You may notice something different on your favourite blog. Left of the URL in the address bar there is a little green lock! This means piks.nl is now served to you via SSL/TLS. You know, https:// instead of http://. This means the connection, and therefore, traffic between you and the website is more secure, because it is encrypted. This was way overdue, even more so because it’s oh so easy now with Let’s Encrypt. Let’s… Read More »Let’s encrypt all the things!
Sure, I am not the biggest Star Wars fan. Not by a long shot. But I do have a mild admiration for the first original trilogy, which made quite an impression on my younger self (he is Lukes’ father! Go figure). And like most people I can look past the quality of the later trilogy. So last years’ Star Wars movie (I guess that’s a thing now) was a bit of a… Read More »Rogue One: one is enough for me (spoilers)
Best-of lists signify another year is coming to a close. People feel a need to sort and order things to make room for what is to come. Or something like that. So here is an assorted list of best new things I found in 2016. Things can be anything, as long as it was new to me in 2016. Feel free to share your list in the comments. Best new app Google Photos… Read More »Best of 2016
Last week Google was kind enough to provide me a Chromebook. I had been eyeing one for some time, but I had no reason why I would need one. I have a laptop, smartphone and a tablet. So what would a Chromebook add? Well, now I know. TL;DR: I love the Chromebook! The good Reasons are actually pretty obvious. It is a laptop but it is light, small, cool, quiet and has… Read More »My Chromebook Acer C730E-C480 review
Last week I had the chance to visit China, specifically Hong Kong, Shenzhen and Shanghai. These are my observations of China, completely biased and uninformed, for personal future reference. My conclusion after many many trips, over many years, over most of the country: Almost anything you want to say about China is true. — Kevin Kelly (@kevin2kelly) October 19, 2015 I thought about this tweet a lot last week. Even though I was… Read More »China Observations
Snapchat is everywhere these days. And with everywhere, I mean a lot of people are talking about it like it’s some sort of elusive enigma only the young kids are able to tune in to. The digital equivalent of high pitched notes. What makes it so hard to grasp, what’s different about it and what’s important about it. Let’s dissect, shall we. Different Snapchat is unlike any other application that you’re… Read More »Snapchat
Today’s big news is that Microsoft has made bash available on Windows 10. No container, no virtual machine, no recompiled sources: Here, we’re talking about bit-for-bit, checksum-for-checksum Ubuntu ELF binaries running directly in Windows. This opens up a world of possibilities. A world also previously within reach alas be it with lesser solutions. This means being able to use awk, grep, find, vim, wget, ls, git(!), package management and everything that is… Read More »Ubuntu on Windows
In 2004 I picked up this book about Donald J. Trump. Published in 1987, it is a story about the, then just, 40 year old Trump’s insane real estate successes. And I was genuinely interested. From what I knew then, Trump was the poster child of decadent 80’s Manhattan mega fortune makers. But around the same time his TV show started, and my interest dwindled. I had better things to do than read about… Read More »Trump – The Art of the Deal
I’ve always loved timelines. Visually seeing where things are in time resonates pretty strongly with me. This love goes back to my earliest memories of the dentists’ office where a huge year-round calendar hung on the wall. It had 12 distinct vertical columns and every day had its own little box. Maybe it’s because of the physical pain that went with those visits, but this calendar is cemented in my mind. It’s what… Read More »My January timeline
Most end-of-year lists are compiled of songs from that current year. That’s fine and all, but great music is timeless and you might discover things later, so my list will be a bit different. These are things I discovered last year, some old some new. I don’t use Spotify or other streaming services. I keep my ears open, read music blogs and watch what Youtube suggests. Works pretty fine for me! So here we… Read More »My music discoveries of 2015
So you read the previous post and now you’re wondering what podcasts to listen to. Well you’re in luck, because this post will tell you. What’s to like? But first, why listen to podcasts anyway? Sure enough, it might not be for everyone. But if you don’t mind listening to people talking, you should be alright. I myself, am a pretty big (public) talk radio fan. Mostly because public radio doesn’t play my type of music anyway, but also… Read More »My Favorite Podcasts
ren·ais·sance (rĕn′ĭ-säns′, -zäns′, rĭ-nā′səns) 1. A rebirth or revival. 2. A situation or period of time when there is a new interest in something that has not been popular in a long time. Podcasts have been around for years. I never really had a particular interest in them. I mean, it’s literally an MP3 of people talking. How hard is that? That can’t be very interesting. So in my memory,… Read More »Podcast Renaissance