Remember when I mentioned I was using my Kindle as a personal newspaper? And that this solution was ideal because I didn’t need to buy another gadget?
I still stand by that, but I bought another gadget to be my “personal newspaper”: a Boox Go 10.3 (Gen II) Lumi tablet. (Phew! From here on, I’ll just call it the Boox Go.)
This comment from Bruno, on Bluesky (pt_BR):
Instagram launches new tool that drains your entire bank account and kills your family. Here’s how to turn it off 👇
Instagram doesn’t (yet) do that. His joke references the recent news that photos from public Instagram profiles could be used to generate new images on WhatsApp with Meta AI, Meta’s generative AI, which also owns Instagram. The press picked it up and led with “Here’s how to turn it off” in the headlines.
Scarcity makes us pay more attention to details. A clear reflection of living with limited resources, one of the things that has intrigued me is the tiny battery capacity of my phone.
It wasn’t the biggest when it was new and, four years later, reduced to ~82% of its original capacity and more demanded by major annual software updates, it now requires some planning on the days I know I’ll be away from power outlets for long stretches.
It’s not quite a problem because I work from home. Still, sometimes I find myself playing battery babysitter.
Meta — the same company that declared in 2021 that by now you’d be living in the “metaverse” — sold a few million camera glasses for pervs and, all of a sudden, the next future envisioned by Mark Zuckerberg’s unhinged mind is one where we all walk around wearing camera glasses powered by “artificial intelligence.”
Yes, Silicon Valley CEOs believe the best way to curb screen addiction at 20 cm from your face is to strap screens 20 mm from your eyes.
In early June, while visiting my parents in a small town in the interior of Brazil, I decided to skip the gym and make a quick run to the pharmacy — the first signs of a migraine had set in, and that’s the best time to take something before it gets worse.
The nearest pharmacy is about 1,5 km (a mile) away. I laced up my running shoes to make it worth the trip: a light walk to pick up the medicine.
On the way back, I decided to change my route and loop through a small square where, when I used to live there, I’d often go for walks.
Almost back at my parents’ house, I crossed a busy avenue without incident. On the other side, I had a momentary lapse and assumed the cross street was one-way. (It actually is — but only on the other side of the avenue.)
I looked one way, saw no cars or motorcycles, and stepped out.
At the risk of being among the first victims of artificial intelligence in a potential machine uprising, I keep my interactions with today’s generative AIs (or AI chatbots) strictly transactional.
I open the site, ask or request what I need, get the answer, close the site. No names, no pleases, no thank-yous, no small talk. I avoid anthropomorphizing them as much as possible. I treat them for what they are: statistical machines churning out words that make sense, not a new form of sentient life — at least, not yet.
Keeping a transactional relationship with AI chatbots is, for me, a way of keeping the line between us clearly drawn, to ward off an unlikely — but not impossible — “AI psychosis,” the kind of spiral where someone genuinely believes the AI is alive.
A newly published report by the Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT), authored by researchers Ruchika Joshi, Adinawa Adjagbodjou and Michal Luria, gave me further reasons to stand by that approach.
During the Brazilian Internet Forum (FIB16), in Belém, Pará, I carried a backpack to the convention center with basic items to spend the day there, do the work I was hired to do, and when I had some free time (which was rare), take a look at this Manual do Usuário.
I had the opportunity to participate in yet another edition of the Internet Forum in Brazil (FIB16), this time in the Amazon forest region, in Belém, Pará. The event, organized by NIC.br, brings together people from different sectors to debate hot and/or important topics related to the internet in the country.
My FIB16, however, was a bit different. Like the previous edition in Salvador, Bahia, I came here hired by NIC.br to host the interview podcast Nós da Internet. I opted to stay for fewer days this time, which packed my interview schedule and kept me from attending the panel discussions. (A tip that’s useful for me: all of them were streamed and are available on YouTube.)
To not miss out on covering the event for this Manual, I thought I’d document the venues and moments of FIB16 and the behind-the-scenes of Nós da Internet in photos. Also, a few more pictures of Belém and its touristic spots.
It had been a long time (really long) since I’d photographed anything other than family events. Ignore the weird angles, blown-out lights, and strange colors. I noticed I’d forgotten everything I ever knew about photography — which, to be honest, was never much to begin with.
