TLDR 2023-06-13

REDDIT CRASHED BECAUSE OF THE GROWING SUBREDDIT BLACKOUT

The large number of subreddits shifting to private to protest Reddit's new API pricing terms caused Reddit to crash. Reddit started experiencing issues on Monday morning. The outage was fully resolved by 1:28PM ET. More than 7,000 subreddits have gone private or read-only as part of the protest. Some subreddits will return to normal on June 14, but others have decided to continue the protest until changes are made. Reddit said on Sunday that it wasn't planning any changes to what's been announced.

THIS IS TWITTER'S NEW CEO'S FIRST EMAIL TO EMPLOYEES

Twitter's new CEO Linda Yaccarino sent her first memo to employees on Monday, marking her start at the company. Yaccarino is a long-time advertising executive and her main task will be to rebuild Twitter's ads business. Elon Musk will continue overseeing Twitter's product and engineering teams. A copy of Yaccarino's full email to Twitter employees is available in the article.

SOL READER IS A VR HEADSET EXCLUSIVELY FOR READING BOOKS

Sol Reader is a VR headset built specifically for reading books. The device blocks all distractions while reading. It uses side-lit e-ink displays and comes with a remote. A full charge lasts for around 25 hours. The device is available for pre-order for $350.

N-Ark's floating city project, Dogen City, will be designed to handle rising sea levels and provide power, food, and water for up to 40,000 people. The city, which will measure 4 kilometers in circumference, will host tourism, medical facilities, and space rockets. N-Ark is planning for approximately 10,000 full-time inhabitants, with up to 30,000 tourists visiting at any time. The company plans to have Dogen City in use by 2030.

CHROME FOR TESTING: RELIABLE DOWNLOADS FOR BROWSER AUTOMATION

Chrome for Testing is a new Chrome flavor that targets web app testing and automation use cases. Setting up adequate browser testing environments is a commonly reported web developer pain point. Chrome for Testing doesn't auto-update and a versioned binary will be made available for every Chrome release. ChromeDriver releases will now align with Chrome releases.

WAKU

Waku is a minimalistic React framework. It supports exportable builds, static site generation, and more. Diagrams showing how Waku's architecture works are available.

FERN - THE FUTURE OF API DEVELOPMENT (GITHUB REPO SPONSOR)

Fern is an open source format for defining REST APIs. You can think of it like a programming language to describe your API - your endpoints, types, errors, and examples. Find out why companies like Scale AI and Flatfile already use Fern to develop their APIs and generate their SDKs, check us out on GitHub [https://github.com/fern-api/fern?utm_source=tldr].

A DEVELOPER'S VIEW OF VISION PRO

Apple's Vision Pro justifies its expensive price tag by delivering an incredible user experience. Apps for the device will likely go the same way as apps for iOS, meaning there will probably be a rush to the bottom with pricing and then a general user expectation that software should be free. While there might not be the same gold rush for apps on visionOS compared to on iOS, there are still many reasons for developers to be excited about the platform.

KILLING COMMUNITY

Online communities help people find a sense of belonging where they might struggle to do so in real life. When a community grows too fast, a stranger-culture emerges where people are more guarded. The sense of belonging to the community is eroded, and people feel more anonymous. Social media sites that are run like startups have to hit growth targets to impress investors. This unsustainable growth destroys communities and lowers the quality of interactions for users.

AUDIOCRAFT

Audiocraft is a library for audio processing and generation with deep learning powered by MusicGen, a state-of-the-art controllable text-to-music model.

THE MODERN WAY OF SERVING IMAGES

This guide covers responsive image techniques and introduces a novel technique that aims to make img tags work almost like picture tags.

MODELS FOR AI SAFETY RESEARCH

The UK's AI safety task force will focus on AI foundational models to better understand the opportunities and risks of these systems.

HOW TO BUY A SOCIAL NETWORK, WITH TUMBLR CEO MATT MULLENWEG

This interview with Tumblr CEO Matt Mullenweg covers the technical, political, and social issues that come with purchasing a social network.

THE OFFICIAL REDDIT APP

Some users were able to fix the issue by clearing Reddit site data and cookies.

VARDA: THE SPACE DRUG FACTORY

Varda's space drug manufacturing factory will run tests while orbiting Earth for just over a month before coming back down to the Utah desert in mid-July.