Despite my week of Monday 18 to Sunday 24 May 2026 being dominated by a viral infection, I managed to get a few important things done. Just slowly. Also, it was a sunny week.
If you follow my every move, you’ll know that last week I said I had “just some random respiratory infection”, but on Friday it was confirmed as respiratory syncytial virus (RSV). It’s not fun. I do not recommend it. Although I managed to get some work done, I was also exhausted. And I still am.
As for the crowdfunder, it’s exactly the same as last week. It’s still sitting at 67% of the third target. There still no progress in finding The Lost Module — although the storage company does seem to have handed this problem to someone who will actually do something about it. And I still haven’t done a proper update. Sorry. Soon.
Podcasts
- On Friday night I recorded an episode of The 9pm Edict with David F Porteous as planned, but I have not yet edited it.
Articles
- The Weekly Cybers #118. So much AI this week! Doctors who insist on using AI scribes, a law school that bans AI, and a news masthead’s AI pivot leads to failure. But there’s much more, so read on!
Media Appearances
- So that slideshow I mentioned last week which included one of my photos of laksa? That slideshow was syndicated to MSN as Laksa: prato tradicional representa a diversidade cultural e gastronômica da Ásia.
Videos, Photos, Corporate Largesse
None of these. You can subscribe to my YouTube channel to be notified when new videos appear and when livestreams are scheduled.
Some Interesting Links
- I have been enjoying China Digital Times, which is produced out of Berkeley, California, by… people, and covers stories related to the digital realm in China. Seems obvious, right? Well they also have a section called China Digital Space, which has a whole lot of background information. Today I want to plug their Grass-Mud Horse Lexicon, “a glossary of memes, nicknames, and neologisms created by Chinese netizens and encountered in online political discussions”.
- Would you like some comedy? Here’s a fantastic show from New Zealand’s Ray O’Leary: Laughter? I Hardly Know Her.
- With a more serious kind of comedy, Miles Jupp’s On I Bang, which riffs off his experience of having a brain seizure.
- Why so many control rooms were seafoam green.
- And from 2020, something for the analog synth crew: EMS VCS3 in the 1970s, part 1 and part 2.
- This week’s suggested follow: OK, this is specifically a Bluesky thing, but it amuses me. USER WAS BLOCKED FOR THIS POST reposts posts which presumably got the user blocked. “For block records, we check if the blockee has recently @’d or replied to the blocker. If it matches, we redact it and post it,” they explain. Some of it is so, so petty.
The Week Ahead
Unlike this week, the coming week will see substantial rain. For the moment that’s forecast for Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday. I am hoping that the majority of RSV symptoms will have departed.
On Monday I’ll start editing that podcast with David F Porteous, although I may only finish it on Tuesday. I also have some administrivia and client work to take care of.
On Wednesday I’m recording an Edict with Dr Alice Gorman and Rami Mandow. This will be another space-oriented episode, of course. If you’re a supporter with a TRIGGER WORD or a CONVERSATION TOPIC for this episode, please let me know by 8pm AEST this Tuesday 26 May.
On Thursday night I’ll have another go at doing that livestream in The Great Unboxening at 8pm AEST, the one that’s been postponed twice now. This time focusing on everything else that’s left before it all gets posted on Gumtree or eBay or whatever. This will be the last in this miniseries, because I have to get rid of everything by the end of the month. In theory.
[Update 27 May 2026: It turns out I’m not quite as recovered from RSV as I thought. Things are being postponed to next week.]
The Weekly Cybers newsletter will appear as usual on Friday afternoon.
At the time of writing there are no plans for the weekend.
Further Ahead
Once more I have run out of further confirmed dates, although there various things in the pipeline. Stay tuned.
[Photo: A pointless building decoration, in Campsie, Sydney, photographed on 20 May 2026.]