2026

Links of the day

I collect cool, interesting links spread all over the web and share them here in daily posts. Hope you enjoy! More of them in the archive.

Google confirms that AirDrop compatibility will come to more Android phones, Android Authority. So far, the feature (which I've used with a friend, it's really cool!) only works with Pixel 10 phones. Google has not provided any dates or information on which models will be eligible.

Hotspot Peek. Track the amount of data consumed in real time in the macOS menu bar when using your phone as a hotspot. One-time purchase of USD 4.99.

CreepyLink. A URL shortener that makes your links look very suspicious.

pandoc in the browser. Pandoc 3.9, released on Thursday (5th), brought support for Web Assembly, which enables its direct use in the browser.

Links of the day

I collect cool, interesting links spread all over the web and share them here in daily posts. Hope you enjoy! More of them in the archive.

How Rodrigo (it’s me!) brings a humanistic view to consumer technology. Buttondown, the service I use to manage Manual‘s newsletter and which sponsors Lerama, has a series of interviews with customers. They published mine.

LibreOffice 26.2. The usual package (performance improvements, compatibility, and bug fixes), plus support for importing and exporting Markdown.

Doppi 6.0. The new major update features a home screen with suggestions for most-played songs and new releases; widgets; and a new album view (Art Stream) reminiscent of Apple's late “Cover Flow.”

DASUNG Paperlike 103. An external E-Ink display with a 60Hz refresh rate sounds too good to be true. If you want to test it out for us, it costs USD 339.

PrivacyPack. Create your own package of free alternatives to big tech to share elsewhere. (Made by Ente.)

SFD Engine. “This tool generates and visualizes emergent behavior in complex adaptive systems.” The website's creator warns: there is no right way to interpret the results.

Comic strip. Character says to the computer: “Say ‘I am alive.’” Computer responds: “I AM ALIVE.” Character says: “Oh my God.”
Comic strip: @inpc@go.mxtthxw.art.

From Anthropic's “studies” claiming that Claude did this or that to Moltbook, a “social network for AIs” (which seems to be a lie), it's always the same story depicted in the comic strip above: people telling AI to behave in a certain way being shocked when AI behaves in that way.

Regarding Moltbook and its foundation, OpenClaw, I will limit myself* to giving one piece of advice: don't use it. The tool open the doors to your private digital life, with unpredictable consequences.

* I limit myself to this because, in my opinion, the press is doing a huge disservice by legitimizing this nonsense.

Links of the day

I collect cool, interesting links spread all over the web and share them here in daily posts. Hope you enjoy! More of them in the archive.

The TV industry finally concedes that the future may not be in 8K, Ars Technica. The realization came after LG and TCL ended production of 8K TVs. (I'm still on Full HD…)

NanoFlow i2 Air. Crowdfunding for the self-proclaimed “world’s smallest horizontal mouse.” (What would be the “world’s smallest vertical mouse”?)

Just the Browser. Configuration files to remove all the junk (AI, telemetry, advertising, integrations) from Chrome, Edge, and Firefox browsers. Requires basic command line knowledge.

Particle Flow. Using your device's camera, see a visual representation of your face and hands in the form of particles. (I only tested it on a laptop.)

The AI industry doesn’t take “no” for an answer

For days now, I've had a quote from David Bushell stuck in my head:

Has anyone else noticed that the AI industry can’t take “no” for an answer? AI is being force-fed into every corner of tech. It’s unfathomable to them that some of us aren’t interested.

David complained about receiving communications from Proton offering Lumo, its generative AI, even though he had expressly indicated that he did not want to receive such messages. The worst part is that Proton, instead of owning up to its mistake and apologizing, insisted on absurd justifications to say that there was no mistake. It only gave in when an executive got involved, and only after the post went viral.

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Links of the day

I collect cool, interesting links spread all over the web and share them here in daily posts. Hope you enjoy! More of them in the archive.

AI controls are coming to Firefox. Starting with Firefox 148, scheduled for February 24th, it will be possible to disable all or just some of the browser's AI features. Let's ignore Mozilla's insistence on this for a moment; at first glance, the implementation seems quite good.

Notepad++ has been compromised by state-sponsored hackers. For those in a hurry, the recommendation is to download version 8.9.1 and run the installer to update the app manually.

Calibre 9. The main new features are a new “bookshelf” view, which displays the spines of the books.

Loops is now the App Store. Loops is a FOSS alternative to TikTok, from the same creator of Pixelfed.

OpenTTD. A FOSS alternative to the old Transport Tycoon, maintained and modernized, but with the same vibe as in 1994. The new version, 15, was released last month.

AntiRender. Upload one of those renders of condos projects, city halls etc., and this site will search for an image from any Tuesday in November to contrast reality with what was promised.

delphitools. A collection of small online tools, or “simple handmade conveniences.” I love its aesthetics.

Why do RSS readers look like email clients?

“Why do RSS readers look like email clients?” The question was asked by Terry Godier, first on Mastodon, then in a more detailed post.

Godier dubbed the feeling of coming across hundreds of unread items “phantom obligation”: “The guilt you feel for something no one asked you to do.” This applies to so many things…

In the Mastodon comments, Brent Simmons, creator of NetNewsWire in 2002, explained that his inspiration was Usenet, not email. Usenet, a kind of discussion forum, has been around since 1980 and, yeah, it really resembles an email application.

In the same response, Simmons asks:

The part I don't understand and can't explain is why RSS readers are still following this user interface.

It's not that they don't exist, but they are few and niche.

I remembered feeeed, a free iOS app. It allows you to subscribe to a variety of information sources (including RSS feeds) and displays them in a kind of timeline, with different visuals for each type, no counters, no pressure.

I also came across Stream, which does away with counters and one of the three traditional panels of RSS readers (the feeds panel) to instead deliver a stream of items to read, like a “unified timeline.” Also for iOS, also free.

There are also small initiatives, usually undertaken by a single person and available on the web, that promise a calmer experience when reading RSS feeds. I am familiar with Artemis, FeedCity, and vore.

More examples?

What’s on your phone, Caiubi?

Editor's note: Every week, I publish the phone's home screen from a blog reader. Want to participate? Fill out this form. Want more? Check out the archive. All app links go to the App Store, Play Store, or F-Droid.

What is your name and what do you do?

My name is Caiubi Nogueira, and I have a bachelor's degree and teaching certificate in psychology. I am currently pursuing a master's degree in psychology at UFRN. In my (non) spare time, I work as a designer and motion designer.

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Links of the day

I collect cool, interesting links spread all over the web and share them here in daily posts. Hope you enjoy! More of them in the archive.

Deezer confirms demonetization of up to 85% of AI-music streams due to fraud and moves to sell AI-detection Technology. More than 60,000 AI-generated songs are already sent to Deezer *every day*, or 39% of the total. Now the French streaming service will sell its detection technology to other companies. AI generating business! (Cleaning up the mess made by AI, in this case.)

The Realme P4 Power arrives with 10,001 mAh battery and a tough chassis, GSMArena. Very cool, yes (it has more battery than my tablet with its 7,306 mAh), but what collective delusion is this to think that a 219g cell phone is light?

Google begins rolling out Chrome's "Auto Browse" AI agent, Ars Technica. Nothing new on the front, just Gemini performing web tasks for you, like all other “AI browsers.” For now, only for those who pay for Google's AI plans.

Spotify rolls out group chats, TechCrunch. Great, another app with group conversations. I’m glad they’re filling this gigantic market gap. There are days when I can’t talk to anyone, due to lack of a messaging app with groups. Thank you, Spotify.

Threema has a new owner, blueWin. Every now and then, this messaging app pops up as a more private alternative. And it's paid. It was already a bit suspicious, but now… The new owners are a German private equity firm.

Zotero 8. Major new update to Zotero, with a new centralized citation area, list annotations, and a panel to customize text display.

European Alternatives. Directory of alternative internet services to those in the US, all located in Europe.

Fun with the web. I'm always impressed by how much you can do with just CSS. The important thing is to try to have fun with all these possibilities.

The security paradox  densediscovery.com

Living in 2026 consists of fighting with other people on multiple fronts, which has become normalized as “competition.” This applies to everything and always generates a paradoxical effect: the intensification of our private daily wars worsens everyone's lives.

In the latest edition of the Australian newsletter Dense Discovery, Kai drew attention to the book Trapped: Life under security capitalism and how to escape it, by Setha Low and Mark Maguire.

The authors argue that “security has morphed from an inalienable right into a commodity hoarded by those who can afford it,” stimulated by an industry that continues to invent increasingly invasive gadgets and software under a promise that is never fulfilled. This macabre market no longer generates security; it generates fear:

The more you securitise your life, the more those walls and gates and guards make your life all about fear rather than less about fear. And so, as the fear grows, then you want more security, you buy more gadgets, you support all kinds of policing initiatives.

The paradox appears when you take your head out of the ground. The apparatus, delusional in essence, ultimately makes the world worse for everyone:

“[This creates] a self-fulfilling prophecy of fearful people wanting more security, the state and private sector producing it, only to make the world more fearful for some and poorly protected for others.

I think about this every time I pass walls with electric fences and barbed wire, affluent residential condos, CCTV cameras, and ostensive policing. This means that I have been thinking a lot, and increasingly, about the subject.

The way Signal is built — with people's privacy as a priority — makes it difficult and slow to release features that other apps have had for a long time. They take a while, but they get there. The latest version, now available, introduces pinned messages in individual and group chats. It works on Android, computers, and iOS.

Links of the day

I collect cool, interesting links spread all over the web and share them here in daily posts. Hope you enjoy! More of them in the archive.

New features in Android theft protection. Special mention to Brazil, where from now on, two of these features are enabled by default when setting up a new phone.

Neocities is blocked by Bing. Neocities is a kind of spiritual successor to Geocities. No one knows what is happening. Worse, the disappearance of the domain affects other search engines that depend on Bing's index, such as DuckDuckGo.

Transmission 4.1. Almost three years after version 4.0, this update to the (excellent) torrent app arrives. Several internal improvements. The only visible ones are icons adapted for the current macOS and Windows. FOSS, for Linux, macOS, and Windows.

Apple’s “Creator Studio” app bundle now available for USD 12.99 Per Month, MacRumors.

Chawan. A state-of-the-art browser with a TUI interface (runs on the terminal), capable of rendering websites in a way that resembles the OG graphical browsers. FOSS.

What are the odds?. Probabilities become increasingly unlikely as you scroll down the screen. (I haven't checked if the information is correct.)

Firefox icons. Firefox for Android offers alternative icons. There's the classic 2004 version, a pixelated version, and a cute one designed by illustrator Momo.

For me, NetNewsWire is the perfect app for macOS. NetNewsWire 7.0, released this Tuesday (27th), reinforces this distinction. The implementation of Liquid Glass is so good that the app looks better (screenshots), without losing its identity. Extra points for the icon-free menus, mitigating one of the silliest problems in macOS 26 Tahoe. Now I’m looking forward to the iOS version.

Links of the day

I collect cool, interesting links spread all over the web and share them here in daily posts. Hope you enjoy! More of them in the archive.

Apple updates iOS 12 to extend iMessage and FaceTime support on older devices. iOS 12 was released in 2018. (Other more recent versions, including 26.2, have also been updated.)

Boomerang. A simple website for sharing files. Similar to WeTransfer, and for good reason: Boomerang was created by the founder of WeTransfer. Free, with an optional paid plan.

FitDrop 1980–2025. A personal exploration of fashion. Outfits fall from the sky, and you can toss them from side to side or drag them to the square in the upper right corner for more details.

TestUFO 3.0. This website shows the refresh rate of the browser on your device. It is useful for testing whether the 120 Hz screen is working as it should.

Links of the day

I collect cool, interesting links spread all over the web and share them here in daily posts. Hope you enjoy! More of them in the archive.

Signal's popularity soars in Europe. In Finland, the app is the most downloaded one in the Play Store's communication category among free apps. I'm curious about the reasons. It can't be sovereignty or anti-American sentiment, since Signal is based in the US. (By the way, have you downloaded it yet?)

WinDirStat 2.5.0. This Windows utility visually displays the device's memory, distinguishing the directories (folders) that take up the most space. The new version adds dark mode support and brings several improvements. Download it here.

stegodon. A CMS for blogs accessible via SSH that communicates with ActivityPub. (The published blog can be read on the web and generates an RSS feed.)

Start a f***ing blog (archived links). I don't know if it's “the best thing on the web you can do,” but it's certainly among the best.

rekall. A fairly dose of cyberpunk aesthetics.