Co-founder and CEO of OpenAI; previously president of Y Combinator.

• Lovedrcmnd.app

  Superintelligence

  Their words

  (Incidentally, Nick Bostrom's excellent book "Superintelligence" is the best thing I've seen on this topic. It is well worth a read.)

  blog.samaltman.com

Cryptographer; created Signal and the Signal Protocol, and writes occasionally about cryptography, web3 and sailing.

• Our reading nowkorrents.com

  GPG is a failed experiment and will not be the thing that brings end-to-end encryption to ordinary people.

  On changing their mind

  In the 1990s, I was excited about the future, and I dreamed of a world where everyone would install GPG. Now I’m still excited about the future, but I dream of a world where I can uninstall it.

Designer, illustrator and writer; author of The Shape of Design and of widely read essays on design and the web.

From one piece The Web’s Grain 5 beliefs · frankchimero.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Designing for screens means arranging the elements first and assigning them a size afterwards, not drawing the box first.

  Their words

  The size of what we’re making is unknown until we know what we’re putting there. So, it’s better to come up with an arrangement of elements and assign them to a size, rather than the other way around. We need to start drawing, then put the box around it.

  The Web’s Grainfrankchimero.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Convenience means someone else makes your choices for you: the less you have to do, the less say you have.

  Their words

  To create convenience—particularly the automated convenience technology trades in—someone else must make our choices for us. In other words: the less you have to do, the less say you have.

  The Web’s Grainfrankchimero.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Technology only adds more: it is never this or that, it is always this and that.

  Their words

  Technology only adds more—it is never this or that; it is always this and that.

  The Web’s Grainfrankchimero.com

Programmer on the Dart language at Google and author of Game Programming Patterns and Crafting Interpreters; previously a game developer at EA.

From one piece What Color is Your Function? 3 beliefs, in the piece's order there

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Splitting functions into synchronous and asynchronous kinds forces that distinction into every piece of code a programmer afterwards writes.

  Their words

  No matter what, you'll have to think about color constantly.

  What Color is Your Function?journal.stuffwithstuff.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Async/await makes asynchronous code easier to write without healing the split it created, and the divide reappears as soon as you write a higher-order function.

  Their words

  It is better. I will take async-await over bare callbacks or futures any day of the week. But we're lying to ourselves if we think all of our troubles are gone.

  What Color is Your Function?journal.stuffwithstuff.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Asynchrony should be a property of how a program is run, not a colour baked into the type of every function in the standard library.

  Their words

  Concurrency in Go is a facet of how you choose to model your program, and not a color seared into each function in the standard library.

  What Color is Your Function?journal.stuffwithstuff.com

Programmer on the Dart language at Google and author of Game Programming Patterns and Crafting Interpreters; previously a game developer at EA.

• Lovedrcmnd.app

  Visual Studio

  Their words

  At EA, I spent years in Visual Studio writing C# and I still think that may have been the most productive development experience I've ever had.

  usesthis.com

• Usesrcmnd.app

  Lightroom

  Their words

  I also use Lightroom for processing photos, but still do one last pass on them in Photoshop since I'm attached to adjusting RGB levels individually.

  usesthis.com

• Lovedrcmnd.app

  Google Play Music All Access

  Their words

  These days, music makes its way to me through Google Play Music All Access a wonderful service with quite possibly the world's worst brand name.

  usesthis.com

Physicist and science communicator. Writes Backreaction and makes videos explaining new physics and astronomy results, frequently to argue that the headline about them overstates the case.

• Likedrcmnd.app

  Cracking the Particle Code of the Universe

  Their words

  In summary, Moffat's new book is a well-done and well-written survey of the history, achievements, and shortcomings of the Standard Model of particle physics.

  backreaction.blogspot.com

Internet artist and programmer; makes bots and small web projects as Tiny Subversions and co-founded the Feel Train studio.

• Likedrcmnd.app

  crouton

  Their words

  So I have an Ubuntu Linux command line installed on Chrome OS. It's really easy to do using crouton. crouton even lets you run X11 and a window manager of your choice, but I don't bother with that.

  usesthis.com

• Usesrcmnd.app

  Vim

  Their words

  Since everything I develop is for the web, I use Vim on the command line, and I run my development servers there too.

  usesthis.com

• Usesrcmnd.app

  Grunt

  Their words

  For making my stuff I use Grunt as my task manager, and specifically I use grunt-init to scaffold my projects.

  usesthis.com

Interpretability researcher at Anthropic, which he co-founded; before that at OpenAI and Google Brain, where he wrote the explanations of neural networks most people learned them from.

From one piece Visualizing Representations: Deep Learning and Human Beings 2 beliefs, in the piece's order there

• Our readingkorrents.com

  In a dimensionality-reduced visualization of high-dimensional data, the raw position of points carries no meaning on its own.

  Their words

  The problem is that in dimensionality reduced plots of high-dimensional data, position doesn't explain the data points.

  colah.github.io

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Understanding a machine learning model and understanding the data it operates on are inseparable tasks.

  Their words

  Understanding data and understanding models that work on that data are intimately linked.

  colah.github.io

Assistant Professor of Computer Science at the University of Toronto; co-creator, with Diederik Kingma, of the Adam optimizer for training neural networks.

From one piece Kingma & Ba, "Adam: A Method for Stochastic Optimization" (arXiv) 4 beliefs, in the piece's order there

• Our readingkorrents.com

  An optimizer's hyper-parameters should mean something a practitioner can reason about, and should rarely need tuning.

  Their words

  The hyper-parameters have intuitive interpretations and typically require little tuning.

  arxiv.org

• Our readingkorrents.com

  The same optimizer should handle objectives that move under it and gradients that are noisy or sparse.

  Their words

  The method is also appropriate for non-stationary objectives and problems with very noisy and/or sparse gradients.

  arxiv.org

• Our readingkorrents.com

  An optimizer that is invariant to rescaling the gradients and cheap in memory is what makes very large models practical to train.

  Their words

  The method is straightforward to implement, is computationally efficient, has little memory requirements, is invariant to diagonal rescaling of the gradients, and is well suited for problems that are large in terms of data and/or parameters.

  arxiv.org

Research scientist at Anthropic; co-creator of the Variational Autoencoder and, with Jimmy Ba, of the Adam optimizer, two of the most widely used tools in deep learning.

From one piece Kingma & Ba, "Adam: A Method for Stochastic Optimization" (arXiv) 4 beliefs, in the piece's order there

• Our readingkorrents.com

  An optimizer's hyper-parameters should mean something a practitioner can reason about, and should rarely need tuning.

  Their words

  The hyper-parameters have intuitive interpretations and typically require little tuning.

  arxiv.org

• Our readingkorrents.com

  The same optimizer should handle objectives that move under it and gradients that are noisy or sparse.

  Their words

  The method is also appropriate for non-stationary objectives and problems with very noisy and/or sparse gradients.

  arxiv.org

• Our readingkorrents.com

  An optimizer that is invariant to rescaling the gradients and cheap in memory is what makes very large models practical to train.

  Their words

  The method is straightforward to implement, is computationally efficient, has little memory requirements, is invariant to diagonal rescaling of the gradients, and is well suited for problems that are large in terms of data and/or parameters.

  arxiv.org

Co-founder and chief executive of GiveWell, which researches where a donation buys the most measurable good and publishes the arithmetic behind its recommendations.

From one piece Staff members’ personal donations – giving season 2014 2 beliefs, in the piece's order there

• Our readingkorrents.com

  It is not appropriate to donate to your own employer, however good a giving opportunity it would otherwise be.

  Their words

  I’m not donating to GiveWell, because I don’t find it appropriate to donate to my employer, for similar reasons to what Holden wrote last year.

  blog.givewell.org

• Our readingkorrents.com

  An excellent organisation is significantly more likely to succeed than a weaker one, so organisational strength belongs in the decision about where to give.

  Their words

  This has reinforced my intuition that excellent organizations are significantly more likely to succeed than others, and GiveDirectly’s overall excellence increases my estimate of the impact it will achieve.

  blog.givewell.org

Co-founder of Y Combinator and Viaweb; essayist at paulgraham.com.

• Likedrcmnd.app

  Hilbert

  Their words

  A few months ago, as I was reading Constance Reid's excellent biography of Hilbert, I figured out if not the answer to this question, at least something that made me feel better about it.

  paulgraham.com

Freelance research analyst and writer of the blog Aceso Under Glass, known for 'epistemic spot checks' of non-fiction claims.

• Mixed onrcmnd.app

  Why Does He Do That

  Their words

  Overall, I think this book has some really good points and brings a lot to the table. It also propagates some really toxic ideas.

  acesounderglass.com

Programmer and writer on computer architecture, performance, and software reliability. He has worked on CPU design at Centaur Technology and on software at Google and Microsoft, and writes long-form technical essays at danluu.com.

From one piece Everything is broken 2 beliefs, in the piece's order there

• Our readingkorrents.com

  How much to test is an economic calculation a team should actually run, not a matter of principle.

  Their words

  The point isn't that you should definitely write more tests, it's that you should definitely do the math to see if you should write more tests.

  Everything is brokendanluu.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  A working programmer routinely works around hundreds of bugs a week in ordinary software, and the industry has normalised it.

  Their words

  If I had to guess, I'd say I probably work around hundreds of bugs in an average week, and thousands in a bad week.

  Everything is brokendanluu.com

Game designer; wrote A Theory of Fun for Game Design and worked on Ultima Online and Star Wars Galaxies.

From one piece Social media is broken 4 beliefs, in the piece's order there

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Social media designers routinely ignore what online-community design already established decades ago.

  Their words

  This matters because all of these lessons, which are well-established across many fields, are routinely ignored by social media designers.

  Social media is brokenraphkoster.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  The bigger a forum gets, the worse behaviour gets, because people come to care only about their standing inside a small subgroup.

  Their words

  The bigger the forum, the worse behavior problems get, as people splinter into smaller social groups, and only care about their reputations within that group.

  Social media is brokenraphkoster.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  People behave well towards each other where they expect to meet again; trust is a product of repeated interaction, not of identity.

  Their words

  It’s repeated interactions that drive trust, you see, and we behave well because we expect to be treated well in the future.

  Social media is brokenraphkoster.com

Co-founder and partner at Union Square Ventures in New York. Has written the AVC blog almost every day since 2003, on venture capital, startups, music and crypto.

• Readrcmnd.app

  The People’s Platform

  Their words

  So I’m reading it now and I thought you all might want to join me.

  avc.com

Programmer and writer on computer architecture, performance, and software reliability. He has worked on CPU design at Centaur Technology and on software at Google and Microsoft, and writes long-form technical essays at danluu.com.

From one piece Literature review on the benefits of static types 3 beliefs, in the piece's order there

• Our readingkorrents.com

  "There is no empirical evidence against my position" is not an argument for it.

  Their words

  Maybe, but if the strongest statement you can make for your position is that there's no empirical evidence against the position, that's not much of a position.

  danluu.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  He prefers languages with expressive type systems and has still never noticed them making him more productive or less bug-prone.

  Their words

  But while I like languages with expressive type systems, I haven't noticed that they make me more productive or less bug prone

  danluu.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  The empirical literature on static typing finds effects too small to matter, in the narrow settings it has managed to study.

  Their words

  The summary of the summary is that most studies find very small effects, if any.

  danluu.com

CEO of Vercel; creator of Next.js and Socket.IO. Writes at rauchg.com.

From one piece 7 principles of rich web applications 3 beliefs · rauchg.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  JavaScript should act immediately on user input to mask network latency, which should remove most spinners and loading messages.

  JavaScript

  Their words

  JavaScript allows us to mask network latency altogether. Applying this as a design principle should even remove most spinners or “loading” messages from your applications.

  7 principles of rich web applicationsrauchg.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  The distinction between websites and web apps will disappear: a blog and a CRM are reigned by the same UX principles.

  Their words

  A flexible enough system that can share rendering code between browser and server and provides tools for progressively loading scripts and styles will probably eliminate the colloquial distinction between websites and webapps. Both are reigned by the same UX principles. A blog and a CRM are fundamentally not that different.

  7 principles of rich web applicationsrauchg.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Minimizing network round trips is essential to a good user experience, because bandwidth keeps improving and latency will not.

  Their words

  The bandwidth capacity of your users' connections might improve noticeably, as it steadily has, but the latency needle won't move much at all. This means that minimizing the number of roundtrips you make to display information on page is essential to great user experience and responsiveness.

  7 principles of rich web applicationsrauchg.com

Public transit planning consultant; wrote Human Transit and argues that a network's shape follows from what a city decides it wants.

From one piece no, autonomous cars will not "abolish transit" in dense cities 3 beliefs, in the piece's order there

• Our readingkorrents.com

  In low-density places driverless taxis really will beat buses, and transit agencies should hand that work over and concentrate on dense corridors.

  Their words

  Driverless taxis will be more efficient than transit in these areas.

  humantransit.org

• Our readingkorrents.com

  No dense city anywhere runs without heavy reliance on transit, and no new transport technology changes the space arithmetic that makes that true.

  Their words

  There is no dense city in the world that does not rely heavily on transit, for reasons of space-efficiency that none of the new technologies can change.

  humantransit.org

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Self-driving cars will not fix commuting; the US needs public transportation instead.

  self-driving cars

  Their words

  However successful driverless cars become, transit will remain crucial for dense cities because cities are defined by a shortage of space per person.

  humantransit.org

Norwegian web pioneer who proposed Cascading Style Sheets in 1994 while at CERN, and was CTO of Opera Software. Also runs a small organic farm.

• Usesrcmnd.app

  Linux Mint

  Their words

  I currently run Linux Mint on the Thinkpad.

  usesthis.com

• Usestheir ownrcmnd.app

  Opera

  Their words

  Thereafter, I install the Opera browser.

  usesthis.com

• Likedtheir ownrcmnd.app

  Prince

  Their words

  Then comes Prince, which converts HTML and CSS to beautiful PDF files. (Disclosure: I'm the chairman of the board of YesLogic, the company behind Prince.)

  usesthis.com

Mathematician; Charles Simonyi Professor for the Public Understanding of Science and Professor of Mathematics at the University of Oxford, and author of The Music of the Primes and The Creativity Code.

• Recommendsrcmnd.app

  A Disappearing Number

  Their words

  And Complicite was really determined – which is why I like this play – not just to talk about mathematicians as crazy characters but also to embed the ideas of mathematics in the structure of the play, so they worked really hard to understand what Ramanujan and Hardy were obsessed with.

  fivebooks.com

• Recommendsrcmnd.app

  One, Two, Three...Infinity

  Their words

  Yes, one of the things that really excited me when I read this – again when I was at school – was this idea of infinity. Gamow was a physicist first of all: Mathematics is the language of physics and you can see that through this book.

  fivebooks.com

• Recommendsrcmnd.app

  Mr Tompkins in Paperback

  Their words

  There's another book by George Gamow which also turned me on, which is Mr Tompkins in Paperback. It's a set of physics lectures which this guy, Mr Tompkins, goes to and always falls asleep during the lecture and then he dreams he's in a world in which the speed of light is 30 miles an hour so he can see the effects of relativity happening on the streets.

  fivebooks.com

Cognitive scientist and designer; author of The Design of Everyday Things; co-founder of Nielsen Norman Group; former vice president at Apple; founding director of the Design Lab at UC San Diego.

• Our readingkorrents.com

  For designers, signifiers matter more than affordances: affordances control what is possible, signifiers are how a product communicates what to do.

  Their words

  Affordances control what actions are possible. For designers, signifiers are far more important. Signifiers are how communication takes place, how one signals the appropriate controls and operations.

  A Great Product Ruinedjnd.org

Former NASA flight director and space shuttle programme manager; writes about how the shuttle was actually flown and what went wrong.

From one piece Manifest Destiny or Pipe Dream? 2 beliefs, in the piece's order there

• Our readingkorrents.com

  The goal of spaceflight is the whole solar system, not any single destination the experts are arguing over.

  solar

  Their words

  The ‘horizon goal’ isn’t Mars, it is the entire solar system.

  Manifest Destiny or Pipe Dream?waynehale.wordpress.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Extending consciousness beyond Earth, out to the stars, is a fundamentally good goal.

  Their words

  When we have built colonies on every habitable niche, then maybe we will find a way to go to the stars.

  Manifest Destiny or Pipe Dream?waynehale.wordpress.com

Writer on learning and skill acquisition; author of Ultralearning and Get Better at Anything, known for the MIT Challenge and the Year Without English.

• Our reading nowkorrents.com

  Reaching a conversational level in a language within three months of arriving is not something to expect.

  On changing their mind

  When Vat and I initially made plans, neither of us were confident that it would be possible to reach a conversational level in any of the languages.

Writer on learning and skill acquisition; author of Ultralearning and Get Better at Anything, known for the MIT Challenge and the Year Without English.

From one piece Looking Back at a Year (Almost) Without English 3 beliefs, in the piece's order there

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Learning a language in a hurry and learning one by slow patient habit are both legitimate; neither refutes the other.

  Their words

  Just because we attempted to learn with intensity, doesn’t denigrate learning languages through slow, patient habit.

  Looking Back at a Year (Almost) Without Englishscotthyoung.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Asian languages are hard enough that arriving without preparation and refusing to speak English will not work.

  Their words

  The main takeaway I made from all of this was: Asian languages are hard, and attempting full-immersion without sufficient preparation is usually not going to work.

  Looking Back at a Year (Almost) Without Englishscotthyoung.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Refusing to speak English is what makes immersion work: it compresses years of language learning into months.

  Their words

  The no-English rule was largely what made the difference. Although there are many ways of learning a language, going for full immersion made it possible to learn what would have taken years in just a few months.

  Looking Back at a Year (Almost) Without Englishscotthyoung.com

Software developer and entrepreneur; co-founder of Heroku, author of The Twelve-Factor App, and a researcher at Ink & Switch.

• Lovedrcmnd.app

  Audacity

  Their words

  Audacity can't be beat for waveform editing despite not looking very pretty.

  usesthis.com

• Lovedrcmnd.app

  Anki

  Their words

  Right now I'm trying to learn a new spoken language, so Anki deserves a mention. This is a great flashcard authoring tool that syncs across platforms.

  usesthis.com

• Usesrcmnd.app

  Logic Pro

  Their words

  For creating music, Logic Pro is my main tool.

  usesthis.com

Cartoonist and comics theorist, author of Understanding Comics, Reinventing Comics, Making Comics and the graphic novel The Sculptor.

• Usesrcmnd.app

  Adobe Illustrator

  Their words

  Once the layouts are complete, I bring each page into Illustrator and do the lettering and borders there.

  usesthis.com

• Likedrcmnd.app

  Mac Pro

  Their words

  For years, I've happily used a succession of mid-range Mac Pros stuffed with extra memory and storage.

  usesthis.com

• Usesrcmnd.app

  Plantronics headset

  Their words

  I'm dictating this on a Plantronics headset to reduce typing (my remaining source of hand strain).

  usesthis.com

Co-founder and CEO of OpenAI; previously president of Y Combinator.

• Lovedrcmnd.app

  You and Your Research

  Their words

  Richard Hamming gave this talk in March of 1986. [1] It's one of the best talks I've ever read and has long impacted how I think about spending my time.

  blog.samaltman.com

Freelance research analyst and writer of the blog Aceso Under Glass, known for 'epistemic spot checks' of non-fiction claims.

• Likedrcmnd.app

  It's Always Something

  Their words

  And I think she did a really good job portraying that- the ups and downs, what a positive attitude can and can not get you, the costs and benefits of fighting doctors and using alternative treatments. It was a very honest description of both hope and despair without become overwhelming.

  acesounderglass.com

Creator of the Zig programming language; president and lead developer of the Zig Software Foundation.

• Mixed onrcmnd.app

  Bonobo Extreme

  Their words

  This thing is a monster. It's huge, bulky, and heavy.

  andrewkelley.me

Deep-learning researcher and Turing Award laureate; founder of the Mila institute.

From one piece Generative Adversarial Networks (with 7 co-authors) 2 beliefs, in the piece's order there

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Deep generative models have had less impact than discriminative models because of intractable probabilistic computations and difficulty using piecewise linear units.

  Their words

  Deep generative models have had less of an impact, due to the difficulty of approximating many intractable probabilistic computations that arise in maximum likelihood estimation and related strategies, and due to difficulty of leveraging the benefits of piecewise linear units in the generative context.

  arxiv.org

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Adversarial nets need neither Markov chains nor unrolled approximate inference networks for training or sample generation.

  Their words

  There is no need for any Markov chains or unrolled approximate inference networks during either training or generation of samples.

  arxiv.org

Author of The Talent Code, The Little Book of Talent and The Culture Code, writing on how skills and group cultures are built.

• Lovedrcmnd.app

  Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

  Their words

  Reading Susan Cain's book is like being handed a pair of X-ray glasses with which you can see everyone you know — including yourself — in a new and vivid light.

  danielcoyle.com

• Lovedrcmnd.app

  Give and Take: Why Helping Others Drives Our Success

  Their words

  This is one of those books chiefly because Adam Grant 1) is one helluva writer, teacher, and researcher; 2) provides a genuinely revolutionary way to look at cooperation, generosity, and human nature.

  danielcoyle.com

• Likedrcmnd.app

  Social Physics: The Lessons from a New Science

  Their words

  We usually think of those qualities as intangibles, but Sandy Pentland's new book makes them real, and, more important, measurable.

  danielcoyle.com

Programmer; makes Handmade Hero and teaches Performance-Aware Programming, and argues loudly about how software got slow.

From one piece Semantic Compression 4 beliefs, in the piece's order there

• Our readingkorrents.com

  The material that teaches people how to program is overwhelmingly bad, because the programmers who know how to do it well rarely think it is worth writing down.

  Their words

  the landscape of educational materials out there still overwhelmingly falls into the "objectively bad" category

  Semantic Compressioncaseymuratori.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Code is procedurally oriented rather than object-oriented: objects are just constructs that emerge to let procedures be reused.

  Their words

  Code is procedurally oriented, and the "objects" are simply constructs that arise that allow procedures to be reused.

  Semantic Compressioncaseymuratori.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Code written to be reusable before there is anything reusing it is likely to be reusable in the wrong way.

  Their words

  This is crucial for efficiency, because if you only have one example, or worse, no examples (in the case of code written preemptively), then you are very likely to make mistakes in the way you write it and end up with code that isn't conveniently reusable.

  Semantic Compressioncaseymuratori.com

Physicist and science communicator. Writes Backreaction and makes videos explaining new physics and astronomy results, frequently to argue that the headline about them overstates the case.

• Likedrcmnd.app

  The Cosmic Cocktail: Three Parts Dark Matter

  Their words

  Freese's book is a valuable, non-technical and yet up-to-date review, especially on the topic of dark matter detection.

  backreaction.blogspot.com

Game designer; lead designer of Street Fighter HD Remix, founder of Sirlin Games (Yomi, Puzzle Strike) and author of Playing to Win.

• Mixed onrcmnd.app

  Adobe Bridge CS6

  Their words

  To make contact sheets of card images, I use Adobe Bridge CS6 even though it's old. The newer Adobe Bridge CC mysteriously can't output anything anymore. (Literally, it no longer includes the "output module", WTF.)

  usesthis.com

• Usesrcmnd.app

  Adium

  Their words

  For instant messaging, Adium. For interviews, Skype. For stuff involving PDFs, Adobe Acrobat Pro.

  usesthis.com

• Likedrcmnd.app

  Time Machine

  Their words

  For backups, I use Apple's Time Machine. I have only ever had to actually use Time Machine for recovery about 3 times, but each time I was incredibly relieved that I had it.

  usesthis.com

Creator of the Zig programming language; president and lead developer of the Zig Software Foundation.

• Lovedrcmnd.app

  Amarok 1.4

  Their words

  Back in 2009, my music player of choice was Amarok 1.4. This was by far the best music player I had ever used on Windows, Mac, or Linux, especially when combined with the wonderful ReplayGain plugin.

  andrewkelley.me

• Recommendsrcmnd.app

  Introduction to EBU R128

  Their words

  I recommend this excellent Introduction to EBU R128 by Florian Camerer:

  andrewkelley.me

Web developer and writer; an early GitHub employee, author of speaking.io and of widely read essays on startups and product.

• Lovedrcmnd.app

  Ruby

  Their words

  I tend to build things with Ruby, and I'm pretty in love with that language even after all these years.

  usesthis.com

• Usesrcmnd.app

  Rails

  Their words

  If it's on the web, I'm usually using Rails to build it, with the exception of some smaller apps where I'll still drop down to Sinatra from time to time.

  usesthis.com

• Usesrcmnd.app

  Boxen

  Their words

  My development environment is managed by Boxen, Homebrew, and my dotfiles. I'm feeling good about all of that, which wasn't always the case if you were a Ruby developer five years ago.

  usesthis.com

Physicist and science communicator. Writes Backreaction and makes videos explaining new physics and astronomy results, frequently to argue that the headline about them overstates the case.

• Recommendsrcmnd.app

  Quantum Mechanics: The Theoretical Minimum

  Their words

  If you want to make the step from popular science literature to textbooks and the general scientific literature, then this book series is a must-read.

  backreaction.blogspot.com

Software engineer who led Google's webspam team for over a decade and later served as administrator of the United States Digital Service.

• Likedrcmnd.app

  Uni-ball Signo

  Their words

  an extra pen in a snack baggie (I like brown Uni-ball Signo 0.5mm pens from Maido)

  usesthis.com

• Usesrcmnd.app

  Gandi

  Their words

  I use Gandi to register my domains – they now offer two-factor authentication too.

  usesthis.com

• Usesrcmnd.app

  Brother MFC-9840CDW

  Their words

  I've got a Brother MFC-9840CDW wireless printer that can also fax ancient institutions that don't understand the Internet yet.

  usesthis.com

Writes Stratechery, a subscription newsletter on the business and strategy of technology, and hosts the Dithering and Sharp Tech podcasts.

• Recommendstheir ownrcmnd.app

  Asianometry

  Their words

  Audio and transcripts of the Asianometry YouTube channel, the best source for learning about how tech works.

  stratechery.com

Co-founder of AngelList. Writes and podcasts at nav.al in short, aphoristic pieces on startups, wealth and judgement rather than long essays.

• Recommendsrcmnd.app

  The Salmon of Doubt

  Their words

  That article is also in his collected-essay book, "The Salmon of Doubt." Recommended.

  x.com

Economist and political scientist at the University of Chicago's Harris School, studying conflict, organised crime and development; author of Why We Fight.

From one piece Are cash transfers overrated? 5 beliefs, in the piece's order there

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Some aid programmes will beat cash at solving a specific problem, but few will beat it at simply making poor people less poor.

  Their words

  I’m more skeptical we’ll see better alternatives for pure poverty-alleviation, but we’ll see.

  Are cash transfers overrated?chrisblattman.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Comparing randomised trials of cash against NGOs’ own claims for their programmes is not a fair comparison.

  Their words

  The evidence they cite in favor of cash points to peer reviewed randomized trials. The evidence on better performing programs point to… NGO home pages.

  Are cash transfers overrated?chrisblattman.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Many aid programmes will beat cash on cost-effectiveness, and the ones that do will be those that fix a market failure or a supply problem.

  Their words

  There will be, I am confident, a great many interventions that do better than cash on any number of metrics. Ones that solve market failures or supply problems are big candidates, just like Starr and Hattendorf say.

  Are cash transfers overrated?chrisblattman.com

Chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway from 1970 to 2025, when Greg Abel became CEO; chairman as of 2026. Wrote the annual Letters to Berkshire Shareholders from 1977 to 2024, read closely across the investing world for decades.

• Our readingkorrents.com

  His advice to his own estate's trustee is the same advice he gives everyone: almost all of it into a low-cost S&P 500 index fund, not with a high-fee manager.

  government

  Their words

  My advice to the trustee could not be more simple: Put 10% of the cash in short-term government bonds and 90% in a very low-cost S&P 500 index fund. (I suggest Vanguard’s.) I believe the trust’s long-term results from this policy will be superior to those attained by most investors – whether pension funds, institutions or individuals – who employ high-fee managers.

  Berkshire Hathaway 2013 Chairman's Letterberkshirehathaway.com

Freelance research analyst and writer of the blog Aceso Under Glass, known for 'epistemic spot checks' of non-fiction claims.

• Recommendsrcmnd.app

  High Price

  Their words

  So if you're either looking for an introduction to this issue or share my very strange definition of light reading, I highly recommend this book.

  acesounderglass.com

Programmer and writer known for detailed source code reviews of classic game engines, and author of the Game Engine Black Book series on Wolfenstein 3D and DOOM.

• Recommendsrcmnd.app

  The Algorithm Design Manual

  Their words

  The Algorithm Design Manual by Steven S Skiena.

  fabiensanglard.net

• Recommendsrcmnd.app

  The Art of Computer Programming

  Their words

  The Art of Computer Programming by Donald E. Knuth.

  fabiensanglard.net

• Recommendsrcmnd.app

  Programming Interviews Exposed

  Their words

  Programming Interviews Exposed is a slim book that can be read within a few hours.

  fabiensanglard.net

Co-founder of Center Centre and founder of UIE; a user-experience researcher and teacher since 1978.

From one piece Design is the Rendering of Intent 2 beliefs · articles.centercentre.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Everyone who renders their intention is a designer, so the experienced designer's role shifts from owning the outcome to teaching the rest of the team to render theirs.

  Their words

  The notion of the academically-trained, experienced designer holding the keys to the design outcome fades with this definition. In fact, when we think about design in these terms, it becomes clear that many of the people rendering their intention don’t know they are designers. This implies the role of the experienced designer shifts from owning the design outcome to educating all the other designers on the team on how to best render their own intentions.

  Design is the Rendering of Intentarticles.centercentre.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Design is the rendering of intent: the designer imagines an outcome and puts forth activities to make it real.

  Their words

  Over the last year, we’ve started explaining design as “the rendering of intent.” The designer imagines an outcome and puts forth activities to make that outcome real.

  Design is the Rendering of Intentarticles.centercentre.com

Independent game developer, creator of the colony simulation RimWorld and author of Designing Games: A Guide to Engineering Experiences. Previously worked on BioShock Infinite.

From one piece Email dredging: Cutting polish and nonlinear results 5 beliefs, in the piece's order there

• Our readingkorrents.com

  What a finished work is remembered for comes down to a few key pieces, and most of the work that went into it barely matters.

  Their words

  the final experience often comes down to just a few key pieces or insights.

  tynansylvester.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  A small studio’s advantage over a large one is the ability to change direction fast, not the ability to out-polish it.

  Their words

  Our advantage is agility and lack of corporate cultural encumbrance.

  tynansylvester.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  The way to find a hit is to experiment a lot, not to polish.

  Their words

  I don’t think the answer is “polish”. It think it’s “experiment”.

  tynansylvester.com

Guardian columnist and environmental campaigner; wrote Feral and Regenesis, and argues for rewilding and against the food system as it is.

• Our reading nowkorrents.com

  Meat raised on feed humans cannot eat, on land that cannot grow crops, can be eaten with a clear conscience.

  Their words, before

  But if we were to adopt it, we could eat meat, milk and eggs (albeit much less) with a clean conscience.

  Their words now

  In the spirit of unceasing self-flagellation I think I might have been wrong about being wrong.

• Our reading nowkorrents.com

  Meat produced from waste and rangeland is efficient enough that giving up meat is not the only ethical answer to world hunger.

  Their words, before

  I no longer believe that the only ethical response is to stop eating meat.

  Their words now

  I was swayed by his argument. But now I find myself becoming unswayed. In the spirit of unceasing self-flagellation I think I might have been wrong about being wrong.

Guardian columnist and environmental campaigner; wrote Feral and Regenesis, and argues for rewilding and against the food system as it is.

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Grazing livestock on land too poor for crops does more environmental damage per unit of meat than feeding grain to animals does.

  Their words

  Wasteful and destructive as feeding grain to livestock is, ranching appears to be even worse.

  Wrong About Being Wrongmonbiot.com

British designer and technologist; co-founder of the design studio BERG, which made Little Printer, and writer of the blog Interconnected.

• Usestheir ownrcmnd.app

  Little Printer

  Their words

  At home I use my Little Printer daily

  usesthis.com

• Lovedrcmnd.app

  iPhone 5C

  Their words

  The 5C? A gorgeous object, a great frame for iOS 7 – easier to hold too and less fragile.

  usesthis.com

• Likedrcmnd.app

  Sony NEX-5N

  Their words

  My camera: Sony NEX-5N with the pancake kit lens so it fits in the front pocket of my bag. Plus: no zoom. Less to think about.

  usesthis.com

Computer science professor who works on fast data processing; co-author of the simdjson parser and a weekly blogger about software performance since 2004.

• Usesrcmnd.app

  Ubuntu

  Their words

  I use an Ubuntu distro for Linux, mostly because it is the most popular option.

  usesthis.com

• Likedrcmnd.app

  Prezi

  Their words

  When I give presentations, I like to use Prezi.

  usesthis.com

• Usesrcmnd.app

  Omnigraffle

  Their words

  When I need to draw diagrams, I use Omnigraffle.

  usesthis.com

Statistician and Chief Scientist at Posit (RStudio). Author of the ggplot2, dplyr and tidyverse R packages and of books on R programming and data science.

• Usesrcmnd.app

  Keynote

  Their words

  I present from Keynote and loathe Beamer.

  usesthis.com

• Lovedrcmnd.app

  Wordament

  Their words

  My current favourite iPhone game is Wordament.

  usesthis.com

• Usesrcmnd.app

  Arq

  Their words

  I use Time Machine + an external HDD for local backups (I've given up trying to use it over wireless), and Arq for remote backups to S3.

  usesthis.com

Founding executive editor of Wired and author of What Technology Wants and The Inevitable. Writes at kk.org and runs its long-running recommendation projects, True Films and Cool Tools.

• Lovedaffiliate linkrcmnd.app

  Kumare

  Their words

  The true parable is spellbinding, funny, moving, and profound. A must-see.

  kk.org

Clinical psychologist and clinical professor of psychiatry at UCSF. His 2010 meta-analysis established psychodynamic therapy as an evidence-based treatment; he has argued ever since that "evidence-based therapy" is used as a marketing term.

From one piece Evidence-Based Therapy: Science or Marketing? 2 beliefs · psychologytoday.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  No research ever showed manualized CBT to be more effective than psychodynamic therapy; it was only studied more often.

  PsychotherapyPsychodynamic therapyCBT

  Their words

  No research ever suggested that manualized CBT was more effective than psychodynamic therapy. It was just more often researched. There is a world of difference between saying a treatment is less often researched and saying it has been scientifically discredited.

  Evidence-Based Therapy: Science or Marketing?psychologytoday.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  "Evidence-based therapy" is a branding term rather than a scientific one, and in practice it is a code word for "not psychodynamic".

  PsychotherapyPsychodynamic therapy

  Their words

  The term "evidence-based therapy" is also, de facto, a code word for "not psychodynamic."

  Evidence-Based Therapy: Science or Marketing?psychologytoday.com

Clinical psychologist and clinical professor of psychiatry at UCSF. His 2010 meta-analysis established psychodynamic therapy as an evidence-based treatment; he has argued ever since that "evidence-based therapy" is used as a marketing term.

• Recommendstheir ownrcmnd.app

  The efficacy of psychodynamic psychotherapy

  Their words

  The efficacy of psychodynamic psychotherapy [pdf] Hailed as a contemporary classic and studied in training programs around the world—the paper that established psychodynamic therapy as an evidence-based treatment

  jonathanshedler.com

• Recommendstheir ownrcmnd.app

  The illusion of mental health

  Their words

  The illusion of mental health [pdf] Scientific evidence that we do not know our hearts and minds and must look past the surface—a classic in the field

  jonathanshedler.com

• Recommendstheir ownrcmnd.app

  Where is the evidence for “evidence-based” therapy?

  Their words

  Where is the evidence for “evidence-based” therapy? [pdf] Few patients who get “evidence-based therapy” get well

  jonathanshedler.com

Journalist, editor and typesetter covering technology and printing history; wrote for TidBITS and the Economist and published The Magazine.

• Usesrcmnd.app

  Tweetbot

  Their words

  My desktop and iOS Twitter client is Tweetbot, and I use Kiwi for App.net on my Mac and Netbot for iOS.

  usesthis.com

• Likedrcmnd.app

  CSSEdit 2.5

  Their words

  I admit a bit guiltily that for previewing and designing CSS, I turn to MacRabbit's CSSEdit 2.5, a version that's no longer shipping, as its functionality was absorbed into the company's Espresso Web site development software.

  usesthis.com

• Mixed onrcmnd.app

  Skype

  Their words

  Skype is invaluable. However irritating it can be, and however much I dislike the user-interface changes in the 5.x client update for Mac, it's still something I rely on.

  usesthis.com

Mac and iOS developer; founder of Red Sweater Software (MarsEdit, FastScripts) and co-host of the Core Intuition podcast.

• Usesrcmnd.app

  OmniFocus

  Their words

  I use OmniFocus on both my Mac and iOS to keep my To-Do lists in check.

  usesthis.com

• Usesrcmnd.app

  TextExpander

  Their words

  I mentioned FastScripts for running quick scripts, but I also use TextExpander extensively, particularly for accelerating responses to customer support email.

  usesthis.com

• Usesrcmnd.app

  Backblaze

  Their words

  Acorn for casual image editing, Skitch (1.0 forever!) for easy screen captures, Rdio for infinite music, and backups courtesy of Backblaze, Time Machine and SuperDuper

  usesthis.com

Web infrastructure engineer and standards editor; chaired the IETF HTTP working group and co-authored core HTTP and Atom specifications.

• Likedrcmnd.app

  Terminal.app

  Their words

  Terminal.app is good enough; I don't need tabs. I use bash (big surprise).

  usesthis.com

• Mixed onrcmnd.app

  Fedora

  Their words

  All of my servers are currently running Fedora, although I'm starting to dabble with Ubuntu, as some of the daemons in Fedora 18 are a bit memory-hungry.

  usesthis.com

• Usesrcmnd.app

  Apple Wired Compact Keyboard

  Their words

  I use an Apple Wired Compact Keyboard so that I don't have to reach too far to the right to use the mouse, an Apple Magic Mouse.

  usesthis.com

Mathematical physicist at UC Riverside. Wrote This Week's Finds in Mathematical Physics and now the Azimuth blog on mathematics, physics and environmental science.

• Usesrcmnd.app

  IrfanView

  Their words

  I spend a lot of time writing papers and preparing talks with free software: emacs for text editing, LaTeX for typesetting, and IrfanView for editing images.

  usesthis.com

• Usesrcmnd.app

  Yamaha Clavinova

  Their words

  But I also like improvising in more traditional ways. I play an electronic piano, a Yamaha Clavinova, and also drums: a dumbek and a couple of frame drums.

  usesthis.com

• Usesrcmnd.app

  WolframTones

  Their words

  I've been recording electronic music using strange software like WolframTones, which lets you 'evolve' pieces using cellular automata, or QuasiMusic which generates sounds mathematically from quasicrystals - patterns that almost repeat but never quite do.

  usesthis.com

Game designer; wrote A Theory of Fun for Game Design and worked on Ultima Online and Star Wars Galaxies.

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Free-to-play games use the same techniques as gambling machines in order to maximise what players spend and how long they stay.

  Their words

  In the sense that social games make use of many of the same techniques as gambling games do in order to maximize financial spend and retention, yes.

  Social games vs gamblingraphkoster.com

Co-founder and chief strategy officer of Intercom; writes and speaks about product strategy, customer support and, lately, what AI does to both.

From one piece Product strategy means saying no 3 beliefs · intercom.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  A real product decision says a proposal is a great idea and still turns it down for something else.

  Their words

  Real product decisions aren’t easy. They require you to look at a proposal and say “This is a really great idea, I can see why our customers would like it. Well done. But we’re not going to build it. Instead, here’s what we’re doing.”.

  Product strategy means saying nointercom.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Whether a feature is quick to build is a roadmap question, never a reason on its own to build it.

  Their words

  The main problem with this argument is that the scope of work should never be a reason to include a feature in a product.

  Product strategy means saying nointercom.com

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Building a great product means being great at saying no -- not maybe, not later, no.

  Their words

  If you’re building a product, you have to be great at saying no. Not “maybe” or “later”. The only word is no. Building a great product isn’t about creating tons of tactically useful features which are tangentially related.

  Product strategy means saying nointercom.com

Co-founder of Superlogical, started in 2026 to build server-side terminal infrastructure; creator of Ghostty. Co-founded HashiCorp and created Vagrant and Terraform before that.

• Usestheir ownrcmnd.app

  Vagrant

  Their words

  Vagrant, of course. I virtualize almost everything. Why do anything on your real computer when you can create a perfect sandboxed environment to do it instead?

  usesthis.com

• Usesrcmnd.app

  Google Chrome

  Their words

  I browse the internet using Google Chrome.

  usesthis.com

• Usesrcmnd.app

  Seagate 1 TB external hard drive

  Their words

  I carry around a 1 TB SeaGate external hard drive that has saved virtual machines of almost every version of every major operating system imaginable

  usesthis.com

Cryptographer; created Signal and the Signal Protocol, and writes occasionally about cryptography, web3 and sailing.

From one piece We Should All Have Something To Hide 3 beliefs, in the piece's order there

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Having nothing to hide is not a reason to accept surveillance.

  Their words

  You probably do have something to hide, you just don’t know it yet.

  We Should All Have Something To Hidemoxie.org

• Our readingkorrents.com

  When everyone is monitored and everyone breaks some obscure law, punishment stops being lawful and becomes purely selective.

  Their words

  Police already abuse the immense power they have, but if everyone’s every action were being monitored, and everyone technically violates some obscure law at some time, then punishment becomes purely selective. Those in power will essentially have what they need to punish anyone they’d like, whenever they choose, as if there were no rules at all.

  We Should All Have Something To Hidemoxie.org

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Legal change usually begins as lawbreaking, so perfectly effective enforcement would freeze a society in place.

  Their words

  What’s often overlooked, however, is that these legal victories would probably not have been possible without the ability to break the law.

  We Should All Have Something To Hidemoxie.org

Computer scientist teaching at Princeton; spent three decades at Bell Labs in the group that produced Unix, C and C++, and co-authored The C Programming Language and The Practice of Programming.

• Usesrcmnd.app

  Sam

  Their words

  I use Rob Pike's Sam editor most of the time – that's what I'm using right now – and vi the rest of the time, because I know it well enough that there's no need to think.

  usesthis.com

• Lovedrcmnd.app

  Alpine

  Their words

  As the last representative of the dinosaur era, I read mail mostly with Alpine, which is faster and easier than any web-based system I know, and does a nice job of storing my mail locally.

  usesthis.com

• Usestheir ownrcmnd.app

  Awk

  Their words

  I write really short things in Awk, and use Python for longer text processing applications.

  usesthis.com