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THIS IS THE PERSONAL WEBSITE OF NICK SIMSON, WHO WRITES ABOUT BOOKS, WEBSITES,
AND PLENTY MORE.




 * TROUBLESHOOTING
   
   I’m a bit puzzled why my profile image doesn’t always show up when I leave a
   comment on another website. I’ve noticed this a lot lately with other
   WordPress sites…I have a WP site, plus a Gravatar, and a microformats
   (IndieWeb) h-card as well. Am I missing something?
   
   Syndicated copies:
    * Bluesky
    * Mastodon
   
   Mar 11, 2024 3:29 PM
   This site, WordPress
   


 * INTERNET XERISCAPING
   
   In reply to Websites as gardens of the Internet ecosystem by Tracy Durnell.
   
   After moving back to the American Southwest last year, I’ve taken an interest
   in desert xeriscaping, gardening that requires little or no water beyond what
   the natural climate provides.
   
   I’m sure there’s a metaphor for digital gardening in this too…optimizing a
   website for performance? Designing with progressive enhancement? Creating a
   zero carbon website or one with a minimal carbon footprint?
   
   Syndicated copies:
    * Bluesky
    * Mastodon
   
   Mar 11, 2024 3:08 PM
   Websites
   


 * EYE-PLEASING TYPE SPECIMENS
   
   Likes Eye-pleasing type specimens by Tracy Durnell.
   
   
   Mar 11, 2024 2:53 PM
   Design, Type
   


 * URL TESTING BOOKMARKLETS
   
   Bookmarked Bookmarklets for testing your website by Jeremy Keith.
   
   > In my mind, there are two different approaches to making a bookmarklet. One
   > kind of bookmarklet contains lots of clever JavaScript—that’s where the
   > smart stuff happens. The other kind of bookmarklet is deliberately dumb.
   > All they do is take the URL of the current page and pass it to another
   > service—that’s where the smart stuff happens.
   > 
   > I like that second kind of bookmarklet.
   
   What a handy collection. Added all these to my Firefox toolbar.
   
   Syndicated copies:
    * Bluesky
    * Mastodon
   
   Mar 11, 2024 9:30 AM
   Bookmarks, Web development
   


 * AUTOMATED BOOKMARKS TAG
   
   I’d like to automate something simple on my website: When I use the
   IndieBlocks Bookmark block, I’d also like to automatically apply the
   Bookmarks tag to my note.
   
   This is just a note to self to write a little plugin or something to automate
   this.
   
   Syndicated copies:
    * Bluesky
    * Mastodon
   
   Mar 11, 2024 9:14 AM
   This site
   


 * “ENHANCED DISTRIBUTION”
   
   I’m doing some weekend maintenance on Eleanor’s portfolio, a WordPress site
   we’ve been running since 2013. Eleanor keeps the content and images updated
   and I’m responsible for plugins, new features, navigation, and keeping the
   little copyright notice up-to-date.
   
   With 404 Media educating us all about the phrase “WordPress Firehose” last
   week, I wanted to make sure we were doing all we could to keep OpenAI and
   Midjourney from using her images to train AI to make art generative images. I
   had installed the Jetpack plugin, an “Automattic Airline” eons ago, and this
   is the area I was a bit worried about. Greg Pak wrote and updated a post
   about the steps he took, including updating the robots.txt file and disabling
   modules in the Jetpack settings.
   
   If you’re self-hosting WordPress and using the Jetpack plugin, you have to go
   to a somewhat hidden “Modules” panel. It’s linked in the footer of the
   Jetpack Dashboard, which you can navigate to from WP Admin > Jetpack >
   Dashboard. Scroll to the bottom, and click on Modules in the footer
   navigation:
   
   Or, copy and paste this to the end of your site’s address:
   /wp-admin/admin.php?page=jetpack_modules
   
   On the Modules page, there are a couple dozen things you can turn on and off.
   The WordPress.com firehose setting is inside the Enhanced Distribution
   module. This was already turned off on Eleanor’s site, and this feature, plus
   the firehose itself is slated to be deprecated and wound down.
   
   For good measure I also have the Blaze module and the JSON API deactivated
   now too. Eleanor also runs a WordPress.com-hosted site with Barbara, another
   visual artist. We made sure that site is opted-out of AI data sharing, and
   maybe down the road that should be hosted somewhere else too. This whole
   ordeal has me rethinking Jetpack and Automattic. Most of the Jetpack
   functionality we’re currently using can be replicated with other plugins.
   
   As Mike stated earlier this week, “Automattic isn’t WordPress. Automattic
   doesn’t own WordPress. We, the users, own WordPress.” Automattic certainly
   has a heavy thumb on the scale when it comes to WordPress governance and
   product decisions.1 I think its imperative for users to push back against the
   kinds of stuff that’s not serving us and our users in turn. Healthy debate
   and independent voices will serve the project and the WordPress brand in the
   long term. We’re not ready to ditch WordPress just yet.
   
   
    1. I cringe a bit at the 40 percent and counting stuff, as if one CMS
       dominating the market share is somehow healthy for the World Wide Web.
       WordPress works for me, but I wouldn’t force its source code and design
       decisions down anyone’s throat. ↩︎
   
   Syndicated copies:
    * Bluesky
    * Mastodon
   
   Mar 9, 2024 8:41 PM
   Words
   Privacy, WordPress
   


 * A FEDI DEV CAUTIONARY TALE
   
   Bookmarked Content Nation Backlash Highlights Mastodon’s Toxicity by Sean
   Tilley.
   
   > Here’s the thing: if you were to take the ActivityPub specification from
   > the W3C, and implement it as specified, you’d end up with something that
   > wouldn’t correctly talk to any service in use today. Mastodon, and
   > platforms designed to talk to it, have a dozen or so behaviors that are not
   > actually in the spec at all: Webfinger, SharedInbox, Privacy Scopes, and
   > Opt-Out for Search are just a few of them.
   > 
   > Many of these things are almost completely undocumented, and can only be
   > developed by lengthy conversations with people who already built those
   > things. Even Mastodon’s own specs say very little. The majority of people
   > dismissed Content Nation as simply being a malicious attempt to slurp up
   > their public and private content for profit. Even when Sascha tried to
   > defend himself, he was ridiculed and mocked.
   
   
   
   Syndicated copies:
    * Bluesky
    * Mastodon
   
   Mar 8, 2024 9:31 AM
   Bookmarks, Fediverse
   


 * IF THIS IS FAILING, FAILING IS WINNING.
   
   Likes Nielsen needs to think again by Léonie Watson.
   
   > I don’t know if Nielsen has a disability or not and I won’t presume to
   > speak about his experience in any case. I do have a disability and since
   > Nielsen didn’t afford disabled people the same courtesy, this is my
   > experience…
   > 
   > …Nielsen thinks that generative AI will make my experience better. Nielsen
   > apparently doesn’t realise that generative AI barely understands
   > accessibility, never mind how to make accessible experiences for humans.
   
   
   
   
   Mar 7, 2024 10:42 AM
   Accessibility, AI
   


 * PLEASE JUST MAKE A BROWSER
   
   Bookmarked Mozilla lays off 60 people, wants to build AI into Firefox by Ron
   Amadeo.
   
   > Mozilla is a tiny company that competes with some of the biggest tech
   > companies in the world—Apple, Google, and Microsoft. It’s also very
   > important to the web as a whole, as Firefox is the only browser that can’t
   > trace its lineage back to Apple and WebKit (Chrome’s Blink engine is a
   > WebKit fork. Microsoft Edge is a Chromium fork). So you would think
   > focusing on Firefox would be a priority, but the company continually
   > struggles with focus.
   > 
   > The Mozilla Corporation gets about 80 percent of its revenue from
   > Google—also its primary browser competitor—via a search deal, so Mozilla
   > isn’t exactly a healthy company. These non-browser projects could be seen
   > as a search for a less vulnerable revenue stream, but none have put a huge
   > dent in the bottom line.
   
   I believe having a diversity of browser engines is the best path toward
   keeping the web healthy, open, and independent. I have a ton of browsers
   installed, but Firefox has been my default for a good 15+ years now. The
   overall user experience, privacy, speed, and developer tools in early 2024
   Firefox suits me just fine. I even use the containers! I want it to be
   maintained with new features coming to HTML, CSS, and Javascript. I want
   security patches and bug fixes. I want the browser experience to continue to
   be one I can customize to my needs. I want the core feature (browsing the
   web) to be the experience that is improved upon with each release. This is
   what I want and expect from a product I use every day of the week.
   
   I’d love to see Mozilla become more independent from Google revenue-wise. But
   I don’t need or want any of the other paid products in the Mozilla catalogue.
   I don’t see the need for AI in my web browser. Spin off an up-to-date version
   of Firefox without the AI stuff, and I’d gladly pay to keep that going.
   
   Syndicated copies:
    * Bluesky
    * Mastodon
   
   Mar 6, 2024 6:50 PM
   Bookmarks, Technology, Web Platform
   


 * WORDPRESS IS MANY
   
   Likes Slowing my roll by Mike Haynes.
   
   > There are thousands of people that work on making WordPress what it is. To
   > associate all their work and contributions to the actions of a few
   > executives at separate company is unfair. Automattic isn’t WordPress.
   > Automattic doesn’t own WordPress. We, the users, own WordPress.
   
   
   Mar 6, 2024 8:49 AM
   Open Source, WordPress
   

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--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 
👋 Howdy, I’m Nick Simson.

I live in New Mexico and work as a graphic and interaction designer.

You can reach me at nick@nicksimson.com. I’m also on Mastodon, GitHub, Bluesky,
CV, and a few other places.

© 2024

🎧 La Poupée Qui Fait Non by Union Of Sound