Newsletter Leaf Journal CCXLVIII 〜 Countdown reaches 0
Issue 248 of The Newsletter Leaf Journal features links to our new posts on out-of-season Christmas decorations and mobile Linux, 21 links from around the web, and other news and notes from the week that was at The New Leaf Journal and the weeks ahead.
Welcome to the 247th edition of The Newsletter Leaf Journal, the official newsletter of the perennially virid online writing magazine, The New Leaf Journal and its short-form writing sister publication, The Emu Café Social. This newsletter comes to you as always from the administrator, editor, and writer of both publications, Nicholas A. Ferrell.
Things again erred on the slow side at NLJ and ECS last week, but I have some new posts to share along with our regularly scheduled links from around the web (albeit the links were not collected without some difficulty...) and other news and notes.
Leaves from the week that was
I published two new New Leaf Journal leaves since mailing Newsletter 247.
In Trying Droidian on a Google Pixel 3a XL, I wrote about installing the Droidian Linux distribution on my Google Pixel 3a XL phone last December and playing around with it a bit through the end of September. I uninstalled it in order to install Ubuntu Touch on my Pixel 3a XL, which should lead to its own review this month.
A couple days before I swapped Droidian for Ubuntu Touch on my 3a XL, I saw something unexpected in Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn. That unexpected thing features in Christmas Countdown Clock in September. The article begins with a photo of an inflatable snowman with an electronic Christmas countdown clock and somehow segues into an anecdote from the 1974-75 NBA champion Golden State Warriors. Rest assured it flows naturally in the article.
I published one short post over on ECS. Creating Miniflux Web App in Ubuntu Touch comes to you as advertised by the title.
Leaves from around the web
I previously covered how I collect and save links for the Around the Web section of this humble publication. My workflow hit a snag this week. I have been using a lightly modified Kindle Fire as my reader as of late. Amazon's Fire OS is based on Android, so I installed from F-Droid Markor and Syncthing, two components of my link-saving workflow. On two occasions, changes to the markdown file where I keep my links were not synced to my computer before I opened the file there, and the older version of the file on my computer was synced to my Fire tablet. In this way, I lost newly saved links not once, but twice. Fortunately, I still added some good new links to the collection. I have some ideas what the issue could be (note I do not have this problem with my phone), so I should not lose any links this upcoming week.
Future article topics
The Angel Next Door Spoils Me Rotten Season 2 Posts 2nd Promo Video
Egan Loo for Anime News Network. October 4, 2025.
Ubuntu Touch 24.04-1.0 release
UBports News. September 30, 2025.
I read the update. I updated. I will update you in due course.
Only 12% of AI Cited URLs Rank in Google's Top 10 for the Original Prompt
Louis Linehan and Xibeija Guan for Ahrefs Blog. August 11, 2025.
Surely this means we would be winning AI if I weren't trying to block the AI crawlers.
I tried this ChromeOS Flex rival, and it's so much better
Joao Carraqueira for XDA Developers. August 12, 2025
I am intrigued but need to read up a bit more on it.
Native Italians
They may have founded Rome, then vanished. New work sheds light on the mysterious Etruscans
Andrew Curry for Science, September 24, 2021.
"The paper’s authors argue that Etruscan culture and language predate the arrival of the steppe people and was just particularly resilient: As new arrivals trickled into today’s Tuscany, they may have learned Etruscan, married into local families, and integrated into Etruscan society."
Etruscan Language and Inscriptions
Theresa Huntsman for The Met. June 1, 2023.
"There is an overwhelming number of 'speaking' objects, or vessels inscribed with phrases to express ownership or dedication, written as if the object itself were speaking. For example, an Italo-Corinthian alabastron in the collection is incised with the phrase 'mi licinesi mulu hirsunaiesi,' or 'I am the gift of Licinius Hirsunaie.'"
Italy carries out biggest crackdown against Sicilian mafia in decades (archived)
Amy Kazmin and Giuliana Ricozzi for the Financial Times. February 11, 2025.
They had to wait until the guys they sentenced decades ago finished serving their sentences for the new "biggest crackdown."
Now for our parenting advice section
Screenshy
Kitten. July 14, 2025.
An interesting essay by a parent on screens and kids. There are a few points in this article that I may address on NLJ in the near future.
Social justice advocacy groups slam Roblox for "silencing important voices" with new parental controls
Vikki Blake for Games Industry.biz. October 1, 2025.
I would recommend that parents be wary of "social justice advocacy groups" that believe they are entitled to un-moderated contact with other people's children.
Tajikistan: Big purge at Interior Ministry
Eurasianet. April 23, 2025.
A good parent sets his or her child up for success. That could mean anything from instilling a child with a good moral foundation to clearing the way for your son to become El Presidente of Tajikistan.
Checking in on the new games coming from Japan
Japanese live-action romance sim lets you become the pampered pet hamster of three sisters
Amber V for Automation West. August 6, 2025.
Sleeping: Little Hamsters, Big Adventures. Tired: Goodbye Salad Days in Brooklyn Bridge Park. Wired: Reincarnated as a hamster in Sweet Hamster Days on Steam.
Steam and Switch versions of risqué bunny girl game differ in surprising ways. Japanese developer provides detailed chart
Amber V for Automation West. September 26, 2025.
The Switch version is slightly censored but it nevertheless appears to keep things about as classy as the Steam version.
Industry insights
To Understand What Books Are Published, You Must Understand How Books Are Sold
Lincoln Michel at Counter Craft. October 2, 2025.
The New Leaf Journal's publication process is much less involved.
60% of the companies actually producing anime saw declining profit or losses in 2024, despite industry revenue being at an all-time high
Amber V for Automation West. August 20, 2025.
I read the article's explanation but I have decided to believe it is because there are too many shows based on manga and novels named something like He Was a Loner in the Real World But Then Was Run Over By a Truck and Woke Up In a Fantasy Video Game World With Super Cheat Powers and a Harem Consisting of Three Human Girls, One Elf Girl, and Two Cat Girls.
Financial aid fraud persists at California’s community colleges
Adam Echelman for Cal Matters. April 1, 2024.
Maybe the bots use their financial aid to make the world a better place for bots.
Piracy Reporting Centre: Singapore Straits Emerge as Piracy Hotspot
Mike Schuler for gCaptain. April 15, 2025.
The Pirates of the Singapore Strait doesn't have the best ring to it.
People problems?
The Japanese Military Has a People Problem
Tom Le for Foreign Affairs. March 28, 2025.
If the 3D people will not serve, there is no choice. You must draw and summon the 2D people!
Are Humans the Greatest Bottleneck to AI Progress?
Shame Tews for AEI. September 8, 2025.
This piece evinces a "people problem" with AI. But due to the author's lack of self-awareness, it is not the "people problem" he thinks.
We Are The Slop
Freya India at After Babel. September 29, 2025.
This is a terrific piece on performative living in our algorithmic social media age, but I submit one small addendum: The problem started with "reality" TV at the turn of the century.
Watching the shop
Talking Shop
Theodore Dalrymple for Taki's Magazine. May 30, 2025.
Theodore Dalrymple writing about fashion is one of the best things on the internet.
Are we living in a stupidogenic society?
Daisy Christodoulou at No More Making. August 24, 2025.
Society doesn't matter if you read The New Leaf Journal.
Most-turned leaves of the newsletter week
In each edition of the newsletter, I share our five most-visited articles of the week. This week's list comes courtesy of Statify, an entirely local and cookieless page visit counting solution for WordPress. Below, you will find the five most-visited articles of 2025 Newsletter Week XLI (September 27-October 3) with their 2025 and historic (dating back to 2021) weekly ranking information.
-
Catching 151 Pokémon in Google Search
Nicholas A. Ferrell. April 17, 2025.
2025: 15 appearances and 9 top placements. -
Trying Droidian on a Google Pixel 3a XL
Nicholas A. Ferrell. October 2, 2025.
2025: First appearance. -
Amazon "Cargo Bikes" in Brooklyn
Nicholas A. Ferrell. April 9, 2025.
2025: 23 appearances and 8 top placements. -
The Pokémon Special Split in Generation 2 - Statistics and Analysis
Nicholas A. Ferrell. January 18, 2022.
2025: 4 appearances.
Cumulative: 59 appearances and 4 top placements. -
Enabling Charging Optimization on GrapheneOS
Nicholas A. Ferrell. January 12, 2025.
2025: 3 appearances.
Analysis
After Reddit helped my Amazon Cargo Bikes article snap the six-week first place streak of Catching 151 Pokémon on Google Search, we returned to our regularly scheduled ranking programming with the latter article securing its 7th win in 8 weeks. They were actually close through Wednesday before my Google Search Pokémon game review returned to its late-August, early-September form at the end of the week. My Thursday article about Droidian narrowly edged Amazon Cargo Bikes for the second spot thanks to Hacker News visits on Friday (a modest amount, it certainly did not threaten "page one"), but Pokémon-Google highlighted its recent dominance by having more views than the Hacker News-boosted Droidian article on Friday. This does however make me wonder how a real Droidian review would perform. Perhaps we will find out in the future (but not before a real Ubuntu Touch review).
News leaf journal
While I am never entirely sure how much time I will have to write new articles, I do have several exciting (I hope) projects in the pipeline. These include, but are not limited to:
- Trick for ejecting SIM card trays.
- Review of Ubuntu Touch as used on a daily driver phone.
- Replacing the battery in a Google Pixel 6a.
- Discussion with my distinguished colleague Victor V. Gurbo about his new album.
- Recap of news stories about Halloween in Japan in 2024.
- My most obscure visual novel review yet (provided I can run it, still TBD).
- Some thoughts on Tokyo Mirage Sessions.
- A golfing comeback story.
- NBA all-decade-plus teams for 1998-99 through 2009-10.
- More BLOB DYLAN.
Time-permitting, I hope to publish all of these in October and November. There are no guarantees, but this should give you an idea of what you may have to look forward to.
Taking leaf
I have plans for today (being October 4, 2025), so I will leave things off here.
Thank you as always for reading The Newsletter Leaf Journal. If you enjoyed this issue and have not done so already, you can follow this newsletter by signing up for our weekly email, adding our RSS feed to your favorite feed reader, or checking in on our archive page. You can also sign up for a separate newsletter which sends daily digests of our new posts here.
I look forward to sharing more links and news next week.
Until October 11,
Cura ut valeas -- Nicholas A. Ferrell.