A personal newsletter by a creative independent who writes about the tensions in their life, their efforts to resolve them, and handmade explorations of the internet, including the multiplayer browsing project we were online. Recent issues mix reflections on AI slop and a revived handmade web with candid notes on ambition, fear of obscurity and building in public.
Website: https://news.spencer.place
Fansplaining publishes essays and cultural criticism about fandom, covering fan communities, fanfiction history, and how media companies treat fans. Issues combine historical background, community analysis and some collaborative pieces from other outlets.
Essays on science, biology, AI alignment and the quirks of internet discourse, written with a wry, speculative voice. Each issue works through an unusual question or theory, often with humor and explicit epistemic caveats.
The newsletter mixes practical engineering write-ups, such as a case study on automating short-form video ads with unit costs and failure modes, with long-form computing history, such as the Colossus codebreakers and the rise and fall of Iomega's Zip drive. Readers get detailed, source-informed explanations of technology's past and present, plus reusable lessons from the author's own projects.
A Substack from the founder of Sublime combining curated ideas with reflections on building human-centered products and a weekly interview series, Humanmaxxing, on thriving in the age of AI. Readers get edited interview transcripts with prominent tech writers and essays on measurement culture and creativity.
One short email a week with hand-picked newsletters from the index. Free, no spam, unsubscribe anytime.
