Hello there! 👋
Last time I emailed you I was up at an old gold-mining village at the top of a mountain in northern Taiwan. This month I have finally started to put some words together about our trip to the beautiful isle of Formosa. Links below.
May saw me shifting gears into house-moving mode as we are just a month and a bit out of transitioning back to Canada full-time. So much planning, so much scrambling. May is a lovely month in Osaka, not yet muggy with perfect blue skies. Gonna miss this.
I look forward to meeting up with friends, old and new, as I re-integrate into the community in Canada. I will be at IETF120 in July and working with the local DWeb community to organize on some events surrounding that. Then in the fall I plan to be at Causal Islands Berlin. Looking forward to meeting everyone!
Being a remote worker I suppose I enjoy local community events that much more. Here in Japan I did my share. We had a meetup for Why from Bluesky who visited Japan again (pics), and I did a workshop on intercultural communication based on The Culture Map, an excellent book. I have a blog post linked below that goes more into what I think about the importance of community events are.
Anyways, I should keep this message short since I have included a lot of links to make up for last time. I became 46 this month. A new chapter is starting out in more ways than one. But we are in the middle of the page-turning process — it’s almost like slow motion — and you can see before the new chapter starts there is another page intentionally left blank. I have that ambivalent feeling of saying goodbye to the things and people I love, but the underlying excitement for the next arc.
Write you in a month!
Chad
🖋 From the Blog
It could be better for everybody — a review of Limitarianism in just 335 words
Short review of a book arguing the moral case against extreme wealth.
Taiwan trip report – Introduction
Initial comments to a series that will be 4 or 5 posts.
Part 1: Kaohsiung and Tainan, featuring Fo Guang Shan
The first post!
Just enough capitalism – A quick review of Slow Productivity
I don’t think you can “quiet quit” your way out of the system.
Rewilding the internet
A long essay co-written by my friend Robin Berjon. This is the stuff we are working on!
Networking our networks
Trip report from attending HN Tokyo.
🧭 Elsewhere
An absolutely delightful exploration of the wisdom/madness of crowds Link →
Walking down a side alley the other day we saw some chefs outside a sushi joint with a 100 kilo tuna… Video →
The ¥1000 spot Link →
Third Place vs. Right to the City Video →
What radicalized you? This little girl Video →
Top 5 actions to fight climate change Link →
Politeness and pain 🥺 Video →
Baby sushi??? Video →
📖 What I’m Reading
The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry by Gabrielle Zevin
(100% Complete)
I loved, and loved, and loved her novel Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow so had this one on the TO READ list as it is one of her most popular and boy does it not disappoint. Could not put it down and read the whole 260 pages within 27 hours, which must be a record for a slow reader like me. It’s lovely, prep your Kleenex!
Connect with me on GoodReads → or on Bookwyrm →