No matter where I look these days, it seems everyone is worried about the dangers of the latest artificial intelligence tools. Here’s a typical concern I’ve heard repeatedly: Oh my gosh, look at that — this thing can generate very reasonably sounding essays, just by studying which words tend to…

I have a leadership video I’d like to share with you. First, some explanation. Every year at the University of Michigan the students select their favorite professors and present them with a “Golden Apple Award.” The recipients are then invited to deliver their “ideal last lecture.” John U. Bacon was…

Notenik has just hit fifty — fifty ratings in the Mac App Store, that is! — so I thought this might be an opportune time to reflect a bit on how the app has evolved over the last several years. First, I’m happy to report that the average rating is…

Elon has been shaking things up lately. Especially for Twitter users. Many people had gotten used to thinking of Twitter as a sort of public space, a digital town square where every reasonable person could find their own soapbox, and perhaps even a few people to stop and listen to…

After staying at a pleasantly ignorable level for years, inflation is once again making headlines. And so the pundits and talking heads are falling over each other trying to explain what’s going on. And, of course, the Russian war in Ukraine, as well as lingering pandemic problems, are making their…

Back on 7 Apr 2021 I wrote a piece titled “The Decline of the Republican Party — First Gradually and then Suddenly.” For those who haven’t been paying attention lately — the suddenly part has now finally arrived. And then, back in May of 2021, I wrote a second piece…

I’ve started using my own Mac app Notenik as a project launcher lately, and I wanted to share how I’ve set this up, in case someone else might benefit from it. (Notenik is available as a free download from the Mac App Store.) I’ll try to break this down into…

It’s been a little while since I’ve posted anything from The Practical Utopian, so I thought it might be time to give everyone an update on what I’ve been up to over the last couple of months. Updates to Notenik Although I enjoy writing opinion pieces, and appreciate all of you who read…

I’ve been reading a lot lately about human tribes: Sebastian Junger’s excellent book Tribe: On Homecoming and Belonging, and The Dawn of Everything, by Graeber and Wengrow, to name a couple. …