A few months ago I built a large bookcase for the guest room + office. Then I decided that the lower half would be better utilized as a dresser.
The final (for now)
I partially disassembled the dresser and then replaced the front and the knob. This saved me from needing to make and fit drawer boxes. The old sides are still visible (that's how the dimensions happened to work out).
AI-native research environments with and for scientists. A continuation of a lot of the visualization and system work I've done but with closer collaboration with the people who would use those systems.
New primitives the foundations of customizable software (and even operating systems). I want to use the flexibility but find ways to provide continuity and stability for the user. Mental models that ground things.
New hardware that use new AI capabilities to be more humane, calm, tactile and collaborative.
I wanted my dock laptop to feel more like furniture - maybe nostalgia for the 'family room computer' from when I was a kid.
The box
It did feel different! But not too long after I went a pretty different direction for the room (less screen) and moved it down into the basement.
I wanted to document some of the work I've been doing at our house. I put up a bench seat + shelves + a sort-of sideboard in the living room in December. And I finally got our artwork up in a gallery wall a little after that.
Bench with custom dog cubbies and bookshelves. It's since gotten a cushion
The sideboard somewhat organized.
I was reading about using random selection of proportional tickets to schedule CPU tasks and wanted to try probabilistically selecting pixel colors. This effect was interesting but I think I was hoping for more structure or more of a feel like a physical process. Will keep exploring.
initial conditions read on scrawl
Site-specific - in the later stage of his career Robert Irwin switched to exclusively doing site-specific installations. He would go study a space and come up with an intervention designed to make you feel the space more. To make you aware of it. There was a lot of variety to what he used - sometimes landscape adjustments, sometimes scrim fabric. It focused on material and placement. read on scrawl
Containers for thought - I've been doing experiments with book logging and album-focused music players. Partly because coding agents make dealing with spotify integration or a book database easier for me. Partly I think because in time where everything is changing it's nice to spend some time engaging with works of art that sustained attention and stay constant. read on scrawl
Making another custom spotify interface - focused on surfacing 6 random albums from a collection I've put together.
Thinking about phenomenology - studying your own subjective experience of the world - and how it might relate to a world of super-capable AI. Meditation can be a way of doing it. read on scrawl
I read "Turning the database inside out" by Martin Kleppman. I've also been thinking about better ways of providing concise context for LLMs. Both have to do with stream processing. Especially struck by the Kleppman description of state made up of derived data from an append-only log of immutable facts. Which I think is also how people are starting to do memory for agents. read on scrawl
Working with embeddings - particularly with the goal of aiding thinking - a lot of the challenge is where do you draw the line for chunks. Paragraph-by-paragraph? Essay-length? Book-length? read on scrawl
I watched the Welch Labs video about the 'bitter lesson' and I think it shifted how I think about LLMs a bit. read on scrawl
I've been thinking about monks and tech and attention. If one of the challenges of life today is managing attention in a world of content designed to take it (ref Chris Hayes Sirens Call), then monks stand out as example of group that willingly placed constraints on their life in order to manage attention. read on scrawl
Thinking about personal OS. More like a personal dashboard but it could expand from there. read on scrawl
WIP booklog