109 - Custom fonts, more AI and Harry Hayes

Hello everyone,

Thanks for the great feedback on the last newsletter! I don't have a plan with this at all, so it's nice to hear when something resonates.

I've broken this edition up into three sections:

I feel the world is really running in two different directions. A small but powerful minority are sprinting towards an AI future, while an increasing loud number are running in the complete opposite direction.

Last week I wrote something about that called 'The incoming fracture' that came up while I was thinking about what the meeting room would be like that has Ive and Altman in it. It's not well written, but you will get the idea.

Enjoy.

Nick x

The hype around Friend has died down, although the advertisements are still around the city. I've not seen anyone wear one in public (who would?), but the one I pre-ordered arrived and, as reported, the quality is very mid. Certainly nothing that I'd wear outside. I wont even turn it on (there is no off button, lol). Click here to see a bunch of unboxing photos I took.

The Gothamist published a great interview with the founder who, during the interview, asked the reporters not to tell people he was behind the ads in the subway.

This week (!), a company called 1x started accepting pre-orders for it's humanoid robot.

Joanna Stern has a very entertaining interview with the founder of the company where he admits that right now, the robot is being controlled for, wait for it, a person in the other room...

Sure, tech improves blah blah, and "think of everything you would as a maid to do...", but I mean come on. Even if we could, should we? How much friction do we want to remove?

As someone pointed out, right now, when it bends down to close your dishwasher, someone else somewhere is also bending down.

Note: It also comes in three colours which is a bad idea from a product stand point (believe me, Tiller in 4 colours was a nightmare) and is also weird from like a historical pov?

And speaking of friction, there was a nice piece published in Vogue Australia titled, Our obsession with efficiency is costing us our humanity. I think it captures it well.

This is 'Friend' for kids, accept it's an app. Looks nice though :/

Okay, it's possible I'm too out of touch here, but this is a very illuminating podcast interview with Larissa Schiavo who works at Eleos AI (non-profit) exploring the welfare of AI models.

I guess built into that is their belief that AI models are/will become/are capable of, having some kind of consciousness. What do you think? Should we worry if an AI model get's sad?

They are holding a conference next month, I've applied to go.

This was shared on LinkedIn and it's very funny and good. As always, memes solve everything! (Thanks for the tip Bianca!).

💌 If someone forwarded you this, you can click here to subscribe.

 

Well this is nice. The Philadelphia Art Museum got a rebrand and new website (built by some lovely people at Gone Fishing).

Gretel did the brand, Self Aware did the site design and Ryan Bugden did the custom typeface.

Elizabeth Goodspeed wrote a very good piece in It's Nice That.

"Custom type has become branding’s newest obsession, promising control, originality, and ownership – but its rapid rise is reshaping the culture and economy of type design itself."

Wonderful people are able to write about this kind of thing.

And right on cue some people have announced the "World first AI font generator!"

A perfect problem for AI right? We need more fonts. We have a huge dataset to train them on? What could go wrong?

There was a brief moment in time while I was completing my honors year (my focus was on 20th century san serif typography and it's impact on visual culture), where I thought I wanted to be a type designer. I tried. And quickly realised you have to be some kind of special human artists, genius, engineer, mastermind, to make one font, let along many weights and variations.

Maybe this is just what's happening. Lots of people who have never done a thing, thinking, surely AI can just do this for me. Like driverless cars?

Nothing Phone
In principle, I'm all for these projects. In reality, I don't see anyone knocking off apple any time soon (for good and bad reasons).

Another attempt at making a phone with few features. It's something everyone wants until they have to live with it. The convenience is just too great.

But the reason I wanted to mention it here is to point out something that I think isn't obvious...

Making the hardware is very hard, but making the software work is really the tricky bit. A lot of people like non-phone hardware a lot more than Apples, but the os is just not as good.

The Nothing phone looks beautiful, but from the screen grabs, you can see the software looks like a university project and that will hurt retention.

There is a counter point to this, but still interesting. Link

Sometimes I shazam a song and I'm surprised to see that it's from an artist I already know. And in the last few months, songs by this young Sydney based producer (Harry Hayes) keep popping up on my phone.

If Harry doesn't become one of the next big music producers and dj's, I'll be astonished.

I've been playing the melodic and uplifting 'More of you' on repeat for months. Plus, 'Baby' which caught the ear of Caribou and I assume is how Harry was able to support Caribou in Aus this year.

His newest EP, (Before it goes) is really solid too, but the track that has got me so hyped for Harry you can find here...

At the 1:12:30 mark of the Fred Again x Floating Points x Caribou set that was played in Lyon last weekend.

I heard it on the recording and immediately tried to shazam it, but nothing came up.

Later, I saw Harry had shared a clip from the set on his IG story of the same track. I shot him and DM and he confirmed that it's an unreleased track of his that will be out early next year.

For me, it's the highlight of the near 5 hour set. A really beautiful track sends the crowd wild! I hope it get's him the attention from DJ's and producers I think he deserves.

Check out his links below.

Instagram (3,000 followers!)

That's all from me,

Nick