This is only the fifth time that The Atlantic has endorsed a candidate for president, and three of those endorsements has been in opposition to Donald Trump. The other two were for Abraham Lincoln and Lyndon Johnson. (Yes, The Atlantic has been published continuously for 167 years. That makes it the third longest running periodical in US history—only Scientific American and Harper’s Magazine have had longer runs. Notably, Scientific American also endorsed Harris against Trump—only its second endorsement ever.)

Speaking of The Atlantic, it’s the rare magazine that’s expanding its print edition and staff. I’ve been a subscriber for a while, and it’s probably the best sub I’ve got.

John Gruber, writing at Daring Fireball:

It doesn’t feel like merely a minor inconvenience for having contributed to U.S. political campaigns in the past — it feels like punishment. Like anyone who gives to a political campaign is a sucker. It’s absolutely infuriating. I care deeply about U.S. politics, particularly in this ongoing Trump era, but these spam text messages absolutely have made me less willing to contribute money to campaigns and causes I believe in. Political consultants may well have analytics that show that these spams-to-people-who’ve-previously-donated-money-to-our-side “work”, but for me — and many of my friends — it has had the opposite effect. I’ve contributed significantly less money this year than in 2020 — and I now avoid ever donating small amounts to down-ballot campaigns — and the one and only reason why is that I’m annoyed that my previous contributions directly led Democratic campaigns and PACs to send me a zillion spam texts. Not only have I never, in my life, given a penny to any group whom I feel is spamming me, but this has made me gun-shy about contributing any money at all. I’ll never ever give out my actual phone number or email address to any political campaign ever again. They clearly have no respect for my time and attention. I think they’ve talked themselves into thinking this strategy “works” because it works for some of the previous donors they spam with new solicitations, but their analytics won’t show the people like me who just stop or greatly decrease their contributions without clicking any of their links. I suppose their analytics can count the “STOP” responses I’ve started sending, but I doubt they can correlate those “STOP”s with my drop-off in contributions.

Man, this perfectly states how I feel as well. I’ve been sitting out donating this season because of this feeling. Unlike Gruber, I haven’t found the “STOP” to work at all, and wish that Apple’s functionality to block and report did more.

Umar Shakir, writing at The Verge:

“In an email to The Verge, GM spokesperson Kevin Kelly said that as the company builds its future, it needs to “simplify for speed and excellence, make bold choices, and prioritize the investments that will have the greatest impact,” which includes laying off “certain teams” in the software and services organization.”

…

“The software and services division includes teams that work on vehicle infotainment and OnStar services.”

Here’s what they said about cutting out CarPlay and Android Auto back in March:

“…we will be offering new content, features, and servicesthat help connect customers to their digital lives. A cornerstone of this strategy involves creating integrated experiences that transform how customers engage with their vehicles…”

I’m sure their “integrated experiences” will be super great! /s

Jess Weatherbed, writing at The Verge:

CarPlay isn’t “consistent with how we think about really creating a pure product experience,” Scaringe said.

Then I guess I’m out. I was hoping they’d come around by the time the R2 and R3 were released, but this seems definitive that they have made up their minds. I won’t buy a vehicle that doesn’t have CarPlay support.

“We recognize that it’ll take us time to fully capture every feature that’s in CarPlay, and hopefully, customers are seeing that. I think it often gets more noise than it deserves,” Scaringe said in the interview.”

It’s not about just features! I believe that it’s possible for Rivian to have a good user experience on its screens; I haven’t used it, but it generally seems well-regarded. But it can’t ever support the apps I want to use without essentially being an iOS device. I user Overcast for podcasts, GaiaGPS and OnX for some navigation, among many other apps that just will not be on the Rivian. And sure, they might make a decent podcast app someday, but I’m not going to use theirs in that car and another everywhere else.

Too bad, too: I love the look of the R2 and R3, and have a deposit down. I’ll leave it with them, in case they get enough pushback to change their mind before those come out, but I’ll cancel if they don’t.

I’ve only dipped my toe into visionOS 2, but I have to say that the two new gestures—to toggle the home screen, and to get a widget with the time and volume controls—are really nice improvements. They seem small—and they are—but they really make the ergonomics nicer than I expected. Also very nice: being able to break video in Safari out into the native “fullscreen” player, with the built-in environments available.

Fascinating results from a study published by the University of Maryland School of Public Health:

“Surprisingly, KN95 masks – the disposable masks used widely – were no more effective than cloth or surgical masks. The study found that a common brand of KN95 masks leak more air than duckbills or other studied masks, because they don’t conform to the face well. That flaw is compounded by a powerful filter with more flow resistance that pushes air out of the mask at the sides instead of through the filter, allowing more virus particles to escape into the surrounding air.”

…

“Cloth masks also outperformed both KN95 and surgical masks. Milton theorizes that cloth masks with greater coverage, wrap around the face and give a better seal than either KN95 or surgical masks. With cloth mask filters, flow resistance is also lower, allowing breath to pass through the filter and not leak out the sides of the mask.”

Wow, this really is surprising! I’ve been wearing the KN95 masks because they seem like they’d be significantly more effective, given the better fit compared with surgical masks and tighter feel over cloth. This really does underline why we need these studies: what might seem obvious or logical is not always true in practice.

Emma Roth, writing at The Verge:

“Apple is planning to introduce a new app called Passwords to help users manage their login information, according to a report from Bloomberg. The company will reportedly introduce the device at its Worldwide Developers Conference event next week.

…

"The new app is expected to make its debut in iOS 18, iPadOS 18, and macOS 15. As noted by Bloomberg, Passwords will be able to generate and store passwords, similar to password managers such as LastPass and 1Password.”

I admit I’m torn about this. On one hand, 1password has been a staple of my computing life for more than a decade. On the other, there’s no doubt that a first-party app could integrate more seamlessly, and 1password has been focused on corporate users more than individuals like myself for some time now.

There’s been quite an anti-1password sentiment online since 1password 8 came out, having dropped a lot of the native Mac core in favor of a more cross-platform Rust-based core. I was one of those who was skeptical of the move, but 1P8 has worked pretty well for me. I also sympathize with how hard it must be to make a type of app that Apple doesn’t really make easy; Safari integration in particular has to be hard for an app like 1password.

I also like the fact that not all my eggs are in the Apple basket, and losing my Apple account won’t also lose all of the things in 1password too. As I write this, I’m talking myself into sticking with 1password, but would love smoother integration. Like when Safari autofills confirmation codes from Messages…so nice! But I don’t trust Apple to not introduce a Passwords app and then leave it neglected for years. I hope as Apple introduces its own app, it also extends integration APIs, so that 1password can fight on a level playing field.

“With this new capability, users will now get an ‘[Item] Found Moving With You’ alert on their device if an unknown Bluetooth tracking device is seen moving with them over time, regardless of the platform the device is paired with.

…

"If a user gets such an alert on their iOS device, it means that someone else’s AirTag, Find My accessory, or other industry specification-compatible Bluetooth tracker is moving with them.”

I’m happy to see a cross-company effort to make this work for Android users as well as iOS users. Striking the right balance between alerting a user appropriately and sending confusing messages is hard, though. In two recent cases, I saw confusing false positives. In the first, I was staying in a house for a week with a team of co-workers. We all got warnings that each others’ AirTags were seen with us for too long, and some of the less tech savvy members of the team were alerted that unknown AirTags had been near them for too long, which concerned them. Of course it was true: I had AirTags in my own bags (as did others in the group), and we’d all been together for a long enough time to trigger the warning. In the next incident, I was on a long international flight, and personally got over a dozen such notifications, I’m sure triggered by all the fellow passengers who’d put AirTags in their luggage and been traveling near me for hours.

I’m worried that such false positives will lessen the impact of the messages in the case of a real, maliciously planted tracker, but I don’t have a good solution.

David Zipper, writing at Fast Company:

“With the Malibu’s demise, GM will no longer sell any sedans in the U.S. In that regard, it will have plenty of company. Ford stopped producing sedans for the U.S. market in 2018. And it was Sergio Marchionne, the former head of Stellantis, who triggered the headlong retreat in 2016 when he declared that Dodge and Chrysler would stop making sedans.”

So unfortunate that we are now clogging our roads with cumbersome, mostly hideous SUVs.

When asked, automakers are quick to blame the sedan’s decline on shifting consumer preferences. Americans simply want bigger cars, the story goes, and there’s some truth to it. Compared to sedans, many SUV and pickup models provide extra cargo space and give the driver more visibility on the highway. In a crash, those inside a heavier car have a better chance of escaping without injury—although the same can’t be said for pedestrians or those in other vehicles.

As the article points out later: if everyone drives a big SUV, which is pretty much the case these days, no one has “more visibility”, nor do they have a “better chance of escaping without injury”. Now we’re just stuck on a new playing field—one littered with big, inefficient vehicles.

This is an unmitigated disaster. Bigger vehicles have their place: I own a big van, and have owned a large truck; both had their purpose, and that purpose was not regular driving. I harbor no resentment towards those who truly need specialized vehicles. But for those who have them merely because they like to be bigger on the road, we should exact a cost: tax the behemoths for their disproportionate impact to our society. Give people economic disincentives to behave this way, and perhaps people will drive regular-sized cars again, and we won’t have to worry about being the smaller vehicle in a crash.

Apologies for the Apple News link to The Wall Street Journal, but it’s the only way I read the WSJ. This link is worth the effort, as it is a truly charming story of a man who has fought for $3,000 in back pay from the government for over a decade, improbably landing all the way to the Supreme Court. Despite the winding road, it’s filled with optimism and promise.