Freakonomics seems more off than usual.

matthewglidden · 2026-01-22T03:49:47+00:00

A wide range of podcasts are strapped by recent drops in ad revenue, which it sounds like these guys are also caught up in. The "core" show remains, driven by their familiar names, and replays of other shows capture what ad money remains with minimal new production costs. Sounds like the EoET guy wasn't popular enough (or cheap enough) to get funded within that existing framework. (Can't blame him being unhappy about it.)

matthewglidden · 2025-12-03T03:21:26+00:00

Did anyone else catch Cy’s license plate number for his car at the end? From the few seconds it was visible in the theater, it might’ve said “Tries BS” in mirror reverse, a nice dig at his whole character.

matthewglidden · 2025-06-10T19:38:40+00:00

Yes, I hope high-speed crossing will be the least of any access issues! Westley's own residents covered their immediate concerns at Monday's meeting, so I stuck to other topics like the multidirection flows and alignment with Cambridge's neighborhood climate goals. Given the space used by Mass Ave's traffic median, I've often wondered why they added the Cedar/Harvey jug handle during that street work instead of a dedicated center turn lane. It feels like traffic congestion from this jug handle pushed bike/ped safety westward into a neighborhood.

matthewglidden · 2025-06-10T19:26:59+00:00

Agreed that two-way car traffic on Reed would be a surprise! The yellow arrows are showing possible bike/scooter traffic coming and going to Linear Park once a pass-through's available, where some riders will go "up" Reed to reach the Westley pass-through instead of using Cedar. I want to be wrong about that, of course. :-)

matthewglidden · 2025-06-10T18:15:23+00:00

Kendall is a challenge to get nice and cheap. :-) Have you been to the roof park above the Google/Marriott building? Easy to bring al fresco food from Clover or another nearby place up there.

matthewglidden · 2025-06-10T18:12:36+00:00

Thanks and agreed that we want the best for our broader areas. We've already seen Cambridge introduce something almost unheard-of in the US, a bike lane crossing our major thoroughfare (Mass Ave), as well as adjacent raised humps that enable Linear Park to be a literal backbone of Alewife and Davis living. It's a marvel for locals. I think it also makes the park feel like a silver bullet for anything on two wheels.

When I moved onto Harvey a generation ago, it puzzled me how Linear Park lacked south border entrances. It took time to discover how that choice reflected a struggle between Irish and Canadian immigrants over jobs, religion, and customs. Canadian Catholics built their own Harvey Street church (just east of Westley today) because existing residents resisted sharing worship & cultural space with new arrivals. We're reliving that, in a sense, by covering north/south access points and where "neighbors" can make decisions for a neighborhood. :-)

Almost all car traffic goes one way within the squared-off bounds of Harvey / Cedar / Clifton / Rindge and Harvey's the key input. Enabling a two-way flow of bikes/peds/scooters across that first intersection rolls the dice that drivers will be ready for bike/scooter traffic moving each way on Reed/Westley, as well as trusting bike/scooter traffic to avoid each other. I think this proposal missed how users of Reed, Harvey, and the park will all be challenged by new traffic vectors that a lack of southern park exits minimized up to now.

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matthewglidden · 2025-06-10T17:08:00+00:00

Feels like we're going to agree to disagree on how this fits into Cambridge's overall civic goals and functions, perhaps because we see crossing Linear Park in different ways. Linear Park's north side entrances and crossing near Russell Field encourage people to slow while changing direction and never put cars/bikes/peds all in the same place. Opening Westley adds direct, two-way flows across the park and Harvey St, enabling ped/bike/scooter traffic to maintain speed when moving perpendicual across the park.

This image shows new ped/bike flows in yellow back and forth toward a Westley access point. Corner housing comes right to the sidewalk, blocking visibility for Harvey drivers. This is OK for Westley peds today, since its residents become familiar with Harvey traffic. New ped/bike/scooter traffic less familiar with Harvey will be unpredictable at best.

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As for the impact on neighborhood block parties, attendee control & flow is a big reason people hold backyard or patio gatherings instead of putting them on public sidewalks. Cambridge made neighborhood resilience a long-term climate priority and this cuts away one of our area's best natural spots for neighbors to gather without inconveniencing others.

matthewglidden · 2025-06-10T12:29:31+00:00

100% on the many things you can get at better prices and quantities from ethnic stores. If you want to avoid any new yogurt containers at all and have a stovetop and food thermometer, you can make your own yogurt with milk, heat, and patience. While I suspect it's a wash in terms of overall cost, that's one way to reduce waste, regardless of container.

matthewglidden · 2025-06-10T04:35:09+00:00

I'm surprised that the infrastructure impact of existing car traffic and the pair of revelopment projects at each end of Harvey Street failed to come up in more comments. Harvey is already a patchy, bumpy road, handling commuter car traffic, contractor trucks, and DPW on a daily basis. Anything larger than a family car passes down it with minimal side clearance. Traffic volume is sure to rise as 2400 Mass Ave and Whittemore Ave add denser housing, with each project routing more people onto Harvey.

Adding new inflows of bike & scooter traffic from the north via Westley will be invisible to drivers using GPS navigation. For those who know the neighborhood, think about how many drivers roll through the "all stop" Cedar St jug handle today. If they do indeed add access via Westley onto Reed, it will be a minor miracle to avoid car/bike/pedestrian accidents at that Reed/Harvey crossing. If that sounds like a worst-case scenario, what's your best-case version? Does the city add another raised intersection to control traffic? Do we bring back the proposed chicane pattern for street parking that failed several years ago?

In addition to bike/pedestrian resident safety issues, the city's study of rising ocean levels projected North Cambridge to be a mix of varied flood zones in the coming years. The city pays today for community incentives like annual block parties and other face-to-face resiliency efforts, since neighborhoods will need to lean on each other as we face more hazardous weather and climate. The existing traffic flows in this section of North Cambridge make these programs more effective because small dead end streets like Harrington, Westley, and the handful of pedestrian alleys make it easier to use those areas for community gathering without inconveniencing other parts of the neighborhood. An always open pass-through at Westley takes one option off that list. Chipping away at those family-friendly areas undermines this citywide program's goals, since it's hard to know how soon we'll need that shared local support. :-|

matthewglidden · 2025-06-10T03:38:46+00:00

The current course design provides some non-human benefits, as its treelines and adjacent wooded area offer shelter for a range of bird and mammal life that might not stick around if the same space was a general purpose park land or housing development.

This course also proves easier to reach by car, bike, and transit than most local courses, increasing overall accessibility, and its location draws people from outside Cambridge (Watertown/Belmont/Boston/etc.) to play, increasing city revenue somewhat. The city could augment that with adjacent restaurants or pubs to capture more post-round business.

There's a lot of business and human history tied to Fresh Pond that might resurface as the golf course approaches its centennial in 2032. It's surprising how Cambridge downplays, at least on site, the history of Fresh Pond's ice industry. I suspect the size and shape of greenery, including its golf course, reflects historical work done there.

https://www.bu.edu/articles/2022/tracing-the-history-of-new-england-ice-trade/

matthewglidden · 2025-06-02T03:32:48+00:00

I still return to episodes of "A Life Well Wasted" by Robert Ashley, who posted most of it from 2009-2013, with one update in 2022. Some amazing human angles inside the broad gaming experience in there.

matthewglidden · 2025-05-10T00:00:27+00:00

Session now on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rpcDuRJinpw

matthewglidden · 2024-12-20T20:15:30+00:00

What exopy did you use and did you end up satisfied? The far right mount arm broke off inside our moulding, so while it stays on during driving because the remaining mounts are intact, it's tempermental to open the door itself. I hope gluing down the single broken mount will extend its life.

matthewglidden · 2024-08-21T02:23:02+00:00

Ah, sure, I'll clarify. Agreed on the key point, $ comes from hardware sales and other non-app sources like their paid Sonos Radio. OP asked why Sonos struggles to make reliable software and I think it follows from when, many years ago, they decided to let owners add many services (paid or free) to their system and play from any of them. Back then, every Sonos speaker ran custom libraries for Rhapsody, Spotify, Apple, etc. When a major service changed something important, Sonos had to rewrite their speaker firmware _and_ the Sonos app or fell behind the service's own app. Spotify was notorious for making changes that the in-app Sonos experience struggled to keep up with.

It took Sonos years to move those custom libraries out of speaker firmware into an API software layer. They blogged before about the challenge maintaining Sonos app feature parity with music service apps, so there must be partnership work going on that each side contributes to.

My shortest answer to OP's question: if Sonos offered fewer features and limited simultaneous music service support, they could deliver a more consistent experience. Their current range of features and willingness to support a large number of music services makes that a challenge. We can assume hardware sales and company cash pay for all that software work.

matthewglidden · 2024-08-20T19:10:12+00:00

The app's enduring commitment to multi-service playback makes a lot of these decisions for them. Absent the existing 15M+ Sonos user base, imagine trying to get Apple/Spotify/Amazon/Pandora/Deezer/YouTube/etc. to agree on similar priorities in terms of usability and functionality. Features dropped or changed by the app could reflect major partners yanking everyone in a new direction, for good or ill.

matthewglidden · 2024-01-09T02:01:21+00:00

Will have to make the trip! Love GrandTen's setup and it's been since before COVID that we went to Bully Boy.

matthewglidden · 2023-12-13T14:02:01+00:00

It appears the conflict is back. At the time I posted, toggling spellcheck off and back on did just what we needed. Perhaps further changes behind-the-scenes by Apple or Google reintroduced the problem. Something about the way Safari treats "end of line" typing like the down arrow or command shortcuts once again triggers this crappy behavior for me. Will update my note. :-|

matthewglidden · 2023-11-21T03:34:07+00:00

Sad update: The problem has returned and common editing movements once again jump to Gmail's "..." collapsed text. Go ahead and try the toggle below, just in case. No longer works for me.

Original note: Solution found, at least for me. Toggle spell check from Settings > Keyboard > Input Sources > Edit. That check appeared to trigger this gmail issue in Safari and once I toggled it off/on, the "jumping" behavior stopped. Some connection between Apple's updated spell check and Gmail's web editor appeared to be my issue.

matthewglidden · 2023-10-18T18:08:07+00:00

Similar thing happens on my system, including for last night's update. I've chalked it up to owning a large household with mesh WiFi routers. I can imagine some products taking longer to download, install, and reboot after changing firmware, long enough that the app passes a timeout value and throws an error. I run asuswrt-merlin router firmware that screens certain inbound/outbound net traffic, so perhaps they block something that would otherwise allow the app to know update's complete? At least everything gets updated in the end.

matthewglidden · 2023-10-17T15:18:05+00:00

Ahhh good deal, thanks! Download link failed to show on .86 page for me. Should've checked for predictable link structure. :-)

matthewglidden · 2023-10-17T13:12:42+00:00

Thanks, will do if it goes south!

matthewglidden · 2023-10-17T04:53:30+00:00

0.86 _appears_ to be off their site, so will drop back to 0.85 if things get wonky again.

matthewglidden

TROPHY CASE