Elise Bently on TincyMCE and CKEditor, AI in the developing world
A packed issue full of AI content, what powers the internet, the real cost of food, offline-first, and an interview all about CK editor and TinyMCE
Lots and lots of links and news this issue, which is quite surprising considering it’s August, but there you go. Unsurprisingly, there’s a lot of AI-related content, so in my interview this time I focus on some older, and maybe familiar technology, with Elise Bently of Tiugo technologies, who now claim the WYSIWYG editors TinyMCE and CKEditor in their portfolio.
Listen here or search for “Chinchilla Squeaks” wherever you find your podcasts.
Sponsored by Zencaster
This issue is sponsored by Zencaster, who’s all-in-one podcasting platform helps me deliver my show episode.
Use my special link zen.ai/chinchillasqueaks to save 30% off your first month of any Zencastr paid plan.
The workers at the frontlines of the AI revolution →
One of the many discussions around the benefits of AI is that it will free us up from all the tasks we don’t really want to do. Except that a lot of people do actually undertake these tasks. And what about people starting their career? How will they learn if there are no “crap jobs” to do? And what about traditional “outsourcing” countries? As always, there are winners and losers.
Stack Overflow jumps into the generative AI world with Overflow AI →
Stack Overflow definitely feeds a lot of the models behind new AI tools, and now they release their own offerings.
Bridging the AI language gap in Africa and beyond →
AI tools like ChatGPT offer amazing opportunities — if you happen to speak a language they support. But according to Mekdes Gebrewold, founder of Ashagari consultancy in Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa, even machine translations are impossible in her language.
New Dungeons & Dragons Sourcebook Features AI Generated Art →
One of the artists working on Dungeons & Dragons’ newest book—Bigby Presents: Glory of the Giants!, has stated that they used AI to help generate “certain details or polish and editing”. The reaction wasn’t quite what I expected.
The Secret Life of the 500+ Cables That Run the Internet →
My grandfather helped lay telephone cables in the oceans, so the life of the crazy limited amount of cables that power the internet has always fascinated me.
The Cloud Is a Prison. Can the Local-First Software Movement Set Us Free? →
I am definitely a proponent of offline and local first computing, but is this new approach the right one? I’m not sure.
The right to pay anonymously has become part of an EU culture war →
Karl Nehammer, Austria’s chancellor, announced plans to enshrine the right to pay with cash into the country’s constitution on Friday (August 4), as card contactless payments become more popular in Europe. Is this an over reaction?
Is social media over— or are we just older now? →
I’m mourning Old Twitter. Maybe that sounds dramatic. Twitter, for the past decade and beyond (at least for me) used to be a place to converse with other writers, laugh at one-liners from comedians and in general, read what people were doing (breakfast choice/breed of pet/city break plans.
German supermarket charges 'true cost' of foods →
Almost all of the products that the German discount supermarket Penny is now selling at the "true cost" of their environmental impacts are markedly more expensive. The organic fruit yogurt costs 31% more; the conventionally produced Maasdam cheese is almost twice as expensive. Is it a marketing campaign, greenwash, valuable?
Have we had our fill of fake meat? →
In the UK, the market for “fake mean” is dropping rapidly. Is it because people are worried about health, the price, or something else?
BREAKING: Avid Acquired for $1.4 Billion →
Investment companies are rapidly hoovering up music technology companies. Why? For more content, I also highly recommend this video.
HashiCorp drops open source for 'source available' →
In a blog post, Arman Dadgar, who cofounded the San Francisco-based company in 2021 with Mitchell Hashimoto, said the company is moving to "the Business Source Licence to ensure continued investment in its community and to continue providing open, freely available products. Another one bites the dust or is it modern necessity in making money out of open source?
From me
Creating narrative story timelines with Aeon Timeline
In this post, I cover how I use Aeon Timeline, an application for building interactive narrative timelines and how I use it for my fiction.
