My name is Philipp and you are reading Creativerly, the internet corner where I unpack my musings, curate and write about noteworthy apps and software, and explore the latest trends in design and tech.

Hey and welcome to Creativerly 352👋

I just recently had the most wholesome, but also funny situation with my dad. He is over 60 now, and while he used a laptop with Windows installed for multiple years at work, and has had an iPhone as, he is not that tech-savvy when it comes to those devices. After retiring, the company he worked for let him keep his laptop, but obviously completely wiped it, even the Windows version it had installed. As he got back into photography a couple of years ago, and has been especially focusing on it since his retirement, he wanted to get a computer in order to save his photos, get them print-ready, but also just view them on a bigger screen.

So, he asked whether I could recommend a computer or a laptop for his use-case. Since he has already an iPhone and an iPad, I thought that maybe a MacBook Air could be something for him, however I quickly dismissed the idea, since the MacBook Air screen might have been too small for him. We discussed this for quite some time, until he randomly drops the info that he actually has a laptop (the one from his previous employer), and I did not know about that. I asked why he does not want to use that, and he mentioned that it is useless because it got completely wiped, and he thought about it as simply electronic junk.

When I told him, that I can create a USB stick with a Windows version on it, in order to install it again on the laptop, he was flabbergasted.

So, I went ahead, grabbed a USB stick, downloaded Windows 11, created the iso file and installation volume with WinDiskWriter, and then headed back to him, inserted the USB stick into his laptop, booted it up, and installed Windows. It was so wholesome to see, how excited he was, because suddenly he did not have to invest any money into a new computer but could rather use the existing one for his photography use cases.

I know that we are 40 years apart in age, and that I grew up with a completely different approach to technology, but still, it was a funny situation, as he stated that I should teach this, and I suddenly made his day, week, and the rest of the year. After I left my parent's place, he even called me just to say thank you again, and what this meant to him.

I am now going to hold on to this situation forever. Lovely.

And now, enjoy this week's newsletter.

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Fresh Updates & News

Vivaldi 7.7 is all about less friction, and more control →

Vivaldi's newest update, version 7.7, brings some lovely improvements to how you organize, access, and control your browsing experience. When you are using Vivaldi across different devices, and you are working on your desktop PC while you suddenly realize there is this one link you had opened on your phone, Vivaldi 7.7 makes it super easy and straightforward to access tabs from all your devices. To find and access a single tab from another desktop just needs a single click to open the Window Panel, and then you see the tabs that are open on your other synced machines.

When you open your synced content, you are not just getting a simple list of individual tabs. Instead, you can bring over entire windows with their complete structure intact. If you are moving between multiple setups frequently, you can be sure that your tabs will always stay in sync and accessible.

Besides that, Vivaldi also reimagined how you interact with your Start Page. Vivaldi's Widgets and Speed Dials now coexist in a unified Start Page experience. This means, your favorite sites sit alongside real-time information from widgets, which creates a personal dashboard that is uniquely yours. Additionally, the Privacy Dashboard also received a refresh, with a cleaner design that makes it easier to understand exactly what Vivaldi is doing to protect you.

Beehiiv wants to put you in control of your media brand →

One week ago, beehiiv* launched one of the most significant updates to power independent journalism and writers.

Four years after launching, beehiiv turned into a powerhouse supporting writers, independent journalism, and creators. It generates $32M of annualized revenue, over 110 employees located around the world working on improving the platform every day, and beehiiv is sending over 3B emails per month. Additionally, beehiiv helped its users generate over $45M of earnings on the platform. Publishers like TIME, TechCrunch, journalists like Joanna Stern or Marissa Kabas, or independent media like Status, are all powered by beehiiv. During their Winter Release Event, beehiiv introduced not just another platform update, but rather an entirely new operating system for the content economy. It introduced more ways for users to monetize, more ways to create, more ways to thrive as a creator, independent journalist, or media company.

Lex Roman from Revenue Rulebreaker, wrote a lovely post about why beehiiv wants you to put in control of your media brand, including a breakdown of the things and features that changed with the Winter Release, so definitely give that one a read.

Popt introduces an expanded version of its place tags →

Popt is the smart, simple iOS note-taking that, that auto-tags contacts, places, and dates, making notes fast, fun, and effortless. In case you want to learn more about it, make sure to check out the deep dive I wrote about it.

With its newest update, Popt introduced an expanded version of its place tags, which can now include any point of interest. Besides places, Popt now made collections more useful thanks to sorting and grouping options, and improved tag insertion. With the new expanded version of the place tag, restaurants and bars, museums, shops, parks, cinemas, and theaters, can now all live inside your notes and in your Collections tab. Popt now packages all countries and cities with a population of over 100.000. As you type in Popt, those places can be tagged and accept the tag suggestions. For points of interest and smaller localities, you can use the Insert tag menu to search for any place in the world.

Make sure to head over to Popt's blog post to learn more about how to use the place tags, and what you can build with it in Popt.

Eugen Rochko steps down as Mastodon CEO →

Eugen Rochko, previously CEO at Mastodon, announced that he will step down after nearly ten years in this role. This also means, that he is transferring his ownership of the trademark, and other assets to the Mastodon non-profit. As a next step, Eugen Rochko will move to a Strategy & Product Advisor role. The blog post he wrote is a beautiful reflection of his time as CEO, the reasons he is now stepping down, and why this is the right step for Mastodon and the fediverse.

Deta is shutting down its managed services →

Deta recently sent out an email in which they shared the unfortunate news, that the team at Deta made the decision to shut down Deta's managed services, which means their managed AI, automatic updates, extensions, and signed releases will no longer work. Deta's most recent product has been Surf, an AI-powered browser which they recently open-sourced. So, if you are a user of Surf and you want to keep using it, you should move to an open source release.

The reason Deta decided to shut down its managed services, is that after almost 7 years, they could not make Deta and Surf work as a startup. Nevertheless, they will continue to work on the open source version of Surf.

Mental Wealth

❯ Finding resilience through humor – “When stress takes over, most people double down. They work harder, worry more, and hold their breath until the tension passes. My friend Tim Gard learned a better way…he laughed.”

❯ The hidden cost of shipping too fast – “Speed is the default expectation in most startups. If you are not shipping fast, it can feel like you are falling behind. After 25 years of working with a wide range of teams, I have noticed a pattern: speed often gets treated as progress even when no one has agreed on what progress actually means. Speed works beautifully when there is clarity. When clarity is missing, moving quickly usually creates work that takes months to untangle.”

❯ It’s Okay Not To Read – “So, I used to read a lot more. The last two years I’ve slowed down some, mostly because of some truly epic reading slumps. I’m kind of back on track right now, but I still have days where I just don’t want to read a book. Sometimes I want to read some fanfiction or just watch a movie.”

❯ The slow decline of joy – “There was a time when every action came with a second thought: how would this look online? Life stopped feeling like something to live and started feeling like something to perform. Somewhere along the way, the luxury of doing things just for joy slipped away. The simple pleasure of playing guitar, revisiting an old video game, or taking film photos became overshadowed by the invisible pressure to create “content.””

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These are paid promotions or affiliate links to support Creativerly. If you are interested in putting your tool, product, or resource in front of over 2000 creative minds, consider advertising in Creativerly and book a sponsor or classified ad spot. Find all the important information at creativerly.com/advertise.

Appendix

❯ ICYMI

AI browsers like ChatGPT Atlas don’t improve the web, they replace it with corporate-controlled summaries and surveillance. People rush to adopt them, ignoring privacy risks and ethical flaws. The web thrives on openness, but AI browsers undermine that. Ask yourself: Who benefits? It’s not you. Read my post about why The web does not need AI browsers – It needs us to fight back.

❯ Quick Bits

Till next time! 👋‌‌‌‌

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