New Outlook does have ads, and this move replaces Mail with Outlook therefore the default mail client will now have ads because it's Outlook. You can remove them with a 365 subscription. So while the article doesn't mention it, the statement is true.
All smart TVs are dumb if you perform one simple action. When the terms and conditions screen pops up during the TV setup process simply select "No." Congratulations, you have a dumb TV. This is what I do and so far it has worked.
Do you check every setting on your phone/tv/pc after you boot it up? It seems very impractical to me.
As a user, I assume that unless I explicitly changed something, my setup remains the same. I used to be able to trust that manufacturers won't try anything too stupid, but at that time the cost in performance, gear and PR was sufficient and incentive to sell information on you was not as prevalent.
The cause of this could be many things, but one thing is for sure: worrying about it only makes it worse.
My advice would be to visit your doctor, asks for a general round of blood tests to check everything is okay, B12, liver function, cholesterol, kidneys, etc. Do the lot. If they show something isn't normal then you can focus on dealing with it, but just as importantly, if the results don't show anything you can rule out your physical health as the problem and focus on other potential causes.
I'd place a small wager on learning you have a clean bill of health helping you get out of this slump, or could go a long way to getting your mojo back.
Depending on where you are located in the world, find a local artisan coffee roastery and see if you can talk to the owner. It's the fastest way to gain access to face-to-face deep knowledge of the coffee industry because they typically work directly with the farmers. In the process, you may also find someone who is willing to work with you and buy all the beans you produce in 2026 and beyond.
There aren't any thanks to a bottom teir poor country. Coffee is sold / exported unroasted here. And if there are, they control the whole production line, from plants to exportation. I could learn from small producer, and learn to scale by myself I guess.
Because they are under no obligation to continue contributing, and if the organization is serious about the future of the project and spot some talent, they'll want to try and get that person into a more permanent role. The real question is actually the opposite of the one you asked: why wouldn't they want to try and pay you for your work if it's beneficial to the product/company?
Plus you may not be working on exactly what they need from the project, but you already know the domain, the code base and the people. Even if they let you keep a few hours to do the stuff you were doing before, it's a net gain.
If I was in that situation I would take the time to plan out in as fine detail as possible a task list for each day for each person. There are several benefits to doing this:
- They know exactly what needs to be done and are expected to do, so even the Maverick is placed on a leash.
- You are probably going to return to a mess anyway, but this way you (and your boss) have the task lists to point to as evidence when reprimanding or even removing people from the team down the line.
- You're covering yourself if the project does get delayed. You did everything you could to help the team while you weren't there.
Your boss may not be technical, but if he has these task lists for each person and you sit down and go through them with him before you leave, he can do daily checks to keep them on track.
Finally, switch off and enjoy your vacation. There is nothing you can do while you are away and probably a lot you will have to do when you return, so throw yourself into the break and enjoy it as much as possible.
If a team is in a messy state or firefighting mode, an authoritarian and micro-managery leadership style can work very well, and even be appreciated by the team.
Nah, you sort out free spirits and free thinkers and leave behind cooperate bedrock bureacrat coders. But then again, this is the reason why we have startup culture, cause this works so well, the grinders have to pay to get innovation externally.
I've been using Fastmail for several months now having migrated away from Gmail. I've found it to be very reliable, extremely fast, and just as importantly-it just does what it says on the tin. No gimmicks, ads, or hassle.
The one problem I've faced is my Fastmail email address ending up in the spam folder of friends and family and having to explain to them how to prevent that. I think that may be a leftover from the days when Fastmail offered free accounts. A bit annoying, but definitely not a deal breaker for me.
Not OP but I do both. I pay for a fastmail account and have <myname>@<one of their domains> which all my _personal_ things go to and then I have my business emails all route via their Aliases and certificate pointing.
There have been some instances where both the fastmail domain and my business domain ended up in Spam for the receiver but that is less than a handful of times and I used Fastmail via Nodemailer as a proof of concept for a newsletter service so (ab)used the service without any issue.
For my pixel art book with No Starch, they insisted on Word templates and it worked out well for a couple of reasons. The first being because their editing team was so used to using the template for feedback. It was easier for me to adapt to the publisher than the other way around, and the whole process was smoother and quicker.
The second reason was to do with a change in format as the book was nearing completion. It's aimed at kids (8+) and adults, but we decided having an open and lay flat printed edition made the most sense because it makes following the tutorials easier. This resulted in the layout needing to be tweaked for a couple of hundred pages, which the publisher handled because we used their template system.
So while it may be annoying for a writer to have to change their methods, it can save you a hell of a lot of work because things change unexpectedly (and in my case for the better).
