Hello, world. I’m MacDara Conroy, and this is my blog.


Category: Aux

Mike Monteiro: How to fix the internet

“We got an internet that reflects both the horror and the beauty of who we are as human beings. We got the internet that reflects who we are.” Mike’s thoughts are more optimistic than that might read, I swear. #link

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The Amateur Gourmet: Escape From Noma

A thoroughly engaging and entertaining write-up, with a refreshingly honest perspective, of one person’s experience at the supposed “best restaurant in the world” [c/o kottke.org]. Perhaps it wasn’t intended as such (as the writer makes it clear they would’ve got a kick out of the place were they not feeling unwell) but to me, Noma simply oozes pretentious bolloxology — both in the superior notions of the institution itself, and its reflection in the cult that ‘foodies’ have built around it, and others like it. #link

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How to Cook Pasta in the Instant Pot

The measurements are US imperial (sigh) but it’s more or less a two-to-one ratio of water volume to pasta weight. I made macaroni and it came out fine, certainly good enough for me. #link

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Max Read: Notes on it's so over/we're so back

Ostensibly, it’s an analysis of online reaction to the LK-99 story but there is, as the saying goes, a lot to unpack here. The drama angle, for instance, speaks a lot to me, as a wrestling fan; it’s also alarming to think that ‘the real world’ might be reduced to the storytelling dynamic of pro wrestling (which I love dearly, but come on). #link

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Oh, this? Just a video of a herd of guinea pigs living wild in a Dutch garden. [c/o TKSST#video

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Tiny helpers

A collection of free single-purpose online tools for web developers (and potentially tinkerers like me). #link

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Recipe for vegan mapo tofu

I also need to try this, although I’ve decided I only really like tofu when it’s either crunchy on the outside, or pillowy and melt-in-the-mouth. So we’ll see how this goes. #link

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Recipe for pure maple candy

I made this a few weeks ago, and the second time it turned out great. The first was botched due to poor-grade, almost bitter syrup (thanks but no thanks, Aldi) and issues with bringing the syrup up to temperature. Second attempt, I used a bigger pot for the two bottles’ worth; I took it a little higher than the recipe suggests, up to soft ball stage on our sugar thermometer. And I didn’t bother adding nuts. The mixture went in a silicone bread loaf mould to cool and I just chopped it into squares a few hours later. Also, it actually tastes better the day after you make it. #link

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Matt Webb: How would I improve RSS? Three ideas

We all know RSS was killed off by the double-whammy of Google shuttering Reader (for no real reason) and Facebook becoming the de facto walled garden for the majority of people online (finally realising the promise of AOL!). But it also never died. My blog has been consistently publishing a feed since the early days, although some backend SSL issues with my domain mean it’s not currently validating. But! You can subscribe to it just fine with NetNewsWire, which I’ve returned to after a few years with Feedly (which is also good, but it no longer recognises my feed, so…) and with which I’m rebuilding my ‘blogroll’. I’d also love the option to send newsletters from my Gmail inbox to NNW, but not enough to pay Feedbin $5 a month for it, sorry. #link

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Model Metropolis

On the dark side of SimCity: “Behind one of the most iconic computer games of all time is a theory of how cities die—one that has proven dangerously influential.” #link

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Maciej Cegłowski on ‘the siege of Carrie Lam’

“Carrie Lam is a Theresa May-like figure who seems to thrive on a performative stoicism, standing firm in the face of a self-inflicted crisis that a more capable politician would simply wiggle out of. She is a tragic figure in the same way that a pilot who points the nose of the aircraft at a mountain and refuses to listen to the passengers screaming for her to turn is a tragic figure. You puzzle over her motives while also wishing that someone, anyone, would throw her out of the plane.” Great analysis here on the protest the west has seemingly put behind it (because if the markets are untroubled…). #link

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Boris Johnson, Shady SEO Master?

This kind of ‘reputation management’ is clearly awful but makes perfect sense, and reminds me of an article I read recently about what I believe was the US agricultural giant Cargill, and how it uses SEO tricks to keep its bad press buried on the web, but which I now cannot find (touché). #link

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Trial by Fire

Bee shared this one with me, from 10 years ago: a quietly furious tale of prejudice where pride — in one’s self-appointed expertise (in this case, junk science about arson investigations), in one’s convictions (the failings of eyewitness testimony), whatever it may be — comes before truth and justice. #link

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How can you tell that an Irish person’s successful? The media starts calling them British

“‘Britishness’ is, essentially, a slightly less nationalistic way for English people to declare how great England is, while deploying a meagre fig-leaf of imperial distance which, for some reason, they find more palatable. This allows the English to combine a heartfelt conviction of their own popularity, with a reflexive, toddler-like joy in grabbing things that don’t quite belong to them; and also enables their pesky habit of cheerily rendering ‘British’ anything else that isn’t nailed down, like countries, museum treasures and, latterly, Irish celebs.” Plenty more choice quotes where this came from. (Though we should probably like cricket more, especially considering how well we’re playing at Lord's right now.) #link

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Forty-plus years of Super Sentai tokusatsu covered in about eight minutes. Interesting to see how blatantly toy-oriented the Japanese shows are compared to the western adaptations. #video

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Olly with an excellent breakdown of the philosophy behind antifascism, one that also serves as a takedown of the naivety of certain journalistic quarters in the face of racist rhetoric and manipulation. #video

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Pure CSS

Diana Smith’s art made in the medium of CSS and HTML. Very impressive. By the way, this is from my MeFi favourites, where I occasionally save stuff that interests me. #link

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Yotam Ottolenghi’s hummus recipes

Hummus is dead easy to make and I really should make some more often. (Same goes for chimichurri, though I’ve found it harder to get the flavour balance right.) #link

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Sometimes all you need in your life is some baby capybaras. [c/o TKSST#video

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Why no-one speaks Indonesia’s language

If there’s a moral to this story, it’s that these things can’t be forced. Imposing orthography from above? That’s been done before: Cyrillic, Korean, even modern Irish. But the nuts and bolts of communication are something else. How may people speak Esperanto, after all? #link

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Layoutit!

Easily adjustable website frameworks via Bootstrap or CSS. Nicely done. #link

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