Ben Werdmuller
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Ben Werdmuller

Ben Werdmuller

NotableLinks

Downpour is out!

"It would not be worth all that to make a game that is a single stupid joke. And I like games that are single stupid jokes, and so I guess I have spent a few years in the hopes that I can let more people make more of them.

08 Mar 2024

Startup pitch: Fediverse VIP

Here’s my pitch for a fediverse product for organizations. Think of it as WordPress VIP for the fediverse: a way for organizations to safely build a presence on the fediverse while preserving their brand, keeping their employees safe, and measuring their engagement. We’ve established that the fediverse is

08 Mar 2024

The fediverse is really happening

Threads has begun its wider beta test of publishing to the fediverse. You can follow accounts that are part of the test from Mastodon, and even see them interact with each other. Here’s Evan Prodromou’s post on Threads, and you can see it if you search for evanprodromou@

07 Mar 2024

Finding the best country in the world to live in

People are sometimes a little taken aback by my criticism of the US, just as they used to be about my criticism of the UK when I lived there. In both cases, it’s not that I don’t like the place — I just see all kinds of opportunities for

07 Mar 2024

NotableLinks

A socialist writer skewered the Formula One scene. Then her article vanished.

"It’s almost unheard of for a news outlet to retract an article without explanation, especially a story of this size whose accuracy has not been publicly challenged." And yet, this brilliant article was. One pet peeve: this article describes Kate Wagner as "socialist". Not that

06 Mar 2024

NotableLinks

Covert racism in LLMs

"Users mistake decreasing levels of overt prejudice for a sign that racism in LLMs has been solved, when LLMs are in fact reaching increasing levels of covert prejudice." Or to put it another way: AI is wildly racist. Although it has been trained to be less overtly so,

05 Mar 2024

NotableLinks

The App Store, Spotify, and Europe’s thriving digital music market

This is kind of a disingenuous statement from Apple, but also an example of why "consumer harm" as currently defined is not the best yardstick for anti-trust. It's notable that Apple is calling Spotify out specifically here, with a side order of snark for the European

05 Mar 2024

On having good taste

I’ve heard a lot of variations of the quote, “you can’t teach taste” over the years, and haven’t thought much of it. Taste in design, in home decor, in good food, in art — it’s seemed obvious that some people are more attuned than others. Tastes are

04 Mar 2024

NotableLinks

TinyLetter: looking back on the humblest newsletter platform

"That is sort of the original spirit of the internet. [...] What if we made no money? What if money wasn’t even something we were thinking about?" A lovely tribute to TinyLetter, which was shut down recently after 14 years. It was founded by Philip Kaplan - aka

03 Mar 2024

NotableLinks

Tapestry: What About?

A pretty good example of clear, transparent communication about product decisions that might not please everyone - particularly when the userbase culture is heavily steeped in open source. I respect this: "Right now, the core of Tapestry is closed source. We have put some components up on GitHub and

03 Mar 2024

Feeding my Edinburgh nostalgia

All told, I lived in Edinburgh for nearly a decade between my late teens and early thirties. I went there to study Computer Science at the University, stuck around to work in the Learning Technology department, co-founded Elgg, left for a while, and eventually came back to live with my

03 Mar 2024

NotableLinks

Blogging is the medium of incomplete stories

"Journalists write stories about incomplete events but there is always a mandate to write more. To write the next post that shows the breaking news. Authors write books that, when published, cannot be changed. An author can write another book, but the story is in print. No such mandate

02 Mar 2024
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Ben Werdmuller

Ben Werdmuller

Writing at the intersection of technology, journalism, and community.

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Ben Werdmuller explores the intersection of technology, democracy, and society. Always independently published, reader-supported, and free to read.