Jake Russo

The last time I had a laptop was late 2021, before I returned it and built a desktop. That was the right choice: the laptop¹ was overpriced and underperformant, and the desktop turned out to be a much better fit.

Not having a laptop, though, was annoying: I would have waste time, functionality, efficiency, and frustration using the computers at school. I would often have to worry about having access to a computer for sufficient time to e.g., write an essay the class before it was due.

Coincidentally, I saw a YouTube video talking about ThinkPads, their low price, upgradability, durability, etc. People seemed to like the T4xx² series, in particular.

The heft of e.g., the T440 wouldn’t work for me. I have a spot in my bag that can fit a slim, 14-inch laptop, and that’s it. There’s some distain online for the ThinkPads ending in “s”, for slim: less of their components are easily replaceable.

But that’s the tradeoff, I guess. And, realistically, I’m ever actually going to upgrade the thing.

I ended up with the T480s that I’m using to write this post (and every other one on this site, so far). It wasn’t the product of much research; I just saw a listing for an OS-less (but entitled to Windows!) T480s on eBay one day, and bought it. It has an i7 from 2018, 16GB of RAM, an SSD, and a passable, 1080P display³. And the thing was <$300.

The mouse buttons above the trackpad are nice, and I use them instead of the built-in trackpad click. The design is minimal, but businesslike and sharp. They don’t look ultra-premium, but they don’t look like they’re from Wish.com, either.

I worried that the battery would be terrible, or the thing would look like it fell off a truck, but it’s not, and it doesn’t. There are, of course, signs of wear: some of the keys are shiny, and there’s a bright spot in the bottom corner of the display.

But it runs well, the keyboard is quite good (I originally thought it was mediocre-at-best, but it’s really grown on me), and it lasts 5-6 hours, which is about how long you can expect this sort of laptop to last.

Maybe I should’ve gone for an X1 Carbon; it’s basically this laptop but better. But this thing works! My only complaint is the screen, since I think a 3:2 aspect ratio is preferable (though all my screens have been 16:9, and I don’t have the weird LG one) and 2K with a little more vibrancy thrown in would be a welcome improvement. There are also some weird lags, sometimes, but those seem like a feature common to laptops, rather than a problem with this one in particular.

The experience of using my desktop is better (for reference, the keyboard cost more than the laptop), but using my laptop is lower-friction. It means I do interesting things, like writing this post, more often. It also means that things I’d write down and put off until I felt like walking over to the computer and turning it on (yeah, it’s just as easy as it sounds — it’s like eight feet away from me as I write this) got done a lot sooner and more often. I’ve subscribed to GeForce now for a few months now (the 4K tier, since I tell myself I need it for my desktop), and don’t use it much. I’m falling for the sunk cost fallacy, since I’ve spend some amount of money on Steam games, and losing GeForce Now (though I could immediately resubscribe and be fine, when I actually want to play) would mean I lose access to those games. But having the subscription means I one of the things I can do more often is game, since I can open it on this laptop. I might write at more length about GeForce Now, but maybe it’d be after I get a GPU and finally cancel the subscription⁴.

I’m thinking about preordering a Framework Ryzen 7040 series (Ryzen 5) because of their famed efficiency, and because it’d be a nice upgrade, a laptop that I could daily drive for years, easily refurbishing when needed. It’s been a while since I built my desktop, and the DIY version seems fun. It would also be a nice gift to myself for my last year of high school, shipping late Q3 of this year.

But the ThinkPad is excellent, and the more I use it, the more hesitant I become to preorder a Framework. This thing works pretty well! And if it stops working, I can cheaply repair or replace it. That also means I don’t have to worry too much about it: I can just throw it in my bag without worrying. Of course, the easy repairability of the Framework might have the same effect, but it doesn’t seem the same.

I guess we’ll see. The Framework improves on almost every one of my gripes with the Thinkpad, but they’re mostly luxury, quality of life improvements.

If you’re looking for a laptop, don’t get one from Best Buy for $300: it’ll almost certainly be terrible. Look for ThinkPads for that price; there are plenty, and they’ll probably actually work. There’s a prolific ThinkPad community⁵ on the internet, and it’s fun to see their passion.

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¹It was a Lenovo IdeaPad, which cost 3x as much as this thing, and was much worse.

²jvscholz on YouTube makes different, interesting videos. I think he has a few other channels, too. Definitely worth a watch.

³ The screen is 14″ (perfect size!) and 1080P, which, coincidentally, evaluates to the same PPI (and, thus, same perceived sharpness) as my 28″, 4K desktop monitor. (I actually don’t miss the high refresh rate as much as I thought I would, but the higher resolution and much better colors always make me glad to be back on the desktop.)

⁴I try to vary my entertainment — games, books, movies, TV, podcasts. I like to feel multifaceted in that sense. It’s often difficult for me, though; maybe I’ll write about this.

⁵Reddit and YouTube are good starting places.

Most of my writing these days (at least, until this site) is literary analysis for my (excellent) English teacher. Predictably, I frequently use quotes, and often, those quotes will come at the end of a sentence or before a comma.

For fear of seeming ignorant: yes, I know that in American English, the comma or period goes inside the quote. For example,

• Tom, “forc[ing] him out of the room,” demonstrates his violent assertiveness.
• Torvald was not “the man [she] could bind [herself] to.”

Sorry for the examples being a little poor; I tried making them up, instead of actually finding them in past essays. They should be more than sufficient to demonstrate my point, though.

I don’t like that; I think it’s annoying. If the punctuation is mine, it goes outside the quotes; if it’s the author’s, it goes inside. This is the case in British English, which I like. Unfortunately, I’m not into the whole “flavor” / “colour” thing. Waste of letters.

Except if the punctuation is an exclamation or question mark or something, in which case, if it’s yours, it goes outside the quotes, even in American English. That’s actually good, and I can see the argument concerning the comma and period: they’re neutral; they don’t change the meaning of the quote; it looks better when they’re enclosed, so keep them there.

But I’ve dug the whole too deep, and I’d seem clueless if I suddenly switched. And I still think my (the British, I guess) way is more precise.

Something I read on Read Max a few months ago stuck with me. He wrote about how actually writing, or actually producing is what makes you better; what really matters is that you produce at all.

I didn’t act on it at the time, but it stayed in the back of my mind, as I was thinking about (but not actually writing) my blog. The thesis of that post is essentially the rationale behind this blog, much of which I detailed here and here.

This applies broadly, though, and just as easily to podcasts. The relationship between this (“notes”) blog and my “main” blog is analogous to that between my Anchor (now Spotify Podcasts) show and my main (“Jake Russo Podcast”) one.

I just started this podcast in the car, outside of a restaurant. I’ve been thinking about doing just that for a week or two, now, and I finally did.

And it went well. It was fun, and, knowing that I only had one take, it was much quicker and more enjoyable than recording for my other podcast (which, unsurprisingly, only has two episodes — one of which is a trailer). My attitude with that podcast and this blog is similar, if not the same: I record something, don’t listen to or edit it, and publish. The goal is similar, too: I’ll never get better at blogging if I don’t do it often; I’ll never get better at podcasting if I don’t do it often. The only way anyone could possibly hear or read what I have to say is if I actually say it. And saying more is better than saying less — more chances.

I write this as I’m going through still somewhat manual process of submitting podcast RSS feeds to Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, and other distributors.

You can listen to the episode I just recorded here.

It’ll eventually get its own page on this site.

If you’re interested in making content for the internet or need something interesting to do (both of which exist in my reason set), give the aforementioned article a read. We’ll see if this lasts; it’d be good if I were actually consistent with it!

Last week, a friend and I attended PechaKucha night, which happened to be hosted by our favorite teacher. We didn’t know exactly what to expect — we had never before been — but were confident, at least, that we might be entertained for the few hours it occupied.

It was great! From monologues on the “transformative power of music”, to orations on the power of reading and the danger of banning books, the passion in each of the six-minute, forty-second presentations was contagious.

The experience reminded me how much I don’t know, the breadth of experience and thought. Some presentations brought words to feeling and sentiment I possess but haven’t executed on — “buy the ticket”, for example, “leave home, and experience other cultures” for another. There were nine presentations in total, and my brief survey here obviously doesn’t account for all of them, but I enjoyed every one of them; they each had their unique insight and poignant moral.

The experience comes shortly after my discovering Gurwinder’s Substack and his periodic “Mind-Expanding Concepts” posts. There’s a certain kind of fulfillment I get from learning different, sometimes idiosyncratic ideas; PechaKucha night was a Gurwinder post on steroids. And I’m certain this fulfillment isn’t unique: if you’re interested, look for new experiences, perspectives, and opportunities for thought. I don’t pretend to be some sort of authority on the subject, but it seemed important enough to write down. At the very least, I’m going to increase the frequency of these sorts of experiences in my own life.

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Philosophy seems interesting and unlike much of what I’ve been exposed to. That’s probably next for me, but it’s a huge area of study, with so much to learn, and I haven’t even started. According to Jared Henderson, Plato’s Dialogues is a good place to start.

Verizon is supposed to be the best, and the data supposedly backs that up. Their coverage is, in my convenience-sample¹ backed estimation, the widest ranging. I’m ~never somewhere where I cannot make a call on Verizon. But I’m frequently unable to connect to the internet — on LTE!

I prefer MVNOs

They’re cheaper and easier to switch between, but the best plans (without considering price) are post-paid through the major carriers. But approximately or effectively equivalent plans are often MVNO options. For example, my Verizon coverage is via Verizon Visible’s Plus plan — an excellent plan, with 50GB of prioritized data (which is of outsized importance on Verizon, because of their annoying network management³ and often low capacity) and unlimited data thereafter. They also include some free international roaming⁴, which, at this point in my life, isn’t of much consequence. They also include 5G UW access, which is nice but unnecessary: I’d prefer solid LTE that actually works most of the time.

Comparing networks

Arguably, the ability to make calls is more important: it’s better to be without internet communication than without communication altogether. But in practice, Verizon’s zero or near-zero internet speeds are the most annoying.

I live in an area with good coverage (often low- or mid-band 5G) from all three carriers², and where Verizon is good, it’s really good. I’ve never been in a situation where I’m so far outside of a Verizon coverage zone that I’m unable to place a call, but I’m frequently unable to connect to the internet, which I do much more often than talking on the phone.

One of the places where Verizon doesn’t work is school — obviously, somewhere where I spend a significant amount of time. Because of this, I got a cheap Boost Mobile (AT&T) SIM, on their $25 for 35GB plan, as a second line on my iPhone.

I’ve been dual SIM for about six months now, and it’s time to pull the plug on my Verizon (Visible) service. AT&T often feels slower (which is likely because Boost is deprioritized) than Verizon (when it works), but I’ll take “slower and more consistent” over “faster, except when it’s slower than dial-up”. And almost every time I lose internet connectivity on Verizon, switching data to AT&T gets me back online. I’ve experienced this around my town and neighboring ones, on long drives, and in other states.

Alternatives?

I’m looking for an alternative, preferably on AT&T. The tech media seems to be running a marketing campaign for T-Mobile, insisting they’re the best carrier overall. Admittedly, I haven’t used T-Mobile for a few years, but the coverage wasn’t great⁵.

I’m considering AT&T Prepaid’s Unlimited MAX (though the 5GB of hotspot⁵ might not be enough), Cricket’s unlimited plan (though I don’t love Cricket), and Google Fi⁷.

I like Google Fi for the price — $20/month per line with a family⁸ plan. Its being a Google product is also nice, since I would prefer dealing with them than e.g., AT&T’s antiquated PayGo portal.

The problem with Fi is its using T-Mobile. As I mentioned, it’s been a few years since I daily drove their network; I’m willing to give it another shot, though, and they’re (T-Mobile) offering a trial!

Speaking of, T-Mobile’s post-paid plans are good both in features and in price.

Domestic roaming?

I’ve wondered about this for a while without finding a decent answer⁹: doesn’t the existence of domestic roaming agreements between US carriers mean Verizon’s advantage — calling — is moot? If one network’s data coverage is better, more consistent in areas you frequent, wouldn’t domestic roaming fill in the gaps?

It turns out domestic roaming agreements are weird, and the agreements between carriers are very location specific. Just because there’s AT&T coverage in an area without e.g., Verizon or T-Mobile coverage doesn’t mean you can roam on one of those networks. It seems like it’s more of a thing in rural areas with hyper regional carriers — thus, LTEiRA agreements.

Domestic roaming is also, traditionally, a feature of the big three’s post-paid plans (though Visible began offering it recently).

Stasis

That’s where I am with my wireless providers. I’ve been meaning to switch for some time but have been carried by the inertia of my Boost/Visible+ combo working. I almost never have a problem with coverage, because when I do, I can switch to Boost from cellular settings, and continue. But this setup is overpriced and unnecessary; it’s annoying that Verizon’s subsidiary MVNO offers such a compelling plan, and AT&T’s doesn’t.

I might post an update here, if/when I find and switch to a better plan. But for now, I’m tired of opining on cell phone service.

I went through a period of being intensely interested in cell phone carriers, MVNOs, plans, etc. If you’re interested and want to learn more (you can get much more into the weeds than I did) or keep up with industry news, take a look at Sneed Mobile Tech and Light Reading. Stetson Doggett does a fantastic job covering plans in particular.

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¹A less clear way of saying “completely anecdotal”, which I left in as a relic of AP Statistics that other students might appreciate.

²My experience with T-Mobile is less recent, but their coverage seems fine in most areas I frequent. There is one area in particular, though, where the three carriers are co-located, all except Verizon with usable internet access.

³Carriers use QCI (quality control index) numbers to prioritize network activity — some are GBR (guaranteed bitrate), which is reserved for live audio or video (e.g., phone calls); others are for diagnostics, etc.; but the higher (and, thus, lower priority) indexes are for data. On Verizon, there are three: 7, 8, and 9. 7 is Frontline, Verizon’s first-responder plan. 8 and 9 are for the consumer plans, 8 being “prioritized”, 9 being “deprioritized”. The prioritized plans are relatively few — mostly comprising of Verizon’s own first-party, post-paid plans (except the recent, terrible Welcome Unlimited), and the Spectrum/Xfinity Mobile plans (which, interesting, are also postpaid). Almost every Verizon MVNO is deprioritized — the likes of TracFone, etc. — and prioritization can be the difference between usable internet and “have fun with 2G”.

⁴I think AT&T has the best (but not the cheapest — that might be T-Mobile) international roaming. I don’t remember the details exactly, but it’s worth googling, if you’re interested.

⁵T-Mobile’s advertising makes me laugh: they call themselves the “best 5G network”, carefully distinguishing their claim from that of “best network”.

⁶You change some network settings on your tethered device — ttl — to mask your traffic as coming from the phone, which should bypass the cap.

⁷Google Fi on iPhone is annoying to set up, and Google doesn’t seem to care much.

⁸My family is mixed across cell phone plans and providers, so it’ll be annoying to switch, but the savings make it worth the trouble.

⁹I’m sure there’s one out there somewhere; my trouble is probably a product of my not knowing how to phrase my question for Google.

I’m a little late on this one — everyone else has already had their say. And, quite honestly, I don’t have much to add.

LTT, and some of its sister channels, were hacked late last week by actor(s?) who transformed them into “Tesla” outposts, featuring Elon Musk giving away free crypto.

I found the attack vector interesting — something I’m more used to hearing about on Security Now, than seeing actually happen. tl;dr: someone opened an infected PDF with a tool that grabbed browser cookies, allowing session hijack attacks for logged-in accounts. I guess it’s not the most sophisticated attack, but it seems like it would require some reasonably intermediate skill.

The WAN Show is one of my favorite podcasts, and I appreciate its growing duration — four-hour WAN shows are becoming the norm! Last week’s¹ was great; it was interesting hearing Luke and Linus discuss the damage of and their response to the attack.

The community support was nice to see — it’s nice to feel like a part of it — and Floatplane subscribers soared — finally passed 40k!

I’ve been somewhat in the market for a metal reusable water bottle for some time — plastic gets annoying² — but indifference and inertia for using single-use plastic bottles stalled me.

Linus and Luke mentioned they thought the best way to give the attackers the metaphorical finger was to make as much out of the incident as they could — Luke even mentioned thoroughly enjoying the excitement and long hours — and made a “Gone Phishin’” shirt to commemorate it. It’s filled with subtle details, like the cookie basket, a floatplane, and a “2FA” heart. I’ve never tried one of their shirts, but the reviews seem overwhelmingly positive. And indigo looks nice.

I upgraded my LTT Floatplane subscription to the 4K tier — the softness of 1080p often drove me to watch the videos on YouTube instead³, if I was using a 4K display or TV — and finally ordered a water bottle and T-Shirt from LTTStore.

And it seems like LTT is back in full swing, and Friday’s WAN show was another record.

These sorts of businesses, communities and creators are one of the wonderful things about the internet.

I’ll write about some of my favorite blogs, podcasts, books, other internet things later.

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¹Relative time in this post is a little weird because of when I started and finished it.

²Cleaning metal bottles can be annoying, too, but this doesn’t seem like much of a problem when you, like me, drink ~only water. They’re not generally dishwasher safe, spawning a market for Shark Tank products like this one.

³And the app doesn’t support background play, which rules out The WAN Show. And downloads are broken so I can’t push it to my podcast app. The audio quality seems (to me, but this might be total placebo) noticeably higher fidelity on Floatplane, which is why that version is worth mentioning. It also includes the pre-show.

Is TikTok anything more sinister than a benign waste of time?

Why the outrage over TikTok? It seems that those who are outraged aren’t TikTok users, and to the extent they are, they’re sympathetic to a forced removal of their biggest time sink.

Their appearance before Congress was riddled with near-incomprehensible questions and legislators thinking they were clever.

The CEO was asked such ridiculous questions as, “have you directed them to change the source code,” and similarly absurd accusations that TikTok is spying through our phones’ cameras to capture our facial expressions.¹

The real threat TikTok poses, if any, is hardly articulated.

Yes, it’s probably bad for a foreign government, especially the Chinese, to have access to the sorts of data TikTok does — preferences, demographic and other inferential data.

Why? A tap into the obscene number of collective hours we collectively spend on TikTok could be invaluable.

Could the Chinese government use TikTok to influence Americans’ thoughts or behaviors? Maybe, but probably not in an obvious way.

Facebook, Google, and other adtech are necessarily good: they wouldn’t survive otherwise. Yes, there are the predictable ads that follow you around seemingly forever after visiting e.g., Allbirds and viewing a single pair of shoes.² But for every one of those instances, there’s a matching one of incredible prediction and statistical maneuvering.

My favorite illustrative example is this: Target knew a teenage girl was pregnant before she did. And this is obviously not because she searched for e.g., diapers. The short version is this: people who are pregnant, whether they know it or not, tend to act slightly differently than other people. This, apparently, extends to their shopping behavior at Target. They used an algorithm that could parse purchase habits and determine, with apparently great accuracy, whether a customer was pregnant.

It doesn’t take much imagination to believe companies, with considerably more tech prowess than Target, use techniques similar to these to predict demographic, health, interest, etc. information. People who are, eventually, known to be members of a certain group or have a certain attribute might act in certain, slightly different ways on Instagram or Google or… you get the idea.

This is why it might seem like Facebook is listening in through your phone’s microphone. But they aren’t. If they were, they’d (1) have to keep it very quiet, and (2) exploit a horrible bug in iOS (or Android), since Apple certainly wouldn’t be on board — they cost Facebook millions because of their App Tracking Transparency popups, which allow users to opt out of cross-app tracking. Unless this is some sort of 4D chess. 😉

So the influence TikTok might exert would be more sublime: it’s much more powerful when someone draws the conclusion you want them to — it’s ‘their idea’ — than to overtly try and convince them. Maybe there are certain types of videos their recommendation system could prefer that would subliminally promote e.g., feelings of resentment of or distrust in government. The usefulness of such an effect is clear.

Whatever the case, our legislators are sorely ill-equipped to handle such a matter of technology. Even the Supreme Court admits they “really don’t know about these things [… we’re] not like the nine greatest experts on the internet.”

I might think differently after reading some more about this. Noah Smith wrote a piece arguing that “of course we should ban TikTok,” and Platformer just published a critique of the CEO’s performance before the House committee. Maybe I’ll revisit this topic.

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¹I got this from a video on TikTok. An interesting meta argument is that videos ridiculing Congress seem to be doing well on TikTok. But is that because of their manipulation? Maybe it is, but maybe it’s what the median TikTok user agrees with.

²I can’t stand ads and have removed them (as much as reasonably possible) from my life. But that’s a topic for another post.

This post is from my former “notes” site.

This isn’t polished — it’s not supposed to be.

Here, I’m recording things on my mind that I find (at least somewhat) interesting.

This is the only common theme to this blog: I won’t follow a particular ‘beat’, though my writings will probably skew tech-focused.

My posts here will not be as polished as they could be. Sometimes it’ll seem like I didn’t bother to proof them — I probably didn’t. That’s the point.

The point of this is to write, and to write more, without pressure; to record and crystalize my thoughts. The posts I wrote today were written during History and Spanish classes. 🙂

I am also working on a sort of “favorites” page, where I’ll log my favorite blogs, books, podcasts, movies, shows, etc.

Writing this way — in the distraction-free Write.as editor — does for blogging what Anchor did for podcasting: it removes the friction.

I might update this page with more information as I finish more posts. Read Why? for more about the impetus behind this blog.

If you find anything I discuss interesting or have any questions, please write to me.

If you want to hear from me next time I post, leave your email here.

This post is from my former “notes” site.

I was reading a recent issue of Bits About Money, where patio11 mentioned a post by Interfluidity. I was curious, and after poking around the website, I found his “drafts” site, where he’s a little more relaxed with what he publishes.

Then I was listening to an episode of Ben Thompson’s Sharp Tech, discussing ChatGPT v4 and its ability to detect the author of one of Ben’s future (from the perspective of the AI’s 2021 dataset) articles; he joked about it finding his “secret blog”.

So I’ve decided to start this not-so-secret blog. I’m writing this on Micro.blog¹, but I’m also considering Bear — something simple where I can quickly write and publish, unlike the arduity of posting to my main site.

I tried Twitter for this reason, but this is cheaper (than Blue 😉 ) and more fun. Yes, Twitter, when used properly, is a great networking tool; Alexey Guzey says this often. But this might work better for me at the moment. We’ll see where this goes.

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¹Now testing on Write.as (after a few minutes on Mataroa — maybe I’ll go back). I like the interface better, but we’ll see. This is the danger here: I’ll end up trying every platform, not writing anything.

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Update: I ended up back on Micro.blog, for various reasons; this site is now called my “notes”, rather than “secret blog”, but the idea is the same.

A lot of this is outdated and was based on a previous version of this website.

As a sort of record of products and services I like and use, I’ve decided to write this post, inspired by I Use This – leo.fm. Mine will be a little different and will focus more heavily on services in addition to products, but I felt it important to acknowledge where I got the idea. Leo Laporte is, in fact, the inspiration various facets of my life, others of which I’ll eventually cover here.

The technology powering this website:

I’ve been wanting a blog – a place where I can publish my work, experiences and opinions. A product of some consideration, trial and error, I’ve chosen the services detailed below as the backbone of JakeRusso.com

Hover

Hover is one of the best domain registrars I’ve come across. Since they’re comparatively expensive, versus Porkbun and Cloudflare (Registrar), I’ve yet to transfer all of my domains over. Hover is relevant since JakeRusso.com is registered with them. Their interface is organized and sightly, and their support (including phone!) is outstanding. Sidenote: Hover is very reasonably priced – the deal of the century versus GoDaddy; but, as is common knowledge on the internet, (or, at least, in certain, more informed segments of it) GoDaddy Sucks™.

Cloudflare

Cloudflare is an internet favorite. Chances are, you’d recognize a Cloudflare error page, even if the name is unfamiliar. And approximately everyone on the internet has visited a Cloudflare-powered site. If you thought WordPress was ubiquitous at ~30%, Cloudflare powers about one in five websites, including this one!

Cloudflare has a number of powerful and useful features, from firewall rules to redirects, Pages (which we’ll get to in a moment), the CDN, etc., etc., etc. Oh, and it’s a great DNS host. Many of its features are available to sites on the free tier (like this one). The Pro plan is relatively affordable at $20 per month, but there isn’t much on my list missing from the free plan’s feature list.

Cloudflare Pages

Cloudflare, as I learned quite recently, offers hosting for static sites. Conveniently, this is a static site, so Pages hosts it for free. At the time of writing, I have ~no idea how to use Git, which means updating the site is a bit of a hassle. Currently, I compile the site into a folder using Hugo and upload it, manually, to Pages. I could use GitHub and Git to update the site straight from the command line in Visual Studio (which Pages would grab), but I haven’t quite worked that out yet. I’ll get to it! Famous last words.

Hugo

Hugo is pretty cool. It’s sites are both blazingly fast and rediculously cheap (even to the point of being free) to host. While CMS systems like WordPress require more capable computers / servers to manage databases, assemble webpages, and run the backend interface, Hugo reminds me of how I learned to make websites years ago, using HTML and a few folders. With Hugo, posts and pages are written in markdown, then assembled into HTML files (based on the template, with the necessary CSS and other supporting files, of course). Those HTML files and other static resources have only to be served to the user by the web host, no database manipulation or complex page assembly required.

PaperMod by Aditya Telange

I’m not very capable at web design. I tried, on and off, for a year to design a site in Webflow before giving up and switching to Hugo. Browing the available themes, I found PaperMod, which I liked out of the box. It has a super clean and minimal interface, and I like the post and page formatting. The template also has a mode that makes the homepage reminiscent of my old Carrd site – a circular profile picture with a short description and buttons below. After some minor configuration tweaks and page creations, the site was ready to go under the new template. As you may’ve noticed, theres a small attribution at the bottom of every page with a link to the GitHub repository. In years past, this might’ve annoyed me; but now, it’s a small price to pay for a great template. And I’m proud to promote the creator of such an elegant design.

Carrd

I’d be remiss at neglecting the opportunity to elaborate on the service that ran my site for three years. Carrd is a sophisticated, one-page site builder – great to have in your arsenal. Though JakeRusso.com is no longer a Carrd site, various components like my contact page (an embeded Carrd form), and my email subscription form are hosted there. Their Pro plan is very fairly priced and constantly on sale for (“Basically”) Black Friday and Cyber Monday. And even if I no longer used Carrd, I’d keep my subscription active for the loyalty I feel towards its (indie!) developer, ajlkn, who helped me recover my registrar account (containing JakeRusso.com) when no one else would. Thanks, AJ!

Obsidian

I don’t buy into the “second brain” thing. Productivity gurus promoting it and other notetaking and task managing apps all spout the same barely-coherent sludge, akin to that of an AI. But! Obsidian is a highly-capable markdown editor, which is exactly what I need to write this blog. The first few posts I wrote (or, at least, tried to) were written in the Visual Studio text editor. While VS is great for making tweaks to configuration, organizing files and using the command line, it’s less apt to an enjoyable writing experience. Obsidian fills that gap (much better than do the programs you might find when googling “markdown editors Windows”). I downloaded it a while ago on a whim and rediscovered it from the desktop icon it’d created during install. The interface is nicely themed, minimal, and distraction-free. Though Obsidian is feature-packed, I choose only to use the simplest ones – I got adventurous a minute ago, creating a folder in which to place these posts!

Adjunct: Email!

Email fascinated me for a few months of mid-2021. I’d been deciding on an email provider for JakeRusso.com, between Fastmail (a recommendation of Leo Laporte) and Google Workspace. Workspace has Gmail, the world’s favorite email provider, and Docs and Drive, apart of their collaboration suite. With Fastmail, it’s easier to manage multiple domains and aliases, though Gmail is better in terms of availablility and deliverability. It was during the Fastmail DDoS attack of late 2021 that I created my Workspace account and switched JakeRusso.com to Google email, frustrated with my inability to access my account. Having a separate Google account, at my eponymous domain, for business and collaboration has been nice. Both Fastmail and Workspace are great email providers, and it’s difficult go wrong with either. Though different use cases would prescribe a strong recommendation for one over the other. I’ll detail those use cases, comparing the providers and my experience with them, in a later post.

Powering the Podcast:

Yes, I know. The Jake Russo Podcast only has one episode. My publishing these posts will spark new episodes discussing them. I’ve wanted a podcast for most of my life, and finally (at least on paper) have one. Whether it’s up to date or not, the podcast requires the support of both physical equipment to record and digital technologies distribute.

Libsyn

One of the oldest and most well-known names in podcasting, Libsyn is my host of choice. It’s rich with the kind of advanced (for lack of a better term) features I enjoy (e.g., custom feed domain). They’re also very reasonably priced compared to newer entrants to the space, which start around three times higher. And while they might be a bit behind the times – they just updated their interface to HTML5! – they’re quality of service is rock-solid. I feel obliged to mention Anchor – yes, it’s free.

PodTrac

Libsyn, I suppose to make up for their competitive prices, nickels and dimes its customers in some cases – decent analytics being one of those. For free, they offer a very basic download count and chart; if you’re looking for something closer to analytics, that’ll be an upcharge. PodTrac, another podcasting dino, offers these analytics for free (completely so, until quite recently) through a prepended URL, which Libsyn is happy to support free-of-charge. PodTrac analytics provide more interesting detail than mere number of downloads – device type, geolocation, and more. Plus, the analytics are IAB certified, meaning if I ever sell ads, I’ll have reliable numbers to present to potential clients.

Heil PR40

The PR40 is the microphone Leo Laporte has used and recommended for decades. It’s engineered by Bob Heil (who used to host a ham radio podcast on Laporte&rsquo;s network), with a distinct sound I enjoy – one I can recognize by ear – and is (by my estimate) one of the top microphones used in radio stations. I bought the microphone in gold a few years back after brief stints with $30 USB microphones from Amazon. Though it’s not sustained as much use as it deserves over these years, it’s a great piece of kit, and one which will come in handy soon.

RODE AI-1

This is all I need. When I bought the PR40, I purchased along with it a Behringer Xenyx X1204USB. It did way too much, and I came to realize all I needed was a high-quality XLR to USB audio interface with live monitoring and a gain knob. My search for such an audio interface landed on the AI-1. It checked all the boxes and is well-made, by a company I trust. It’s much smaller than the Behringer and outperforms it in clarity and noiselessness. Episode two of the podcast will be recorded on the AI-1.

AKG K240 MK II

The K240 series is well esteemed in its niche. While not great for listening to music, or any form of entertainment for that matter, their open-backed design provides a unique experience when monitoring and editing spoken word. Lately I’ve been a fan of variety (something I might discuss later relating to writing instruments) and the K240 is different than any other pair of headphones or earbuds I use. When under recommendation of, you guessed it, Mr. Laporte, I was shopping on Amazon for the K240, I figured I’d go for the MK II.

RODE PSA-1

Outside of the Yellowtec realm of $400 boom arms, the PSA-1 was the one to have. Well-made and miles ahead of the no-name Amazon arms, the Rode is a clear winner. Others like Elgato have made their offerings to the space in the more recent years, and Rode has released a successor, but the PSA-1 is a solid performer and works just as well as I need it to.

Heil PRSM

Arguably overpriced, the PRSM (-C for champagne) is well-made, like any Heil product. It’s a perfect fit for the PR40, and is as much a means by which to attach the microphone to the boom arm as it is one to prevent stray vibrations and bumps from reaching it. Speaking of overpriced, the going rate for a piece of Heil foam is $20.

Peripherals

Keyboard: Durgod Hades 68

After much deliberation earlier this year, I settled on the not-very-well-known but performant Durgod Hades – what I’d hoped was a diamond in the rough. As of the time of writing, it’s disappeared from Amazon, as is common for these sorts of brands. My model sports black, PBT keycaps and Cherry MX Brown switches. The backplate is aluminum, as is the case, creating a heavy, solid feel and typing experience. The keys are RGB, though I keep them set to white. It took some getting used to, but I’ve come to type well on, and thoroughly enjoy, this keyboard. When it was available on Amazon, it was quite customizable, with a number of switch brands and flavors to choose from, as well as the choice between white or black, PBT or ABS keycaps. I enjoy the 65% layout – a nice balance between compact and functional, and the smallest you can go without sacrificing the necessary arrrow keys. This will be my last keyboard for a while; though, if I find the time, I might build a custom one.

Mouse: Logitech MX Master 3

Of course, a few months after I bought it, Logitech came out with the 3S. But the 3 is well-loved for good reason. It’s comfortable, ergonomic, and substantial. The buttons click crisply, the pointer tracks smoothly, and the scroll wheel scrolls like a dream. The mouse features an additional scroll wheel and thumb button, though I tend only to use the primary scroll wheel and forward and back buttons, in addition to right- and left-click. While a wireless might be unimportant to a keyboard, wireless to a mouse, with all the moving and pointing it does, is certainly valuable. Bluetooth is purpose-made for wireless headphones, but lacks the reliability of the Master 3’s good old 2.4GHz dongle. The MX Master 3, combined with the Durgod Hades, are the type of mouse and keyboard that make you frustrated to use someone else’s.

In Conclusion

I considered including more devices in what has become more of a “listicle” than I’d like, my smart home gadgets among those. I might discuss these in greater detail in later posts.

I’ll update this post if I think of anything to add or change.

This is my first real post here, which has been stimulating and gratifying to produce. It’s my goal to write ~once weekly, so stay tuned!

Until next time.

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