Cool Things - February 11, 2026

Went through some tabs while mostly ish paying attention to a webinar.

From Laptop

• In an age of delivery apps and convenience, hotels shouldn’t overlook the minibar – (subscription wall) This is about intentional care. It is so good.

  When a guest has to rely on a delivery rider to meet basic needs, does it not signal a failure of hospitality? By outsourcing feeding, hydrating and comforting guests to apps, hotels aren’t just losing revenue – they’re also surrendering a chance to connect. Convenience might be king but hospitality is supposed to be about care.

• Cover to Cover – local one-day conference on print magazines (another of my vices.) I missed going to the inaugural one last fall, but have tickets for this one.
• AWS says you’re on your own if media codec patent owners come knocking – could be something, could be nothing. But if you are using AWS to manipulate media, you should at least know about.
• How to Beat F.O.B.O., From the Expert Who Coined It – (subscription wall) I love the idea of FOBO (Fear Of Better Option) and am 100% adding that phrase into my lexicon. This paralyzes startups. Just ship.

From Phone

• ‘Sanatorium Under the Sign of the Hourglass’ Review: The Quay Brothers’ Surreal Stop-Motion Fantasia Is a Mouthful, an Eyeful and a Mind-Melt – I feel like this needs to be seen in an old-school moviehouse.
• The DJ’s Guide to the Camelot Wheel and Harmonic Mixing – Some music theory
• Fast database queries are not always better – the slow log doesn’t necessarily lie, but it also doesn’t always tell the truth
• Debugging a FUSE deadlock in the Linux kernel – Nerding debugging at Netflix scale
• Beyond Measure - The Hidden History of Measurement from Cubits to Quantum Constants – The sort of nerdiness I consume
• Lost parks: What happened to Raleigh’s five original squares?
• The Documentation System – There is a secret that needs to be understood in order to write good software documentation: there isn’t one thing called documentation, there are four. I suspect this also needs some rethinking with AI consumption. But I’ve got to get out from code to focus on this stuff.
• I Thought I Heard You Speak - Women at Factory Records – Factory is/was such and important label
• The 30 Most Engrossing Fashion Books of All Time – This could be a very expensive list
• Ghost Walk dance explained
• Empire Roller Disco – I don’t need this book. However, I have another similar themed one, so would match…