iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 08/01/2026

Gmail is introducing a new AI Inbox, basically a personalised briefing based on your emails. So much for email as the last channel where algorithms don’t get between you and your audience. blog.google/products-and...

See what matters most: AI Inbox
Your inbox is filled with updates; some are critical, others are just noise. The new AI Inbox filters out the clutter so you can focus on what’s most important.
AI Inbox is like having a personalized briefing, highlighting to-dos and catching you up on what matters. It helps you prioritize, identifying your VIPs based on signals like people you email frequently, those in your contacts list and relationships it can infer from message content. Crucially, this analysis happens securely with the privacy protections you expect from Google, keeping your data under your control. This lets high-stakes items — like a bill due tomorrow or a dentist reminder — rise to the top. We’re giving trusted testers access to AI Inbox before making it more broadly available in the coming months.

120

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 13/11/2025

Finishing up tomorrow's newsletter... It's not too late to sign up: www.weeklyfilet.com

010

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 11/11/2025

🤝 Which countries have increased or reduced their emissions the most since the Paris Agreement in 2015? dataguessr.com/topic/emissi... 🧵↓

Dataguessr
Update your knowledge of the world. One quiz at a time.

With an arrow, the word "warming" is added before "world".

The word Dataguessr uses the warming stripes that illustrate warming global temperatures over time as background.

At the bottom, a button saying "Start now"

120

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 31/10/2025

Gave my website a little glow up to bundle all the web apps I've created over the years that people might still find useful. Have a look: davidbauer.ch

Stylised screenshot of davidbauer.ch website showcasing eight digital tools in a grid layout. Featured projects include: Dataguessr, a playful way to update your knowledge of the world. How I Use AI, a collection of use cases, ready to use and adapt. You Don't Know Africa, a simple game that has already humbled millions of people. Choose Impact, an online tool to compare job opportunities. Priority Compass, a tool to focus your energy on what really matters. Climate Questions, a playful conversation starter. And One Minute Challenge, a little meaningful distraction to refocus. Each tool is displayed as a card with preview images and brief descriptions.

030

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 16/10/2025

Favourite extremely nerdy feature in @ghost.org.

An overlay that reads:

Forget something?
Looks like you've got some unfinished business. There is 1 TK reminder left in your post.

Two buttons:
Continue to publish
Back to editor

040

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 15/10/2025

Lese gerade das neue Buch von @emcke.bsky.social und liebe diesen pragmatisch-poetischen Hinweis, wie das manchmal Holprige und Ungewohnte an inklusiver Sprache wirklich gut auszuhalten ist.

Viel wird zur Zeit gestritten über die Frage, ob und wie wir sprachlich verschiedene Geschlechtsidentitäten adressieren sollen. Mir scheint es schlicht eine altmodische Geste der Höflichkeit, Menschen so anzusprechen, wie sie angesprochen werden möchten.
Das verlangt mitunter, von bislang üblichen Sprech- und Schreibweisen abzuweichen. Das ist nicht immer leicht. Ich probiere es vorläufig mit einem Doppelpunkt und will neben männlichen und weiblichen Personen auch nicht-binäre mit ansprechen. Ich vermute, wir werden verschiedene schriftliche und mündliche Formen ausprobieren - manche als verletzend, manche als unpraktisch wieder verwerfen. Und uns nach und nach auf etwas verständigen, das den Test des Alltags besteht. Bis dahin werden wir stottern oder holpern - aber das tue ich sonst im Leben auch.

Der letzte Satz ist gelb hervorgehoben.

030

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 07/10/2025

⚡️For the first time, solar and wind covered all electricity demand growth, sloooooooowly reducing fossil fuel dependency. My chart, data from the newly released @ember-energy.org Global Electricity Mid-Year Insights 2025 (ember-energy.org/latest-insig...).

Bar chart with the title «Solar and wind sloooooowly push out fossil energy» comparing electricity generation changes from H1 2024 to H1 2025 across five regions. Worldwide: demand rose 369 TWh, solar and wind grew 403 TWh, while hydro fell 42 TWh and fossil fuels dropped 27 TWh. China: demand up 198 TWh, solar and wind up 247 TWh, fossil fuels down 58 TWh. United States: demand up 76 TWh, solar and wind up 49 TWh, fossil fuels up 18 TWh. European Union: demand up 9 TWh, solar and wind up 16 TWh, hydro down 33 TWh, fossil fuels up 25 TWh. India: demand up 12 TWh, solar and wind up 28 TWh, fossil fuels down 29 TWh. Source: EMBER Global Electricity Mid-Year Insights 2025.

033

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 12/09/2025

Such a great feature. If you want to share a link on Spread and it detects that someone else has recently shared it, it asks you to repost it rather than post it yourself. Amplify the signal instead of adding noise.

130

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 27/06/2025

Small difference, huge impact. How many times have you had to wait for edit permissions to a document, just because the person who sent you the link forgot? Figma solves this by giving you the benefit of the doubt.

Screenshot from a Figjam with a message that reads: Enjoy FigJam for up to 3 days while waiting for admin review.

010

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 13/06/2025

Always a bit surprised at how few people know these shortcut urls. So useful. Looooooooong list with more such shortcuts, some less useful than others. whats.new/shortcuts

Productivity tip chart showing shortcut urls to instantly create new files in the browser. Row-by-row listing: doc.new creates Google doc, sheet.new creates Google sheet, meet.new creates Google video call, canva.new creates Canva design, invoice.new creates Stripe invoice, figma.new creates Figma file, zap.new creates Zapier zap, linear.new creates Linear issue, miro.new creates Miro board, transfer.new creates Wise money transfer. Simple white background with black text in monospace font.

030

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 30/05/2025

It‘s little design choices like this one that promote climate-harmful travel options to millions of people. (Not to mention it’s downright absurd in this case – Rossinière is a mountain village only accessible by bus.)

A push message from Booking.com after booking an accommodation, saying: Accommodation in Rossinière...

Next step: search and compare thousands of flights to Rossinière.

010

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 15/05/2025

Sorry, deine Gebühren werden nun gebraucht um die grossen Verlage quer zu finanzieren.

SRG wirbt für sich bei den Privaten

Im Sinne einer Quersubventionierung oder unkonventionellen Medienförderung wird die SRG die Mittel für Online-Marketing in Zukunft vor allem auf den Plattformen der privaten Schweizer Medienhäuser investieren und nicht mehr auf den internationalen Tech-Plattformen. Damit werde «ein wichtiges Zeichen zur Stärkung des Werbemarkts Schweiz» gesetzt, heisst es.

363

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 14/05/2025

Not every data-driven story needs to lead with graphics. Love this super effective summary on the effects of congestion pricing in NYC. From @upshot.nytimes.com. www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

A table titled "What's changed since the toll began?" displaying impacts of congestion pricing in what appears to be New York City. The table shows traffic-related metrics with their status indicators. Positive outcomes include: fewer cars on streets, faster traffic speeds and commutes, improved bus service, increased transit ridership, more taxi/Citi Bike trips, reduced car crash injuries, fewer parking violations and noise complaints, slightly improved fire response times, and fewer school bus delays. Some metrics show neutral results (traffic outside the zone "Not worse," restaurants/Broadway "Holding up") while others remain inconclusive ("Pollution" and "Lower-income commuters" both "Too soon to say"). Public opinion is listed as "Not great, but improving." The data presents a comprehensive overview of congestion pricing effects across multiple transportation and quality-of-life indicators. (Note: This Alt-Text was auto-generated using Claude 3.7)

1183

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 10/04/2025

The good news: World surpasses 40% clean power in 2024, driven by a record rise solar and wind. Solar has doubled in just three years. The bad news: It's 40% of a growing pie, so emissions keep rising. (Data from the latest @ember-energy.org report: ember-energy.org/latest-insig...)

Two area charts comparing global power generation (in TWh) and emissions (in MtCO2) from 2000-2024. Left graph shows stacked area chart of electricity sources with coal (black) at bottom, followed by gas (gray), other fossil fuels, nuclear (dark blue), hydro (blue), other clean energy (light blue), wind (dark green), and solar (light green) at top. Total generation increased from ~15,000 TWh in 2000 to ~30,000 TWh by 2024, with renewables growing significantly in later years. Right graph shows emissions rising from ~8,000 MtCO2 in 2000 to ~14,000 MtCO2 by 2024. Source: Yearly electricity data, Ember.

030

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 31/03/2025

Dabei hätten wir es eigentlich bewenden lassen können. Besser wurd's nie mehr.

040

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 05/03/2025

Striking chart: “Cool” years are now hotter than the “warm” years of the past. ourworldindata.org/global-tempe...

Chart titled "Global temperature anomalies by El Niño and La Niña conditions" showing temperature differences from 1950-2025 compared to 1991-2020 average. The line graph tracks world temperature anomalies in degrees Celsius (-1°C to +1°C), color-coded by: strong La Niña (dark blue), La Niña (light blue), Neutral (gray), El Niño (orange), and Strong El Niño (red). Overall, temperatures are trending up, with recent La Niña lows higher than earlier El Niño highs. Key definitions of El Niño and La Niña included below graph. Data sources: Copernicus Climate Change Service and NOAA (2025). Credit: OurWorldInData.org/climate-change (CC BY).

042

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 26/02/2025

Do you say thank you or give compliments when chatting with AI? Recently, after a particularly satisfying conversation with Claude, I felt the urge to express my gratitude. I started wondering: Why would I do this? The LLM won’t care, because it can’t. So I asked Claude directly.

Screenshot of a conversation with Claude.

David: thanks a lot, you've been very helpful (do you actually like compliments even though you're just a LLM

Claude: Ha! You're right to question that - I try to be direct about being an AI and don't need or experience validation from compliments. But I do genuinely aim to be helpful, so I'm glad the solution worked for you. Your question is an interesting philosophical one though - while I don't "feel" anything about compliments, I think there's value in humans maintaining their natural social instincts like expressing gratitude, even with AI. It helps preserve those positive social habits for human-to-human interactions. For what it's worth - given your expertise in journalism and product management (from your preferences), I appreciate you taking a critical lens to the nature of our interaction!

261

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 22/02/2025

Some that come to mind (that I haven’t seen mentioned yet): * @maxroser.bsky.social: ourworldindata.org/a-history-of... * @waitbutwhy.bsky.social: waitbutwhy.com/2014/05/life... * Strava maps * Bar chart races * Trump‘s sharpie 🫣

030

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 24/01/2025

Crazy stat: More than 10% of the world's living languages of around 7000 are spoken in Papua New Guinea. From @ourworldindata.org: ourworldindata.org/data-insight...

Bar chart showing number of living languages spoken as first languages across 10 countries. Papua New Guinea leads with 840 languages, followed by Indonesia (710), Nigeria (530), India (453), China (306), Mexico (293), Cameroon (279), US (236), Australia (224), and Brazil (222). Living language defined as having at least one person speaker using it as their first language. Data from SIL International (2024). Chart by Our World in Data under CC BY license.

050

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 13/01/2025

For context. Vaccines have saved more than 150 million children over the last 50 years. ourworldindata.org/vaccines-chi...

Horizontal bar chart showing lives saved globally by different childhood vaccinations between 1974-2024. Measles vaccination saved the most lives (93.71 million), followed by tetanus (27.95 million) and whooping cough (13.17 million). Total lives saved across all vaccines: 153.84 million. Chart includes data for 13 diseases, ranging from tuberculosis (10.87 million) to Neisseria meningitidis A (2,000). Source: Shattock et al. (2024), published by Our World in Data (CC BY license).

012

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 13/01/2025

Decades of progress, millions of lives saved, and that's how you gamble with it. From this @upshot.nytimes.com article: www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

Line graph shows vaccination rates among U.S. kindergartners for measles, polio, and whooping cough from school years 2011-12 to 2023-24. All three diseases tracked closely between 94-95% vaccination rates until 2019-20, around the federal measles target of 95%. After 2019-20, rates declined to below 93% for all three diseases, falling well below the federal target of 95%. Source: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

Epidemiologists say that when vaccination rates slip under 90 percent for measles, outbreaks become significantly harder to contain. At some point below that, spread becomes almost inevitable if measles is introduced.

There are thousands more schools with vaccination rates below 90 percent compared with just five years ago, according to a New York Times analysis of detailed data from 22 states.

A horizontal arrow chart showing changes in school vaccination rates in selected U.S. states, titled "Change in share of schools with vaccination rates below 90 percent." Wisconsin and Minnesota show the highest post-pandemic rates at more than 50%. States are arranged vertically with rates from 0% to 70% on x-axis. Arrows indicate movement from pre-pandemic to post-pandemic levels.

121

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 03/01/2025

Ha, good question! (adapted from www.sahilbloom.com/newsletter/7...)

If you were the main character in a movie of your life, what would the audience be screaming at you to do right now?

040

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 30/12/2024

Perspective matters. Almost every new car sold in Norway is electric. What really matters, though, is the second chart. Even in Norway, only a third of all cars in use are electric. Everywhere else: a very long road ahead. 📈 @ourworldindata.org. More context: ourworldindata.org/electric-car...

Line chart showing the percentage of new cars sold that are electric (including both battery-electric and plug-in hybrids) from 2010 to 2023 across different regions. Norway leads at 93% in 2023, followed by China at 38%, Switzerland at 30%, European Union at 22%, and United States at 10%. World average is at 18%. Data source: International Energy Agency, Global EV Outlook 2024, via OurWorldInData.org

Line graph showing the share of electric cars (including fully battery-electric and plug-in hybrids) as a percentage of total cars in use from 2010 to 2023. Norway leads with approximately 28% by 2023, followed by China at 8%, Switzerland at 6%. Europe averages 4%, while the United States shows about 2%. The World average is approximately 3%. Starting near 0% in 2010, adoption curves steepen after 2016, particularly for Norway. Source: International Energy Agency, Global EV Outlook 2024, published by Our World in Data.

010

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 17/12/2024

I ██ what you did there. www.republik.ch/2024/12/17/a...

Teaser eines Artikels, bei dem Teile des Titels und des Leads geschwärzt sind.

Alle dürfen sehen, wie der ████ ████, ausser der hat was zu verbergen
Im Grundsatz müssen die Behörden jedes ████ offenlegen, das ██████ ███ ███. Doch wollen sie das nicht, ████████, um sich aus der ██████ zu ziehen.
Von Basil ████, 17.12.2024

010

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 05/12/2024

Tired: Chat with an article Wired: Chat with the source material of the article. Here’s what that looks like: every.to/napkin-math/...

Today, we’re launching a new essay format on Every: Extendable Articles.

Extendable Articles include a chat bot that lets you talk to the content that you’re reading. But there’s a twist:

In an Extendable Article, we make available all of the source material—original interview recordings and transcripts, YouTube videos, news stories, articles, and more—that the writer used to put the piece together. So you don’t just get the writer’s perspective—you can chat with all of the information they used to inform it.

The last sentence is highlighted in the screenshot.

061

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 05/12/2024

I've seen dysfunctional newsroom planning up close more than I wish I had. So this in the latest @niemanlab.org Predictions resonated deeply. www.niemanlab.org/2024/12/news... This is no small issue. It's what keeps stories from living up to their full potential. Some thoughts on how to fix it. 🧵

Newsroom planning goes silo-free

“The key is inviting everyone who touches a story from beginning to end to be a part of the conversation.”

Kendall Trammell, Senior Producer, CNN Digital

100

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 02/12/2024

One cannot highlight this often enough. Chart by @scientificdiscovery.dev / @ourworldindata.org, more details at: ourworldindata.org/data-insight...

A horizontal bar chart titled "Number of lives saved by childhood vaccinations since 1974" shows the impact of various vaccines. Measles vaccination leads with 94 million lives saved, shown in orange. Following in blue bars are Tetanus (28 million), Whooping cough (13 million), and Tuberculosis (11 million). Smaller impacts are shown for diseases like Haemophilus influenzae type B (2.8 million), Streptococcus pneumoniae and Polio (both 1.6 million). The chart continues with progressively smaller numbers for Yellow fever (550,000), Hepatitis B (460,000), down to Neisseria meningitidis A (2,000). The data source is attributed to Shattock et al. (2024) and published by OurWorldInData.org under CC BY license.

13417

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 29/11/2024

Just rediscovered one of my all-time favourite Reddit posts. np.reddit.com/r/askscience... Shuffling a deck of cards can result in quite a few different card orders. 52! to be exact. But how big a number is this really? Well... 👇

I've seen a a really good explanation of how big 52! actually is.

Set a timer to count down 52! seconds (that's 8.0658x1067 seconds)
Stand on the equator, and take a step forward every billion years
When you've circled the earth once, take a drop of water from the Pacific Ocean, and keep going
When the Pacific Ocean is empty, lay a sheet of paper down, refill the ocean and carry on.
When your stack of paper reaches the sun, take a look at the timer.
The 3 left-most digits won't have changed. 8.063x1067 seconds left to go. You have to repeat the whole process 1000 times to get 1/3 of the way through that time. 5.385x1067 seconds left to go.

So to kill that time you try something else.

Shuffle a deck of cards, deal yourself 5 cards every billion years
Each time you get a royal flush, buy a lottery ticket
Each time that ticket wins the jackpot, throw a grain of sand in the grand canyon
When the grand canyon's full, take 1oz of rock off Mount Everest, empty the canyon and carry on.
When Everest has been levelled, check the timer.
There's barely any change. 5.364x1067 seconds left. You'd have to repeat this process 256 times to have run out the timer.

040

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 22/11/2024

How it started, how it’s going.

3176

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 22/11/2024

Feels like the end of an era. Filters are no longer the main thing Instagram wants you to add to an image. It’s music now.

Screenshot of the Instagram editor for posting images. Music suggestions have taken the prominent spot where filters used to be, which is highlighted with an arrow pointing to it.

010

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 20/11/2024

Really quite embarrassing how low Switzerland ranks here, having dropped another 12 ranks. www.datawrapper.de/_/spV75/

A ranking chart titled 'Who is leading in climate action' showing country scores from the Climate Change Performance Index 2025. The chart explains that overall scores are calculated from four categories: greenhouse gas emissions, renewable energy, energy use and climate policy. The first three ranks are deliberately left empty, with a note stating 'no country is doing enough to prevent dangerous climate change.' Denmark leads at rank 4 with 78 points, followed by Netherlands (70) and United Kingdom (69). The list continues through several European and other nations, with Switzerland shown highlighted in red at rank 33 with 56 points. Each country is shown with its flag, score, and a small triangle indicating rank change (▲ for improvement, ▼ for decline) with the number of positions changed. The ranking deliberately leaves ranks 1 to 3 empty, as «no country is doing enough to prevent dangerous climate change.»

3287

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 19/11/2024

As everyone is moving here, a word of caution. pluralistic.net/2024/11/02/u...

I will never again devote my energies to building up an audience on a platform whose management can sever my relationship to that audience at will. – Cory Doctorow

4151

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 25/11/2023

lol what?! www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

The World Coal Association has rebranded itself as “FutureCoal: The Global Alliance for Sustainable Coal,” Chief Executive Officer Michelle Manook said at a press conference in Delhi.

“For too long our global coal value chain has allowed anti-coal sentiment to dominate and fragment us,” Manook said in a statement. That’s “resulted in a lowering of the global coal IQ,” which the group defines as an understanding of coal’s contribution to society.

031

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 10/11/2023

To better understand how they work, I built my own GPT. Took me 5 minutes to create, 15 more minutes to tweak, now it's here for you and me to play with. What do you think? chat.openai.com/g/g-4IeH4fhK...

Climate Action GPT
Your personal guide to making a difference in the climate crisis
By David Bauer

031

David Bauer @davidbauer.ch · 16/10/2023

I little experiment I‘m running: a weekly exploration of how artificial intelligence «imagines» the future. I'm using ChatGPT and Midjourney to create a haiku and an illustration from a very simple prompt: The future of...{something} More here: newsletter.weeklyfilet.com/how-artifici...

020