A very random collection this week, with some prepping research. The Life-Sized City report from Berlin is pretty cool, so is the one about building a simple game in different engines, I also liked the post about microservices. Engineering Microservices Are a Tax Your Startup Probably Can’t Afford - very long read about the pitfalls and some advantages of microservices. Formally verified cloud-scale authorization [Paper] - fascinating. Maybe only do that if you have a billion calls a second. ...

A few uplifting stories about urbanism and science this week. I also really liked the video about the empty virtual world and browsing through Moby’s gratis track collection. Leadership The best culture book of 2025: The Power of Mattering [Podcast] - I am not 100% convinced, but it is on my to-read stack now. TBM 351: The 4 Prioritization Jobs (And Why It Matters) - I would say they are very much related. ...

This probably falls into the category of weird hobbies. Friends have asked me about it, so I figured it was time to write it down. Some history I grew up in the 80s and cassettes were a big part of how I experienced music. I remember recording bits of radio shows to create my own mixtapes. Furthermore, I also recorded records of friends and relatives to play on my Walkman. ...

Many podcasts this week. I really loved the one with Cyndi Lauper. I did enjoy the one with Kent Beck and basically all the engineering and leadership ones. Leadership Kent Beck on why software development is an exercise in human relationships [Podcast] - great interview with Kent, he is so humble and down to earth. Meaning: why showing work matters has such an impact [Podcast] - interesting discussion round. ...

I have been listening to podcast for a long time. I have blogged about this previously. During that time, I have changed devices and players. I might have started with a classic iPod, then went to a Symbian phone, now on Android, first with BeyondPod and currently Pocket Casts. The one constant was the increasing number of podcasts and episodes I had to deal with every week. I do love the variety and coming across weird episodes on “In Our Time”, where I learn about topics I would never have known about. ...