Newsletter Leaf Journal CCLIII 〜 NewsELEC
Newsletter Leaf Journal 253 welcomes November 2025 with links to two new NLJ articles on tech troubleshooting and translations and several short posts, 21 links from around the web, and other news and notes from the week that was and the week to come.
Welcome to the 253rd 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.
I published a couple of new New Leaf Journal posts and several new Emu Café Social short posts. Below, we will cover those, exciting links from around the web, and other news and notes.
Leaves from the week that was
I published two new New Leaf Journal articles since mailing Newsletter 252.
In JP to EN Game Translation Mishaps, I tackled the story of a RPG on Steam which had its title butchered in the English-to-Japanese translation process. Fortunately, the error helped the game attract attention among Japanese players and the title was fixed. Was it a stunt? I suspect not. I tied the story to my own experience using machine translation on Japanese text in working on my August 2024 article about the original Adobe Flash version of Gogatsu no Sora.
One day later, I published Troubleshooting AmberELEC Install on Anbernic RG351V. The RG351V is a cheap Chinese handheld console for running retro games. I wanted to replace the stock firmware and all that came with it with a clean free and open source Linux-based operating system called AmberELEC. I ran into unexpected issues, but I was able to solve them (and share the solution) with my patented do it myself research attitude.
Over on ECS, I covered Mullvad VPN's decision to shut down its Google Search proxy. Continuing my handheld game console theme from NLJ, I wrote about the upcoming Arduboy FX-C, which reminds me that I need to try my earlier Arduboy model. In public affairs news, I questioned a City Journal author's assessment of the real loser of New York City's recent mayoral election and ESPN's new gambling partnership.
Leaves from around the web
My output last week was adequate, but not exceptional. But I can promise an exceptional list of 21 links from around the web.
Veterans/Armistice Day Reading
In the Centennial Footsteps of “A Soldier’s Journey”
Attila Szalay-Berzeviczy for RealClear Defense. November 11, 2024.
A look at the new World War I memorial in Washington DC.
109-Year-Old Messages in a Bottle Written by Soldiers Heading to Fight in World War I Discovered on Australian Beach
Sarah Kuta for Smithsonian Magazine. November 6, 2025.
It took 109 long years but the messages finally made it home.
Performative virtue signaling
The Hipster Hologram
Adam Leher for Tablet Magazine. November 3, 2025.
"But to be a hipster in the 21st century was something altogether different. It meant subscribing to a boutique version of rebellion—a lifestyle curated by algorithms and financed by your parents. You demonstrated your difference through your purchasing habits: vintage vinyl, craft beer, selvedge denim, an apartment decorated to resemble an ad for authenticity. Shopping at Urban Outfitters made you aspirational; shopping at Marc Jacobs made you successful. Either way, you were playing dress-up in the ruins of counterculture."
Broken Telescopes
Theodore Dalrymple for Taki's Magazine. November 7, 2025.
"I have developed a kind of mental allergy to slogans brandished as virtuous that do not say anything that anyone (apart from lunatics) would contradict or oppose. Sloganeering in general is the death of thought, and the only slogan I have ever really appreciated was that of a man with a sandwich board who used to walk up and down Oxford Street in London, warning the population against the seven deadly proteins. They were supposedly connected in some way with the seven deadly sins."
Election previews
Why Iraq's Election Is Iran's Last, Best Hedge
Kian Sharifi for RFE/RL. November 5, 2025.
Say what one will but Iraq is committed to its regular elections (whether a conclusive result is reached is a separate matter).
The Man Who Wants to Make Iraq Great Again
Tom O'Connor for Newsweek. November 7, 2025.
"Many mottos accompany the parliamentary election campaign mounted by Sudani’s aptly named Reconstruction and Development Coalition. The coalition’s logo is a crane, the kind which can be found across Baghdad’s skyline as new buildings, roads and bridges rise."
Approaching tech problems differently
Tech illiterates and new gacha
Cabbage Sorter. November 7, 2025.
She's talking about a Chinese dress-up game called Life Makeover with which I am only familiar through her blog. With the introduction aside, I couldn't help but think of some of my troubleshooting adventures as I read about people who are less inclined to put in the effort.
Manufacturer issues remote kill command to disable smart vacuum after engineer blocks it from collecting data — user revives it with custom hardware and Python scripts to run offline (HT 82Mhz)
Jowi Morales for Tom's Hardware. November 1, 2025.
This doesn't make me question my decision to go for an offline model.
Collaborating through games
This two-player game will expose any power imbalances in your relationship and possibly make things even worse. We asked the dev why he’d do something so twisted
Amber V for Automation West. April 11, 2025.
I'm not convinced this is more effective than Mario Party.
Learning to trust with Hanabi
Bojidar Marinov. November 7, 2025.
Certainly better than learning to trust with Mario Party.
Doing more with less
The Nintendo Switch kept us busy with its limited CPU and RAM, but it also made optimization a fun puzzle to figure out – Japanese engineers talk about difficulties they faced and their expectations for the Switch 2
Nobuaki Shibuya for Automation West. February 18, 2025.
The big problem with Switch's limitations seems to have been the need to port games to it made for consoles without those limitations.
Nintendo still plans on developing Switch games despite resources primarily shifting to the Switch 2
Carlos Zotomayor for Automation West. November 7, 2025.
Nice to see Nintendo reading my articles.
Yes, I'm still using a Palm Pilot even though it's 2025: Here's why I can't give it up
Stephen Radochia for Android Police. April 20, 2025.
I never had a Palm Pilot but one look at the screen reminded me of my old Tiger Game.com. (Aside: Can't believe I missed this backlog link last week when I published my PumpkinOS article).
The 1994 IBM PC Invoice
Wouter Groeneveld at Brain Baking. November 6, 2025.
I like old hardware by 4 Mb of RAM may be pushing it.
Research-turned-into-articles
What Did A Young John Roberts Contribute To Chief Justice Rehnquist's Opinion In Dames & Moore v. Regan?
Josh Blackman for The Volokh Conspiracy. October 30, 2025.
Supreme Court reporting forensics.
“A virgin, a tree and a death were the symbols of our defeat.” – a Chrysostom quote?
Roger Pearse. September 9, 2025.
The search for the source of a quotation.
Visual formats
I Saw ‘One Battle After Another’ Six Times in Six Formats in Six Days
Jim Hemphill for IndieWire. October 7, 2025.
I never thought much about movie formats. This guy saw the same move six times to try them all.
Japan’s Forgotten Analog HDTV Standard Was Well Ahead Of Its Time
Lewin Day for Hackaday. November 6, 2025.
Many things that were ahead of their time were of little interest in their time.
Searching for love
Birds-of-Paradise Glow to Attract Mates, Adding a Flashy Element to Their Impressive Courtship Displays
Sara Hashemi for Smithsonian Magazine. February 12, 2025.
Will they be glowing when they settle down and get married?
Erich Fromm on Why Love is Not About Finding ‘the One’
Jack Maden for Philosophy Break. April 2025.
Based on anime I have come to understand that once two people start dating the show (or season) immediately ends.
My take on the news of the week
November's Full Beaver Supermoon Peaks on Wednesday—and It Will Be the Year's Biggest
Margherita Bassi for Smithsonian Magazine. November 3, 2025.
I missed it on Wednesday but it was already unusually big on Tuesday.
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 XLVI (November 1-7) with their 2025 and historic (dating back to 2021) weekly ranking information.
Ranking
-
Catching 151 Pokémon in Google Search
Nicholas A. Ferrell. April 17, 2025.
2025: 20 appearances and 14 top placements. -
Examining Whether Defense Wins NBA Championships
Nicholas A. Ferrell. July 9, 2024.
2025: 26 appearances and 10 top placements.
Cumulative: 30 appearances and 11 top placements. -
Amazon "Cargo Bikes" in Brooklyn
Nicholas A. Ferrell. April 9, 2025.
2025: 28 appearances and 8 top placements. -
Height differences in anime romances
Nicholas A. Ferrell. March 22, 2023.
2025: 8 appearances.
Cumulative: 23 appearances and 7 top placements. -
Enabling Charging Optimization on GrapheneOS
Nicholas A. Ferrell. January 12, 2025.
2025: 4 appearances.
Analysis
Catching 151 Pokémon in Google Search claimed its 12th top placement in 14 weeks and 14th overall. It is now tied for the third-most top placements in a single year. See the leaders below.
| Rank | Article | Year | Top Placements |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The Mystery of Sōseki and Tsuki ga Kirei | 2022 | 30 |
| 2 | The Mystery of Sōseki and Tsuki ga Kirei | 2021 | 25 |
| 3 | Catching 151 Pokémon in Google Search | 2025 | 14 |
| 3 | The Mystery of Sōseki and Tsuki ga Kirei | 2023 | 14 |
| 5 | An In-Depth Look at Norton Safe Search | 2024 | 13 |
While there are not enough weeks left in the year for Catching 151 Pokémon in Google Search to move into the top two for most year-in top placements, I would be very surprised to not see it climb into solo third place next week.
Our top-three was rounded out by the other two top-performing articles in 2025. Examining Whether Defense Wins NBA Championships, which had been our dominant article in the first half of 2025, had its second excellent week in the last four for a comfortable second-place finish. The ranking beyond the top two was uninspiring in terms of visits, with about 10 articles in close proximity to the 4th and 5th positions on the ranking. Rounding out the top three was Amazon "Cargo Bikes" in Brooklyn.
News leaf journal
I may in the near future see if I can configure Buttondown (our newsletter host) to send emails from our newleafjournal [dot] com domain. If at any point you see that our newsletters are coming from that domain instead of a Buttondown domain, you will know why. Our newsletter archives will continue to have a Buttondown name regardless of the email-sending domain.
Notable leaf journal
My schedule for next week is not looking too bad at the moment, so I hope to make some progress on a few "big" projects I either have in the works or have been planning for some time. But first, I ought to tidy up my workspace, for clear writing flows from clear thinking, and it is hard to think clearly with all this stuff on my work desk.
Taking leaf
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.
Until November 15,
Cura ut valeas -- Nicholas A. Ferrell.