iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Reposted by Simon Peng

Bruno Dies @brunodias.dev · 21/08/2026

I am becoming incredibly exhausted of this pattern: many people: "AI sucks!" Very Smart Person: ah but have you considered (distinct application of ML or statistical modeling that has no real relationship to what the tech industry is marketing as, and people broadly perceive as, "AI")

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Reposted by Simon Peng

Ken Jennings @kenjennings.bsky.social · 02/08/2026

For the record: NOPE. Honestly, I don’t think there’s an issue today I care about on a personal level more deeply than trans rights. And it’s rough out there right now. Bigots on one side of the political aisle and too many cowards on the other. ⬇️

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 23/07/2026

The crazy thing about never using AI is how I don’t feel like I’m withholding it from myself because of a belief. It’s nothing like being vegan or not using Amazon. It’s just so completely unnecessary, I don’t think about it. And this is the world changing tech we all need to be brace for?

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Reposted by Simon Peng

Avi Lewis @avilewis.ca · 22/07/2026

These companies, and the tech oligarchs leading them, are completely out of control. The Carney government is committing a grave error by embracing corporate generative AI with no controls, regulation, or red lines whatsoever.

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 16/07/2026

This quote feels more and more important to internalize as every day passes. "Corporations are not moral actors. They’re self-interested, immortal vampires - parasites that thrive on moving as much money from your pocket to theirs. ... simonpeng.net/2026/07/16/this-quote…

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 16/07/2026

On the self-limiting beliefs of Canadian politics: simonpeng.net/2026/07/16/on-the-sel…

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Reposted by Simon Peng

Noah Berlatsky @nberlat.bsky.social · 14/06/2026

reading a book allows you to access the actual thoughts of dead authors. but what if AI allowed you to read things which dead authors did not say?!

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 09/06/2026

What is the point of Adobe creating a customizable user interface if they are going to re-open their stupid generative AI tabs every time you launch the application? I have saved over my InDesign workspace so many times, and “generate” always comes back. It’s annoying and gross and unsurprising.

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 04/06/2026

An Open Letter to Hamilton Centre MP Aslam Rana re: the Government's "AI for All" Policy Announcement: simonpeng.net/2026/06/04/an-open-le…

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 04/06/2026

I have a lot of half-formed thoughts about Canada’s new “AI for All” policy but for now I can’t help but note how inevitability is baked into every pillar. Nowhere are consent, choices or alternatives made a focus of the policy. It’s happening whether you like it or not. The liberals have bought in.

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 03/06/2026

It seems like only people who stand to profit from data centres think building data centres is a good idea. 🤔🤔🤔 #ai #hamont

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 28/05/2026

I emailed my MP @aslamrana.bsky.social asking him to support this bill. He has never responded to any of my emails, this included, but I hope he does support it. It’s a simple, easy way to signal support for the working people he represents in Hamilton.

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Reposted by Simon Peng

Paris Marx @parismarx.com · 19/05/2026

i’m already pretty cynical about canadian politics but i have to imagine it must be pretty disillusioning for people who aren’t to see all these liberal politicians and talking heads do such a big 180 on their climate rhetoric (not to mention actions) in such a short period of time

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 04/05/2026

Patreon really can’t stop trying to enshittify. I love the IDEA of improving discoverability, but the shape it’s taking really makes me feel like one day you’ll struggle to see posts from people you follow (remember how YouTube subscriptions used to work?)

Screenshot of a Patreon product announcement for some reason sharing “a feed for just your memberships” as a feature and not the entire point of Patreon.

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 02/05/2026

I really wonder how effective these @ndp.ca fundraising emails are. The fake “your name here” format, the immediate jump to donations. @avilewis.ca is saying lots of great new things but this feels right out of the traditional NDP playbook. Not very inspiring to me, so I hope they have other ideas.

Screenshot of part of an NDP fundraising email. It reads: “Simon, A couple of weeks ago, Avi Lewis and the NDP put forward a ban on surveillance pricing, and it's been making national headlines:” and shows a screenshot of a National Observer article about NDP Surveillance Pricing policy.

Screenshot of part of an NDP fundraising email. After the article screenshot is reads: “Simon, this is making noise because people know it's a real threat if not addressed.” And is immediate followed by a call-to-actions button that’s says “I want to donate”

Screenshot of an NDP fundraising email. It reads: “And that's why we need your help.
Can you donate $75 or whatever works for you to help put pressure on the Liberals to ban surveillance pricing?
If we act now, we can stop these kinds of predatory practices from taking over and becoming the norm.
Thank you,
Canada's NDP”

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 30/04/2026

I’ve been tinkering with an old soviet “AGAT 18” half-frame film camera. The first roll had some issues, mostly with me not understanding how to focus properly, but one of the best pictures I got out of it was of the moon through my telescope!

Photo of the moon, partially in shadow, shot on film. Pretty grainy and not framed fully and with a slightly orange hue.

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 30/04/2026

It seems like the big AI revolution is just making automated phone systems worse? How does having fake typing and room sound make dealing with a robot that can’t understand my last name any more “user friendly?” There’s a real dishonesty to these systems that is maddening.

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 24/04/2026

Artemis II was amazing!!! But most of us (most of everyone ever) will never have the chance to see what they saw with our own eyes. But you actually can see the moon in an amazing amount of detail with a pretty cheap telescope, and it is more impactful than just looking at pictures.

Photo of the moon taken through a 8" dobsonian telescope. Moon is almost exactly half-illuminated, with sharp shadows cast on the craters along the terminator line. The photo was taken on my iPhone 13 mini against the telescope eyepiece.

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 19/04/2026

Lesson from this and the NW clause for labour rights: Doug really does care what people think about him. When a story lands and the optics are bad, he hits undo. Unfortunately, so much of the damage he does goes unnoticed. #onpoli

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Reposted by Simon Peng

Joey Coleman @joeycoleman.ca · 14/04/2026

Council Quote of the Week (nothing will top this) Gage Park basketball court scheduled to be build by 2051. They will be age 41 in 2051, noted two teenagers to City Council, adding that will probably be more concerned about back pain than playing basketball by the time the court is built. #yhmcc

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Reposted by Simon Peng

Blayne Haggart @bhaggart.bsky.social · 13/04/2026

“AI for all” is an empty marketing phrase that serious, informed leaders would never, ever utter (And “more rewarding”? Don’t insult my intelligence). It tells us that the person saying it — in this case, Mark Carney — is either ignorant, a sucker, or simply dishonest. bsky.app/profile/saro...

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 04/04/2026

I don’t often feel simple patriotism. It’s not something I really understand. But I’ll be honest, seeing a Canadian on his way to the moon fills me with a really simple kind of pride. 🇨🇦🚀🌕

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 03/04/2026

Finished reading: There Is No Antimemetics Division by qntm 📚 This book was a real blast. It was a fun mix of heady, sci-fi thought experiments and some more pulpy fun. It helped that it didn’t overstay its welcome, too. A differ... simonpeng.net/2026/04/03/finished-r…

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 01/04/2026

Here’s a blog post I wrote for work: It’s okay if you have an ugly logo. My hot-take as a designer is that aesthetics in branding really aren’t as important as the people behind the brand really owning how they look and speak. If that looks janky or naive, often that’s completely fine.

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 19/03/2026

Some surprisingly good news coming from home. Ontario’s Court of Appeal upholds our city’s rejection of a bigoted ad on public transit. The older I get, the more naïve I find free-speech absolutism. I like living in a country that recognizes that we shouldn’t give hate speech a pass. Feels good.

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 17/03/2026

I think by this point we’re used to any and all AI features being opt-out or impossible to disable. So imagine my surprise when I looked at Microsoft’s privacy settings to see the one feature they make opt-in is making AI slop more easily identifiable! Devious, nasty design all the way down.

Screenshot of microsoft privacy setting for turning on AI watermarking, which is disabled by default.

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 05/03/2026

Just finished reading: Empire of AI: Dreams and Nightmares in Sam Altman’s OpenAI by Karen Hao. This book is so dense and leaves me with so many different thoughts about the AI industry. My biggest takeaways right now: OpenAI ... simonpeng.net/2026/03/05/just-finis…

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Reposted by Simon Peng

Better Things Are Possible @internethippo.bsky.social · 18/09/2025

I'm not sure about this branding but I'm not the billionaire business genius

Mark Zuckerberg presenting his Pervert Glasses for perverts

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 28/02/2026

Picture from a quick trip outside last night. It’s amazing to me how the moon is so constant and highly photographed, and yet it’s still so awe inspiring to observe. I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of looking at this guy, through a telescope or with the naked eye. Puts things in perspective. 🔭

Photo of the moon, nearly full with a shadow cast across the top-left of its face. Taken with my iPhone 13 Mini through an Orion SkyQuest XT8 (8" dobsonian) telescope with a 25mm eyepiece.

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 24/02/2026

My latest newsletter, in which I talk about MAiD and addiction epidemics to try to make the point that new, better ideas rarely have a chance in government, and that’s literally killing us. This one’s maybe my most depressing piece to date, but it feels important to discuss.

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 19/02/2026

If your compassion for people is limited to the extent of your patience, then I don’t think you were ever actually feeling compassion. You shouldn’t be able to be annoyed out of seeing someone’s humanity.

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Reposted by Simon Peng

tante @tante.cc · 19/02/2026

I am a luddite and to me there is a lot of joy in technology. In technology that we deploy for all our wellbeing. Solar panels and vaccines, high-speed rail and wikipedia. But they joy stems from the feeling of being able to be part of humanity in an embedded, meaningful way. Not from buying shit.

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 19/02/2026

A lot of shit has me pretty riled up right now so let’s stop and smell the roses for once and everyone appreciate my great new (old) clock I got for my studio. ⏰

Photo of a sick old school/office style clock from the 90s with a delightful off-white body and red 24-hr numbers. Also some other things on my walls, but it’s all about the clock, baby!!!

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 19/02/2026

Cool, guess I’m gonna be moving my “get the fuck off substack” to-do way up the list. This is actually very helpful motivation to finish up the transition and pull the plug.

Screenshot of the stupidest thing I’ve ever seen. A tweet from Polymarket announcing a deal with Substack so writers can integrate predatory gambling into their writing? It’s trash.

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 13/02/2026

This stupid joke doesn’t work on my website because I use a font that doesn’t have ambiguous characters. Isn’t accessible design fun?! 🤷

A post reading “I have been feeling really bad for people named Al in the age of AI and ambiguous characters.” But the name Al and the term AI are clearly different because the lowercase l has a small spur at the bottom and the uppercase I has cross bars.

The same post but the name Al and term AI look the same because the L and I are indistinguishable. Isn’t explaining a joke fun?

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 13/02/2026

I have been feeling really bad for people named Al in the age of AI and ambiguous characters. 😔

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 12/02/2026

I feel like my hot take of the year is that, after avoiding updating for a while, I actually kind of like the whole Liquid Glass thing in iOS. It’s a bit cheesy and goofy and not always functional but isn’t that what used to make tech fun? It feels oddly retro and I’m digging it.

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 11/02/2026

I posted yesterday about how Adobe had randomly shoved generative AI shit into my custom workspace layout, which I promptly closed. But surprise, when I opened InDesign today this bullshit was back! Has there ever been a feature forced into people’s faces against their will as much as AI?

A screenshot of my custom InDesign workspace layout with an ugly "text to image" panel added in.

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 11/02/2026

Gonna need to really try not to get a big head now… I’m assuming YouTube mails you a plaque for all milestones, right?

Screenshot from my YouTube dashboard showing a trophy and the text "New achievement: 10 subscribers!"

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 10/02/2026

The best purchasing decision I made in 2025 was getting this tiny box of banana stickers. They have never let me down and there’s so much joy to be found in sticking bananas to things. 🍌

Photo of a tiny box with bananas on it and many different sizes and styles of banana stickers piled next to it.

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 10/02/2026

I rarely open Adobe applications anymore, but when I do, they have added a fucking GenAI panel to my custom workspace and have also done a double attention-grab badge on the blue “share” button nobody fucking uses. Jesus Christ, Adobe is garbage.

Screenshot of part of the InDesign workspace with a new "text to image" panel added in to my personal workspace layout, and a blue "share" button that now also has a blue dot on top of it for some reason.

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 08/02/2026

I’m trying out a new medium for my newsletter/blog, Everyone’s Creative! It’s scary and exciting to try out being on camera, and definitely more my format than just writing. www.youtube.com/watch

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 07/02/2026

Finished reading: The Blade Itself by Joe Abercrombie 📚 A super enjoyable read, even if it wasn’t the most original or sophisticated fantasy novel. Tropes and cliché abound, but it was a fun and surprisingly brutal romp. I’ll probably dig into the rest of the series sooner than later.

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 31/01/2026

Watched Bugonia last night and it was a total delight. Similar to GDT’s Frankenstein, I’m enjoying seeing some movies by very acclaimed directors who seem to have made their magnum opus already and are now just making things for... simonpeng.net/2026/01/31/watched-bu…

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 16/12/2025

As I tried to close the stupid AI chat box on the Zoom home screen, this tool tip popped up, summing up the AI-based enshittification of tech perfectly. Made a thing nobody want to use? No problem! Just don’t give people a choice.

Screenshot of Zoom app tool tip that says "AI Companion always shows on the home screen."

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Simon Peng @simonpeng.net · 14/11/2025

I really don’t like trucks. I think they suck. Instead of just stewing about it I wrote a bit about how artists can help shape the world for the better: www.everyonescreative.net/p/you-can…

Inverted photo of a big dumb truck on a red background. On top it says "I HATE TRUCKS" and above and below it says "I don't have a nuanced opinion about this. These are lame and for losers."

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