Sony says the disc backlash isn’t making “any impact” on its business, and I believe it. Not because Sony is on a crusade. Because Sony is reading a number that says exactly that, and the number is correct.
From Op-ed
Is HomePod Dead?
HomePod is truly a product of its time. Its core feature is to stream Apple Music with Siri. Some side hustles it can pull off: AirPlay smart speaker, or wireless home hub, but I tend to agree with the community consensus the wireless hub only works in principle. None of these features are unique to HomePod, let alone the most polished.
Gemini 3.6 Flash Released
Over the last few weeks, my main takeaway with the Fable 5 and GPT-5.6 releases was their respective costs and cost performances. Neither company particularly hides the fact that the real models they offer are paywalled. It creates a distinct entry barrier for those who simply are not the target audience of the marketing materials surrounding the AI hype: vibe coding, content creation, and so on.
Fable 5 Now Included in Max Subscription
Fable 5 saga is finally coming to an end with Anthropic deciding to include the flagship model in Max. Since I am on Max tier for this month temporarily, the announcement is disappointing in two ways: a. Fable won’t be available on a similar price tier as GPT 5.6 Sol, and b. Fable is simply too inefficient when it comes to token counts compared to Sol. Whichever way you cut it, you can get a better deal from Codex.
1Password Adds Claude Support
If you have been on a vibe coding frenzy thanks to Fable 5, 1Password has something to offer for you today. The company has announced a new feature that fills website credentials on Claude’s behalf. By the developer’s claim, the feature is designed to have zero-exposure to the agent — tasks are handled by AI, and the credentials do not enter the model or its memory. Each request still needs to be approved on 1Password. It is currently only available on Mac and Google Chrome. The detailed announcement and support document is in the link. Give it a read if…
Sony to Stop PS Disc Production
Sony is winding down disc production for new titles as of 2028. The signs were on the wall. Digital-only storefronts. Disc-less consoles. Competitors who went digital years ago, or are still trying to. However, the announcement was ill-received. It was seen as contempt for consumers’ rights. For archival efforts of video games. For anyone who wanted physical media. Sony’s true motive behind the decision is irrelevant. The disc was never engineered to protect those rights.
Fable 5 Trial Extended, Again
The great game of chicken is afoot. Fable 5 trial period is extended, yet again, to July 19th. Albeit anecdotal, there are numerous developers sharing similar stories about the cost performance of the new ChatGPT model, GPT-5.6 Sol. The community consensus agrees Fable 5 and Sol are both frontier models delivering similar results. What’s staggering in these accounts of ChatGPT comparison is not its mere performance. The current consensus seems to be running around a third or a quarter of the cost of running Fable 5.
macOS to Drop Encrypted HFS+ Support by 2027
Apple announced that macOS 28, which will be released in 2027, will not support encrypted HFS+. The support document simply calls it “Mac OS Extended file system”. You may want to double-check old archival HDDs if they’re still formatted to encrypted HFS+. I’d recommend simply reformatting the drive to encrypted APFS, though decrypting the volume is an option too.
Fable 5 Trial Extended
Fable 5’s trial period got an extension. If you had a chance to try it on an existing subscription, you already know whether it worked out for your actual project. There’s no stronger evidence than that. For me, Fable 5’s capability was amazing in its own right — but not at usage-based pricing.
Fable 5 Is Back, Also Sonnet 5 Is Out
Anthropic announced Sonnet 5 this week, described to be as capable as Opus 4.8 but cheaper. Rough timing — Fable 5’s return ate all the attention. I haven’t had the chance to do any coding with it in-depth yet. But from the limited exchange I had over chat, Sonnet 5 still struggled with technical specs. For any technical discussion, I had better luck with Gemini Flash 3.5. In terms of output, Sonnet became incredibly verbose. There is no trace of the laconicism I had noticed in Sonnet 4.
The Murky Rabbit Hole of DIY NAS
My NAS is reaching the end of its design. Twenty terabytes usable across five bays, a few hundred gigabytes left, and it’s warned me twice now that I’m nearly out. I’ve bought time where I could, moving what I can to the pool meant for cold archive. But the design is aging out on more than one front. Swapping the drives to bigger ones won’t fix the root of the problem. With the new home lab feeding the queue, the need only grows until the backlog clears. The clock is ticking.
What Remains of Fable 5 Ban
Apple said Apple Intelligence would bring AI to its brand. It was a broken promise, unless Genmoji is to be considered a success. Apple is now saying the new Siri AI will deliver the promises they made back in 2024. Neither iOS 27 nor macOS Golden Gate has been officially released (available only in beta), but this definitely marks the beginning of the full transition toward AI-centrism in consumer OS. The dependency is real now — local or cloud, there’s no opting out.
Steam Machine Out to Have Pie and Eat It Too
Valve announced yesterday the specs and price point of the new Steam Machine. It has been speculated Valve is coming after the console market, specifically, the “couch” market. The first Steam Machine from 2015 was a commercial failure, in large part because the pricing wasn’t agreeable to either console or PC gamers. After the successful run with Steam Deck, Valve is giving Steam Machine yet another go, seemingly for the same reason.
Quest to Find Ergonomic Keyboard of Today
Remember Microsoft Sculpt Keyboard? It was legendary in retrospect. It was a tenkeyless design with a detached numpad, yet fully functional as a full-sized keyboard. It didn’t need additional software to set up — it was pure plug and play. I had written simple configurations for Sculpt Keyboards before; it was a testament of what the ergonomic keyboard was capable of.
“Ethical Concern” is AI Dunce Cap
Storage is at an all-time premium nowadays, with even the price of SSDs and HDDs being affected by AI craze. As much as I would love to say ‘rip the discs raw’, there is bound to be a real world limit on how much storage I can secure for a self-hosted media server. My search for encoding these raws led me to looking for configurations used by others, and for what it’s worth, their activity could easily translate into online piracy. Claude shut down the conversation immediately, citing my query as equivalent to looking for a black-market arms dealer.