Underlines and line height

I was thinking about something I wrote yesterday when I was talking about styling underlines on links: For a start, you can adjust the distance of the underline from the text using text-underline-offset. If you’re using a generous line-height, use a generous distance here t…

Burning Questions: WTF is a Petzval Lens?

Photographers and Cinematographers are enamored with creative ways to separa­te their subjects from their backgrounds. One such trick is to implement a "swirly" background effect that turns otherwise mundane scenes into something out of a dream. Although the swirly bokeh effect…

LUMIX S9 Review Update: This Camera Aged So Well

The LUMIX S9 has recieved a few firmware updates, and so we've updated our full review. The other day when shooting with it, I realized that if you've got it, you've got very little reason then to want to get any of the new fancy point and shoot cameras that are being announced…

The Red Onion Font

The latest post from The Pudding starts off about as good as possible to attract the likes of me: “This is a project about onions and math.” I mean, yes. I’m in. And I enjoyed the interactive article, Dicing an Onion the Mathematically Optimal Way, but the design was absol…

The Colors of the World, Seen From the International Space Station. “Recent...

The Colors of the World, Seen From the International Space Station. “Recent photographs from crew members aboard the ISS show some spectacular views of auroras, moonsets, the Milky Way, and more, seen from from their vantage point in orbit.” 💬 Join the disc…

Silicon Doodles & Microchip Art

Back in the earlier days of microchips, the designers would sometimes add tiny images to the chips, for fun. From NPR: Many of the doodles came from engineers who weren’t doing it for an audience. “We did it for ourselves,” said Willy McAllister, a retired electric…

Dictators love a crisis. “For reasons of both personality and political ambition,...

Dictators love a crisis. “For reasons of both personality and political ambition, Trump needs a crisis to govern — or rather, to rule. And if the actual conditions of reality will not give him a state of exception, he’ll create one himself.”

Keeping Small Journalism Alive

In 2025, we’re trying to get to a minimum of 2,000 subscribers! Capture One is discounted for members! The New Phoblographer membership is now based on our website. Yes, we moved away from the app. It was a bittersweet move — but what we’re offering you now is even better.…

The Story of the Chinese Farmer

In a talk about Taoism called Swimming Headless, Alan Watts shared with his audience the parable of the Chinese farmer. Once upon a time, there was a Chinese farmer who lost a horse. Ran away. And all the neighbors came ‘round that evening and said, “that’s too bad.”…

“Today, general officers no longer seem to see themselves as guardians of...

“Today, general officers no longer seem to see themselves as guardians of the constitutional order. It now seems clear to us that the military will not rescue Americans from Mr. Trump’s misuse of the nation’s military capabilities.”

The ‘What It’s Like To Be…’ podcast features interviews with people about...

The ‘What It’s Like To Be…’ podcast features interviews with people about their jobs (recently: a deli owner, a harbor pilot, a hospice nurse, and a brain surgeon). The host told me it’s “Studs Terkel meets Ted Lasso”. 💬 Join the discussion on kot…

A Cure for Corporate Addiction to Personal Data

I wrote the original version of this post for the March 2018 issue of Linux Journal. You can find it here. Since images from archival material in the magazine no longer load, and I want to update this anyway, here is a lightly edited copy of the original. Bear in mind that what…

The Big Lie About Bird Photography

I remember watching a BBC special about photographers and how they're taking images in the wild. Specifically, one of the photographers say that in order to shoot good photos, you have to have the eye in focus. This is a big lie -- and it's often nearly impossible to do with tod…

A forthcoming book from long-time technology writer David Pogue: Apple: The First...

A forthcoming book from long-time technology writer David Pogue: Apple: The First 50 Years. “Deeply researched & lavishly illustrated, Apple: The First 50 Years includes new interviews with 150 key people who made the journey, including Steve Wozniak…” 💬…

A 90-minute video of making a batch of woodblock prints “from blank...

A 90-minute video of making a batch of woodblock prints “from blank paper to finished print” from the printer’s POV. Relaxing & ASMR-adjacent. 💬 Join the discussion on kottke.org →

Thread Meeting

Style your underlines

We shouldn’t rely on colour alone to indicate that something is interactive. Take links, for example. Sure, you can give them a different colour to the surrounding text, but you shouldn’t stop there. Make sure there’s something else that distinguishes them. You could make…

Best Cameras from 2015: 5 Classics Worth Owning and The One to Skip

The last decade has seen the launch of some unique cameras, many of which are still popular today. In a time when tariffs are making life challenging for photographers, we have decided to look at some of the most unique offerings from the past decade, which can help you fill in…

“‘This Show Felt Like It Was Falling Out of Me’. Six female...

“‘This Show Felt Like It Was Falling Out of Me’. Six female artists on how they prepared for their major solo debuts this fall.” 💬 Join the discussion on kottke.org →

I love that The Kid Should See This has dozens of videos...

I love that The Kid Should See This has dozens of videos about poop, including a recent one about why poop is brown. 💬 Join the discussion on kottke.org →

nikitonsky is being grumpy

nikitonsky: No wonder I could never remember where the Save button is. Pro tip: keep controls at the same place so that your users can form a habit #YouTube #Watchlist #Save

Lomography Lomochrome Color 92 Review: The Past is Alive

I began the review of Lomography Lomochrome Color 92 back in 2023 -- like most other film photographers these days, I took my sweet time developing the film. This is one that I didn't want to rush. This film is beautiful and embodies a look that I don't see often captured in dig…

At 40, She Discovered She Was One of America’s Best Free Divers....

At 40, She Discovered She Was One of America’s Best Free Divers. Sara Burnett took a free diving intro course and a year later she competed in a world championship for the US team. “Why am I doing an extreme sport at this age?” 💬 Join the discussion on ko…

Go 1.25 is released

The Go Blog Go 1.25 is released Dmitri Shuralyov, on behalf of the Go team 12 August 2025 Today the Go team is pleased to release Go 1.25. You can find its binary archives and installers on the download page. Go 1.25 comes with improveme…

If you’re still back-to-school (or racing-the-tariffs) shopping, these M4 Macbook Airs are...

If you’re still back-to-school (or racing-the-tariffs) shopping, these M4 Macbook Airs are somehow still on sale. “$800 is an absurdly low price for so much computer.”

Car and plane travel from Canada to the US has dropped sharply...

Car and plane travel from Canada to the US has dropped sharply year-over-year, with a 37% drop in July car trips and 26% drop in air travel. Not sure why they call it a “boycott” — the Trump regime’s outright hostility to outsiders is the cause here.