• I like magnets — some [[ideas]]:
  • [[magnetic computing]]
  • [[magnetic 3d printing]]
  • [[magnetic assists]]
    • In general magnetism seems like an amazing way to transfer momentum?
  • [[magnetic gears]]
    • As in the little devices I’ve built
• Today (actually yesterday) I saw a great video on the [[principle of least action]] and it blew my mind a bit. It also introduced me to diffraction grating effects — which I had heard about but hadn’t grokked/seen demonstrated.
  • The fact that angular momentum is quantized… wow. Also it introduced me to [[diffraction gratings]], which I had heard of only in passing.
  • And angular momentum has the same unit as action: Joule-second.
  • This all made me think also of…
    • Could you use diffraction gratings at astronomic scales to see into the past? E.g. by making visible light from a star that has taken a longer (slower) path to get to us.
    • The effect that makes lights ‘stretch out’ in one direction in some mediums, like water (think of night lights reflected on a lake) or… the effect that is apparent in my chrome kitchen countertop that is quite something and I sometimes call the [[rainbow folding]]). I’m unsure if these are really related but something about the discussion about the paths that light can take made me think of it.
  • All in all I really enjoy thinking about [[physics]] as of late.
  • -> [[Action principles]] and [[Lagrangian]] are both interesting over at Wikipedia.

• Noding from work after a while! I spend a lot of time here writing but for obvious reasons I don’t tend to write in the Agora while at it. Still, I would like to take up the habit again of writing more journals so I thought I’d give it a shot.
• I met [[Stapelberg]] for lunch as we often do on Mondays and it was great.
  • I heard of an upcoming [[nix hackathon]] from him.
• Now I have a bunch of meetings upcoming; more than planned (as it tends to happen). I’ll try to make the most of it, and still protect enough time blocks that I can do what I intended to get done during the workday (without going too late into the night).

• [[moloch]]

2025-05-18

• [[Read]]: [[Another Now]]
  • Fiction by [[Yanis Varoufakis]]. Really enjoying it so far. The plot is obviously a bit forced, a vehicle just to share his political ideas. But it’s a fun way to explore those ideas.
  • The 80s and [[Thatcherism]]. [[Miners’ strike]]. [[Wapping dispute]].
  • [[Anarcho-syndicalism]].

• I started this Saturday earlier than usual by waking up at 9am and going to a 10am event in my neighborhood about urban planning :) It was pretty interesting!
• Then did some shopping, meditated and now (as of around midday) I’m starting the day in earnest; drinking [[gyokuro]] and planning the day.
• I hope to [[flow]] all day!

2025-05-17

• Finished [[Platform Capitalism]] (audiobook).

  • I’ll need to give it another listen, as not all of it went in - listening while distracted.
  • But seemed good. A lot more academic than [[Technofeudalism: What Killed Capitalism?]]. The latter was more engaging, but (maybe?) less rigorous. I appreciate this book’s succinctness.
  • Some things that stuck out from this listen:
    • It has a good historical overview of where platforms came from and how they came to dominate.
    • It has a useful typology of platforms.
    • Platforms primarily gain their advantages from data.
    • Trying to force platform capitalists to respect privacy is impossible - it’s part of their DNA.
    • Over time platforms try to control the whole stack.
    • Over time, platforms slowly converge to offering the same services.
  • There’s a tiny bit at the end on possible ways to counter platform dominance. Very small, but worth noting.

• [[Public platforms]].

2025-05-14

• [[platform capitalism]].
  • It’s all about the [[data]].

2025-05-11

• [[Bookmarked]]:
  • Nature and other dangerous words: Marx, method and the proletarian standpoint in the web of life | Dialectical Anthropology
    • tags: [[Cheap Nature]]. [[Capitalocene]]. [[Ecosocialism]]. [[Jason W. Moore]].