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Here’s one for all the iconheads out there.

I’m not sure if this great collection hosted by product engineer Alex Meub is all of the Windows 98 icons, but it sure has all the ones I remember.

Each one is downloadable, too. Might as well use them to replace your Windows or Mac icons. Or, if you’re a real sicko, you could swap them on Android or iOS.


A GIF of scrolling Meub’s icon collection.
Time to make your icons good again.
GIF: Wes Davis / The Verge
Google Chat now lets you subject coworkers to your celebrity impressions.

Google is rolling out voice messages for enterprise Workspace users. To send one, tap the microphone button to record yourself. Others can react to your message, quote it, or reply to it.

Only the Android / iOS Google Chat apps support voice recordings right now, but web users can receive them, and will get recording later.


A GIF showing Google Chat voice messages.
[Ron Swanson voice] “Veganism is the sad result of a morally corrupt mind.”
Image: Google

Here’s why AI search engines really can’t kill Google

The AI search tools are getting better — but they don’t yet understand what a search engine really is and how we really use them.

Federation is the future of social media, says Bluesky CEO Jay Graber

The head of Threads and Mastodon competitor Bluesky on why she thinks decentralization is the way forward in a post-Twitter internet.

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D2, but not The Mighty Ducks.

I spent a little bit today fiddling with this playground for open-source diagram scripting language D2 (not to be confused with the system programming language D, Dreamcast survival horror game D2, or data visualization library D3).

It’s not a programming game like, say, Swift Playgrounds, but it offers some of the same easy satisfaction of entering text and seeing an immediate result.


D2 Playground

[D2 Playground]

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Google is starting to roll out AI answers in search results — even if you haven’t opted-in.

this is an experience on a “subset of queries, on a small percentage of search traffic in the U.S.,” a Google spokesperson told Search Engine Land.

Last year, we wrote about the AI takeover of Google Search and how Google wants you to forget the 10 blue links — but back then, it was opt-in. Just this week, Google’s head of AI search became the company’s head of search, period.


Why Figma CEO Dylan Field is optimistic about AI and the future of design

The leader of design toolmaker Figma on life after the failed Adobe deal and what comes next in a live interview from SXSW.

Google Drive on the web goes to the dark (mode) side.

You may find that your Google Drive account has Dark mode on the web now — I have it on just one of mine, so far.

If Google has blessed you with the update, you’ll get a “New! Dark mode” prompt at login. After, the option lives under the gear icon > Settings > General > Appearance. Check the gallery below for more.


A screenshot of the Google Drive Dark mode notification.

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Be careful when you Drive in the dark.
Screenshot: Wes Davis / The Verge
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Would you like to play a game?

Screenshots posted by App researcher Nima Owji show that LinkedIn is testing games, with companies ranked on how well their employees do. TechCrunch published some official screenshots supplied by LinkedIn, which confirmed the games.

Pour one out for the first team that gets berated by their boss over their company’s Crossclimb score.


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Bad news for Cohost.

The Twitter/X alternative’s latest financial update is dire: it may run out of money in April after losing contact with a single person who’s provided its funding so far. While the operators lay out backup plans like crowdfunding, the site’s future seems uncertain to say the least.


March 2024 Financial Update

[cohost dot org on cohost]

How to save culture from the algorithms, with Filterworld author Kyle Chayka

The author of Filterworld: How Algorithms Flattened Culture discusses how we might be able to cultivate our own tastes once more.

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Google seems to be aggressively de-listing spammy search results.

Search VP Pandu Nayak told me the other day Google is dead serious about enforcing its policies against content designed to game search results. Looks like that’s already happening:

Many SEOs and site owners are saying their sites are no longer showing in the Google Search index, even for a site command, after receiving the manual actions.

Google helped make the web a mess. Now it has to fix it.


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Major porn sites aren’t taking the EU’s new moderation rules lying down.

Pornhub and Xvideos, two porn sites designated as “very large online platforms” last December, are challenging their Digital Services Act obligations, Politico reports. Pornhub isn’t happy about its VLOP status, and it and Xvideos are asking for a pause on rules requiring them to publish a library of the ads on their services. The DSA is focused on content moderation, and fighting illegal and harmful content.


Guest host Hank Green makes Nilay Patel explain why websites have a future

On this special episode of Decoder, Complexly co-founder and YouTuber Hank Green turns the tables on Nilay Patel.

From ChatGPT to Gemini: how AI is rewriting the internet

How we use the internet is changing fast thanks to the advancement of AI-powered chatbots that can find information and redeliver it as a simple conversation.

How much electricity does AI consume?

It’s not easy to calculate the watts and joules that go into a single Balenciaga pope. But we’re not completely in the dark about the true energy cost of AI.

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Good news for Trump’s Twitter clone.

The Washington Post reports that Truth Social has the Securities and Exchange Commission’s go-ahead to complete its SPAC merger, taking the company public and unlocking around $300 million after years of uncertainty. But don’t worry, there’s still plenty of drama:

A federal prosecution of three early Digital World investors, who investigators said made tens of millions of dollars in insider trades related to the merger deal, is also scheduled to go to trial in April. In a superseding indictment filed last week in federal court, prosecutors added a charge of money laundering to one investor, Michael Shvartsman, saying he used some of his profits to buy a $14 million luxury yacht he later renamed “Provocateur.”


In defense of busywork

Thanks to AI, rote tasks are ripe for automation. But is that really a good thing?

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The BBC explores pushing further into the fediverse.

Six months after kicking off an initial Mastodon trial that saw it launch its own instance on the federated platform, the UK’s public broadcaster is not just extending the experiment by another six months, it’s also “planning to start some technical work into investigating ways to publish BBC content more widely using ActivityPub.”

It feels like a promising sign for the future of the fediverse.


Filed under:

AI at Work

How AI can make history

Large language models can do a lot of things. But can they write like an 18th-century fur trader?