Monthly Archives: March 2021

Article note: I've been wondering where the DuPont name for Berg Mini-PV clones came from for years. Apparently it really is a _super_ tenuous connection that Berg was a subsidiary of DuPont at the time the clone market took off.

Article note: I'd never run into this before. On a quick skim, it's pleasingly readable, very broad, and highly pragmatic. I think it's going on the list of accessible primers on hard topics I suggest to students, (Things like Jorg Arndt's "Matters Computational" (aka fxtbook) for "That stuff you didn't learn how to apply in your algorithms or Numerical Methods classes" and Horowitz and Hill's The Art of Electronics for "That stuff you didn't learn how to apply from your Circuits/Electronics courses."

Article note: Good. Stallman has been eventually proven right about so many things, so many times that he gets a lot of latitude for being weird and off-putting in my book. We, as tech-people, should do our damnedest to support the offbeat-but-useful, they visualized and built the world we inhabit.

Article note: Health-tech startup. Structured for maximum appeal (Noninvasive procedure, trendy health issue, charismatic woman at the front), and hooked in to the opaque-ass US medical billing system. Looks too good to be true. It's _always_ the Theranos scam being run.

Article note: Wait, what? They found instructions that will let you dynamically update microcode! It sounds like it requires a tricky setup, but dang.

Article note: Pursued by a horde of angry upper-middle-class white ladies, CEO whatever was quoted "NONONO NEVER MIND PLEASE DON'T EAT US, WE JUST WANTED TO GET RICH OFF OUR IPO!" Anyway, Cricut should not be rewarded for their history of rent-seeking behaviors, cloud-dependent IoT bullshit, and questionable build quality. If you're in the market for a die cutting machine, get a Silhouette (which is usable with local software and/or Free software, _and_ is a mechanically superior machine), or (a little up-market) a Graphtec or Roland.

Enlarge / A Cricut maker in its natural habitat: a carefully staged table full of miscellaneous crafting bits. (credit: Cricut)

Crafting device-maker Cricut has completely abandoned a plan to start requiring all device owners to pay a monthly subscription fee following a week of sustained public blowback.

Cricut makes cutting machines for precise detail work used by millions of home crafters. The machines work much like printers, but in the inverse: you put a pattern into the software, send it to the device, and the machine slices your design into paper, vinyl, fabric, or a hundred other materials. Users who owned the machines have always been able to import as many of their own designs into the software, Design Maker, as they wish.

Last week, however, Cricut announced it was imposing a $7.99 monthly subscription fee for anyone who wished to upload more than a handful of patterns into Design Maker in a given calendar month. The subscription would apply not only to new users, but also to the millions of consumers who already laid out hundreds of dollars for a Cricut device and all its attendant accessories.

Article note: Oh, that's _amazing_. SE/30s are extremely desirable (as the most powerful compact Mac), and extremely prone to capacitor or battery leak damage, so there's quite an opportunity for transplant motherboards. The same folks did a SE board-swap a while ago, but this is probably a bigger deal (SEs are simple and hard to kill).

Article note: The fact that Widevine is a thing we tolerate is repugnant, but making it as non-intrusive as possible as still commendable.

Article note: That took slightly longer than I expected, but was the inevitable result.

Article note: Don't buy IoT bullshit. Cricut has always engaged in rent-seeking behaviors. I've played with similar units from Silhouette and they are clearly a better choice, because you actually own them.