When I redesigned this blog 2 years ago, I decided to give the Tailwind CSS framework a spin. Fast-forward to today: Tailwind is now entirely gone, replaced by some simple, well-structured Sass code. This was not an easy transition — it took me over 8 hours of dedicated effort, with no way to automate the task at hand. I think that in and of itself might be an argument against Tailwind, but that probably sounds like circular reasoning if you don't understand the why, so allow me to elaborate.

Every Sunday evening, a couple of music-making nerds join the IRC channel #mod_shrine, download a ZIP file of ~20-30 samples, and spend the next hour using only those samples to make a song. Then they listen to all the songs people made, vote on their favorites, and find out who got 1st place.

My music library is a fountain of memories I'd otherwise have forgotten by now. I can tell you which Monstercat compilation I was listening to the first time I played hooky from college, driving 2 hours to visit my first partner. I can picture the hotel room I was sitting in while listening to Rossz Csillag Alatt Született that one time. And Mouth Silence was the unofficial soundtrack of my senior year college job. But those are just a few sparse anchor points. What if I wanted to know what else I was listening to around these times?

I wrote some custom CSS to bestow Jellyfin's web client with a blurred backdrop on detail pages. The code is mildly cursed, but I'm quite fond of how the result looks. You can use it too if you want!

About 20 years ago, Google shook the world with its newest product: Gmail, a free email service with an entire gigabyte of storage attached. It was the start of a beautiful, connected world. Apple then casually dropped the most revolutionary computing device of the century, and Microsoft remembered how to make a good operating system with Windows 7. Streaming services like Netflix and Spotify completely reshaped how we consume media, while social platforms like Facebook and Twitter did the same for our online conversations. Consumer technology was taking over our lives, and we ate it up. Guys, the free market works! It really works!!

Today is Undertale's 10th anniversary. In case you weren't aware, this game used to be a cornerstone of my online identity; I used its sprites as my avatars and cherry-picked its flavor text for my social media bios. I cared about this game a lot, and I still feel the shockwaves of its emotional impact on me when I revisit it. So, today's anniversary seems like an appropriate time to write about the thesis statement that's been brewing in my head: Undertale was a good enough game to become my all-time favorite game, at least for a couple years.

As of today, I've pulled my music catalog from Spotify. I refuse to be an accomplice to the murderous whims of a CEO who's gotten far too comfortable flaunting his stolen wealth and moral bankruptcy. If you publish music on streaming platforms, I think you should follow suit. Compromising on human rights isn't worth any amount of money, but especially not the table scraps Spotify pays artists like us.

(or, Running FL Studio on Linux)
I'm not sure exactly where I draw the line between software vendors I will and won't use, but I know it lies somewhere between "riddled with ads" and "actively facilitating a genocide". Unfortunately, that leaves me with a tough decision at the very bottom of my productivity stack, namely my operating system. The best things Windows has going for it are that (1) I'm already using it and (2) it supports FL Studio and every VST I've ever used. It's a foregone conclusion that I'll be giving up the first point, so it's time to see how far I can push the second point.

Last week, I released my new song & interactive music video "EVERYTHING!" into the world. This 4-minute audiovisual experience is the culmination of months of self-discovery, experimentation, and artistic doubt. It's a deeply personal work of art, and one that I couldn't have made without the help of many of my friends. I'm proud of how it turned out.

My new video "beating all 28 Boss Blinds in one run" is my contribution to April Cools' Club this year, an initiative to create something unusual-to-you, 100% sincere, and up to your usual standards of quality. Balatro videos are my comfort content when I need to sleep or unfocus, and it feels nice to pitch in my own contribution to that genre.