My name is Philipp and you are reading Creativerly, the internet corner where I unpack my musings, curate and write about noteworthy apps and software, and explore the latest trends in design and tech.

Hey and welcome to Creativerly 375 👋

Last week, after writing Creativerly consistently every single week for the past 7 years, I did not send out a new newsletter issue for the very first time. The reason for it is simple: I was just incredibly empty. I had a packed week and weekend, and then suddenly adulthood hit like really hard. I was overwhelmed with my job, my personal life, pretty much everything that has been going on in my life. When I have found myself in such a situation a couple of months ago, I would probably had forced myself to write the newsletter anyway, which would have overwhelmed me even more. And in those situations, the quality of the newsletter also often suffered. But fast forward to today, and I simply realized that I need a break, a break from writing, a break from my side-projects, a break from Creativerly.

The last thing I want is that I burn out, because I force myself to create something every single week. Over past years, that process always felt natural, because I discovered so much interesting stuff I wanted to share and write about. And while there is still so much interesting and shareworthy stuff out there, it became so hard and overwhelming to filter signal from noise, as we are getting flooded with slop every single day. I assume, filtering through that stuff is not only overwhelming for me, but also for others.

Yet, I still feel like that there is this small and cozy corner of the internet, where people hang out to consume true human writing, opinionated posts, personal posts, posts that sparkle your own ideas. All that stuff is still out there, we just have to dig for it a bit more. On the other hand, we should all keep sharing that stuff, resurface it, and spread the word.

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Fresh Updates, news, and findings

Capacities' newest update introduces 'recurring tasks' →

One of Capacities' most requested features just landed in its app: full support for recurring tasks out of the box. This means you can now set a task to repeat and keep working from the same task object. You can set a scheduled date for fixed rhythms like every Monday or every month on the 15th, but you can also set a completion date for flexible intervals like every 3 days after you finish.

The 'Mac Vault Bundle' gives you access to 43 macOS apps at a retail value of almost $2.000, but you can save up to 97%* →

The new 'Mac Vault Bundle' from BundleHunt gives you access to 43 premium macOS apps, that you can all grab via a lifetime license, which means no subscriptions, and you own them forever. With just a few clicks you can create your own bundle of premium macOS apps and save up to 97%. The current bundle includes apps like DeltaWalker – an app for advanced file and folder comparison to compare, merge, and sync data – for $6.99 (retails at $59.99), SupaSidebar – one sidebar for all your browsers, as it gathers tabs, bookmarks, and apps from all browser in a single sidebar – for $4.99 (retails at $49.99), Notepad.exe – a lightweight native macOS IDE for Swift, Python, and JavaScript – for $7.99 (retails at $79.99), and a lot more.

Head over to BundleHunt and check out the 'Mac Vault Bundle' to see all the amazing apps that you can grab at huge discounts. And remember, those are all lifetime licenses.

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Blogs Are Back is a privacy-focused RSS reader built for people who want to follow writers, not algorithms. As social media platforms are optimized for engagement, they made reading feel like work. Blogs Are Back was built with the mission that the web is better when people connect directly with the writers they care about. RSS is an open technology that puts you in control. Therefore, you get to decide to which blogs you want to subscribe, you can read them in chronological order, and never miss a post.

Blogs Are Back is privacy-focused by architecture, as feed content is cached in your browser using IndexedDB, and the posts you read never leave your device. If you want, you can create an account to sync your subscriptions and reading status across devices, however, there is still no content tracking involved. The only thing that gets stored are the blogs you follow and which posts you have read, but never the content itself.

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Mental Wealth

❯ (One) Good AI Is Here – “The cultural battles over AI have broken down over predictable lines in the past few years, with critics rightfully calling out the big AI platforms for training on content without consent, recklessly building without considering environmental impact, and designing platforms that are unaccountable because their code and weights (the parameters that describe how an AI model works) aren’t open for third-parties to evaluate. The AI zealots have done themselves no favors, by not only dismissing all of these valid criticisms, but by also making increasingly outlandish and extreme claims about the capabilities of the Big AI platforms, while simultaneously scaremongering about the brutal effect they’ll have on people’s lives and careers. It’s no wonder the public sentiment about AI has become so negative.”

❯ The Drawing Hand – “A friend and I were talking about AI and the question of where I lie on the spectrum came up: “I’m now on the handmade, artisanal, craftsperson end of the spectrum.” A client project recently moved into the LLM layer. Some of the team had already been working with an LLM to wireframe and prototype some aspects based on my initial Figma designs. I’m far more judicious and faster (it is my design to be fair), but it’s interesting to see how Figma Make and Claude extrapolate my basic design system file and screens into primitives and code. Things got... lost in translation. Extraneous primitives, too many primitives, borders got ignored. The results look like the blurry part before something comes into sharp focus.”

❯ Sacrifice your job for the glorious AI future – “Didn’t you hear? There’s a glorious future on the horizon, if only we allow the CEOs of major tech and AI companies to do whatever they want with us and our world.”

❯ Users own the present. You own the future. – “A few years ago I sat in a research session at Moonfare. Since private equity is a premium product, our clients are mostly C-level executives, founders or people who have spent decades being the person in the room with the answer. He was one of them.”

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Appendix

❯ ICYMI

Discover the rise of decentralized social networks like Mastodon and Bluesky as traditional platforms increasingly face criticism. In my post about "The tools for decentralized social networks – How to interact with Mastodon and Bluesky" you can learn about essential third-party tools enhancing these networks, from clients like Ivory and Ice Cubes to cross-posting apps like Croissant.

❯ Quick Bits

Till next time! 👋‌‌‌‌

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