Baldur Bjarnason
@baldurbjarnason.com
2.9K followers 430 following 5.6K posts
Writer, web developer and consultant based in Hveragerði, Iceland. Lapsed Interactive Media Academic. Webby Tech Stuff and webby book stuff. https://www.baldurbjarnason.com/ https://softwarecrisis.dev/
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baldurbjarnason.com
I figure since there's been a recent influx of people here on Bluesky, it might be worthwhile to do "highlights reels" of sorts for my newsletter, which is at www.baldurbjarnason.com

The biggest topic on my newsletter is software and web development, usually from a bit of a systemic perspective.
Reposted by Baldur Bjarnason
uglyreykjavik.bsky.social
It doesn't look very safe.

#Iceland #Reykjavik #photography #streetphotography #decay #door #windows #balcony #concrete #rust
A very small rusty balcony on a run down building with broken windows and cracked concrete.
Reposted by Baldur Bjarnason
courtneymilan.com
Them: need help doing things?

Me: yes

Them: we have a doing things medication

Me: ooh

Them: hahahahaha guess what you have to do to get it?

Me: oh no

Them: things.
Reposted by Baldur Bjarnason
pfischer.bsky.social
Choosing Marilyn Monroe as an example for this is a prime -- and dark -- demonstration of how AI slop's core purpose is the erasure of consent for everyone, from the artists whose work has been stolen to the performers the user turns into lifeless puppets
baldurbjarnason.com
Media Notes (October 2025)

www.baldurbjarnason.com/notes/2025/m...

Some of the stuff I've been watching, a surprising amount of which is available on YouTube of all places.
Media Notes (October 2025)
Web dev at the end of the world, from Hveragerði, Iceland
www.baldurbjarnason.com
baldurbjarnason.com
I completely missed out on movabletype back in the day, but IIRC it had a bunch of interesting ideas that other systems never picked up.
baldurbjarnason.com
The most common forum used today seems to be Discourse. Blogs are WordPress. And retail is Shopify or WooCommerce (which is just another flavour of horrible and dysfunctional).

What have we done to deserve this?

(Don't answer that, I've read history books.)
baldurbjarnason.com
Me when I have to wade into a Discourse theme: "OMG, this is a horrible POS. No documentation to speak of. Why is anybody using this?"

In a Wordpress theme: "OMG, this is a horrible POS. Why is anybody using this?"

It genuinely feels like pretty much everything in tech is just unusably awful.
baldurbjarnason.com
Because of its long history of underpaying both writers and employees, trade publishing has a disproportionate number of vulnerable narcissists and the pathologically codependent in a mirror image to how lottery-sized winnings have caused tech to be dominated by grandiose narcissists and sociopaths
rachelfeder.bsky.social
Tell me your most unhinged literary opinion, as a little treat
Reposted by Baldur Bjarnason
spavel.bsky.social
There is a cult of action at the heart of tech.

This cult says: don't mind that the systems are broken. Don't try and fix them. You can just do things, using you ubermensch will.

AI has plugged into this cult to promise 10x-ing your action. But instead your will becomes subservient to the machine.
"Just doing things" is not a path to value
Action for the sake of action feels good, but the path of least resistance leads you to surrender your own agency.
productpicnic.beehiiv.com
Reposted by Baldur Bjarnason
amyhoy.bsky.social
a lot of the cool new shit i’m finding in multiple areas of interest is not only made in china but designed in china, they are seriously innovating and really so good at taste & aesthetics, too. and western companies are just sitting on their asses for some reason
justinmikulka.bsky.social
“You get this sense of a change, where China’s competitiveness has gone from being about government subsidies and low wages to a tremendous number of highly skilled, educated engineers who are innovating like mad.”
headline: western executives who visit China are coming back terrified
Reposted by Baldur Bjarnason
oisinmcgann.bsky.social
‘96% of healthcare professionals said the model helps to reduce children’s anxiety, and 46% reported a lesser need to use sedation after the children played with the set.‘

‘Lego doesn’t sell the sets and instead has donated more than 10,000 of the kits to hospitals around the world.’
Reposted by Baldur Bjarnason
desfitzgerald.bsky.social
Seeing people nonchalantly post stuff like makes me feel like I'm going crazy honestly.
A post from an academic on blue sky that says: "I'm learning about "prompt engineering" when asking LLMs to extract data. I now add this to all instructions:

Style
Be concise, analytic, and specific (cite page/figure if provided). If essential info is missing, keep going but flag Unclear and exact data needed. Never invent data.
 
#academicsky"
Reposted by Baldur Bjarnason
rahaeli.bsky.social
Many of y'all have heard me say this, but my answer for the "within your own lifetime" variant of this question is that I have a detailed and practical plan to time travel back to replace my past self to set up the conditions such that PayPal never achieves success because that fixes SO MUCH
ddmgembala.bsky.social
Over drinks with fellow archaeologists at a conference some decades ago, we discussed who we would hypothetically time travel to remove from history. Columbus and Calvin were the two universally chosen. Hitler was nearly unanimous but one person thought removing Goebbles was better.
tlecaque.bsky.social
ALSO. ALSO. Needing us to find Europeans who condemned him for his actions at the time--and there are many! So many! My God so many!--is also some white supremacist bullshit, because the TAINO PEOPLE HE WAS MURDERING CERTAINLY CONDEMNED HIM FOR IT AND THEY WERE HUMAN BEINGS OF HIS TIME TOO.
Reposted by Baldur Bjarnason
evilcleverdog.bsky.social
Using ChatGPT
edithcharles.bsky.social
What's something that isn't considered embarrassing but you think it should be?
Reposted by Baldur Bjarnason
tante.cc
tante @tante.cc · 16h
"The tech platforms that promised to transform our attention spans succeeded, but only superficially. They created a new, much worse way of creating culture. A universe of dumbasses talking to other dumbasses, measured by numbers that don’t make sense and don’t reflect a...The Great Dumbening
Reposted by Baldur Bjarnason
spavel.bsky.social
boost your user satisfaction and growth with this one weird trick (removing the shit everyone hates that you added for no reason)
r/SaaS
u/soasme
I deleted ALL AI features... and user growth went UP.

Everyone's busy adding Al to everything.
I did the same for indie10k.com but it didn't work.
I removed all of fancy Al stuff - Al coach, Al growth ideas, Al "personalized" advice - everything.
Guess what?
I see more registered users and higher retention.
That actually make me wonder why now i have one page with one button, without all that Al thingy, but it does better?
Here's my question:
Is Al feature actually helping SaaS grow?
Reposted by Baldur Bjarnason
dpcarrington.bsky.social
Towns may have to be abandoned due to floods with millions more homes in Great Britain at risk

- Every constituency projected to be at greater risk, with many areas likely to be uninsurable, Guardian investigation finds

www.theguardian.com/environment/...
Towns may have to be abandoned due to floods with millions more homes in Great Britain at risk
Every constituency projected to be at greater risk, with many areas likely to be uninsurable, Guardian investigation finds
www.theguardian.com
Reposted by Baldur Bjarnason
Reposted by Baldur Bjarnason
techpolicypress.bsky.social
Studies are beginning to reveal fissures in the argument that AI boosts productivity, writes Tech Policy Press fellow @eryk.bsky.social. Nonetheless, companies and governments are pouring investments into speculative growth without ample evidence.
Generative AI’s Productivity Myth | TechPolicy.Press
People may be using artificial intelligence, but that doesn’t mean it’s useful, writes Eryk Salvaggio.
www.techpolicy.press
Reposted by Baldur Bjarnason
uglyreykjavik.bsky.social
This week's theme is ugly doors. Specifically, ugly doors on ugly walls.

#Iceland #photography #streetphotography #decay #door #window #concrete #rust
An ugly white door on a run down building.
Reposted by Baldur Bjarnason
maryrobinettekowal.com
My hot take is that none of these are structure. These are all recipes that describe structure.

Structure is the Salt, Fat, Acid Heat of writing.

3-Act/Hero's Journey etc are recipes.

You can make great meals without using a recipe if you understand the principles of structure.
ddwardiswriting.bsky.social
So #WritingCommunity how do we feel about structure?

Do you use the 3 act structure? The 5 act?

Hero's Journey? Save the Cat? Super Structure Method? Story Genius Method?

Something else?

What have you got?
Reposted by Baldur Bjarnason
spavel.bsky.social
There's an interesting contrast between these do-nothing apps and non-finito prototyping AKA provotyping: a research technique that hands participants a deliberately purposeless product to see how they will use it.

The difference being that the provotype is the start, not the end, of designing!
Non-Finito Prototyping: A New Technique for Digital-Physical Product…
In art, an unfinished work remains unfinished. In design, an unfinished work opens up possibilities for the user.
www.delve.com