns explore important questions of consent and female desire that have strongly resonated in our current moment. In addition to this nomination, Penny's columns […]
R.I.P Dean Allen
Dean Allen, a web pioneer and good man, has passed away. I’ve been processing the news for a few days and still don’t know where to begin. Dean was a writer, who wrote the software he wrote on. His websites were crafted, designed, and typeset so well you would have visited them even if they […]
Thirty-Four
I am very thankful and grateful to have made it through the past year, which was a really special one personally and professionally. I learned to open myself up more to relationships, continued aspiring to be clear and direct with yellow arrows, and worked alongside some incredible people to tackle the biggest and hardest problems, […]
Ariel Levy in Longreads
I had originally planned last year to write a review of each book as I read it, but The Rules Do Not Apply threw a spanner in the works. I had no idea how to write about it, much less review it. The author, Ariel Levy, has a great interview in Longreads from when the […]
Xerox Alto Zero-Day
Next to the very real news of the Spectre and Meltdown CPU issues, it was lovely to come across Ken Shirriff's story of getting past password protection on some old Xerox Alta disk packs from the 1970s. As further proof for why 2018 is going to be the year of blogging, two of the comments […]
Morten on Gutenberg
Morten Rand-Hendriksen's talk and demo on Gutenberg from WordCamp US is an excellent overview of where it is, where it could go, and some VR stuff thrown in there for fun. Definitely worth the watch.
Books in 2017
Here's what I ended up reading this year, in roughly chronological finishing order. (I usually have 3-4 books going on at once.) Tools of Titans by Tim Ferriss. The Art of Stillness by Pico Ayer. Out of Your Mind by Alan Watts (audiobook, really a series of lectures). Book of Five Rings by Miyamoto Mushashi […]
NORAD’s Santa Tracker
Politico has a lovely story on the history and present of the NORAD Santa Tracker, which started because a 1955 Sears department store ad had “a digit wrong — and was instead the direct line into the secret military nerve center in Colorado Springs, Colo., where the Pentagon was on the lookout to prevent nuclear […]
Design in Kentucky
Fast Company Design has written Tech Has A Diversity Problem–So This Designer Went To Kentucky, about John Maeda's work pairing some of the top designers in the world with students in Paintsville, Kentucky.
Post-Verbal Language
James Beshara has a really interesting read on how communication will change and evolve in a post-verbal world, namely one where human/brain interfaces like Neuralink can more directly transmit thought between people than the medium of language allows today. After reading the essay I wonder if people's thoughts or the neural pathways they activate, if […]
iPhone Fast Charging
I love USB, cables, and charging things. So MacRumors comparison of different wired and wireless charging options and speed for the iPhone X is my catnip. tl; dr: USB-C + USB-C-to-Lightning cable gives you far and away the fastest times. I've found this true for the iPad Pro as well.
State of the Word, 2017
I really enjoyed connecting with the WordPress community in Nashville this previous weekend. On Saturday I delivered the State of the Word presentation alongside Mel, Weston, and Matías. There's always a post-event buzz but I definitely noticed a change in tenor of people's thoughts on Gutenberg after the presentation and demo. The video is above, […]
Adam Robinson on Understanding
This is a long quote/excerpt from Adam Robinson I’ve been holding onto for a while, from Tribe of Mentors. Worth considering, especially if you strive to work in a data-informed product organization. Virtually all investors have been told when they were younger — or implicitly believe, or have been tacitly encouraged to do so by […]
Tribe of Mentors
Tim Ferriss’s new book Tribe of Mentors is out. I have finished it already, and can say it’s really excellent and I even liked it more than Tools of Titans even though I’m not in this one. 🙂 As I said in a message to Tim: Curious how Tribe of Mentors is different from Tools […]
Post Status Interview
In the lead-up to WordCamp US we're in right now I chatted with Brian Krogsgard at Post Status in an hour podcast and we spoke about the core releases this year, Gutenberg, React, WooCommerce, and WordPress.org. On the 29th I'll be talking to WP Tavern, so tune in then as well. For something completely different, […]