If you’re struggling to get AI agents past enterprise security reviews, join me tomorrow for a session on how Cross App Access (XAA) brings managed authorization to MCP!
I'll be joined by Sohail Pathan to show off our Cross App Access playground and give a live demo of how the protocol works!
Tomorrow - February 18, 2026 (8 AM PT)
👉 https://www.brighttalk.com/webcast/14899/661521?utm_source=apk_social&utm_medium=brighttalk&utm_campaign=661521
{
"type": "entry",
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"url": "https://aaronparecki.com/2026/02/17/12/xaa-mcp",
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"text": "If you\u2019re struggling to get AI agents past enterprise security reviews, join me tomorrow for a session on how Cross App Access (XAA) brings managed authorization to MCP! \n\nI'll be joined by Sohail Pathan to show off our Cross App Access playground and give a live demo of how the protocol works! \n\nTomorrow - February 18, 2026 (8 AM PT) \n\n\ud83d\udc49 https://www.brighttalk.com/webcast/14899/661521?utm_source=apk_social&utm_medium=brighttalk&utm_campaign=661521",
"html": "If you\u2019re struggling to get AI agents past enterprise security reviews, join me tomorrow for a session on how Cross App Access (XAA) brings managed authorization to MCP! <br /><br />I'll be joined by Sohail Pathan to show off our Cross App Access playground and give a live demo of how the protocol works! <br /><br />Tomorrow - February 18, 2026 (8 AM PT) <br /><br /><a href=\"https://aaronparecki.com/emoji/%F0%9F%91%89\">\ud83d\udc49</a> <a href=\"https://www.brighttalk.com/webcast/14899/661521?utm_source=apk_social&utm_medium=brighttalk&utm_campaign=661521\"><span>https://</span>www.brighttalk.com/webcast/14899/661521?utm_source=apk_social&utm_medium=brighttalk&utm_campaign=661521</a>"
},
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},
"post-type": "note",
"_id": "47386668",
"_source": "16"
}
{
"type": "entry",
"published": "2026-02-16T22:52:38-08:00",
"url": "https://beesbuzz.biz/blog/13924-This-site-now-Cloudflare-free",
"category": [
"cloudflare",
"Internet",
"admin tax"
],
"name": "This site now Cloudflare-free",
"author": {
"type": "card",
"name": "fluffy",
"url": "https://beesbuzz.biz/",
"photo": "https://beesbuzz.biz/static/headshot.jpg"
},
"post-type": "article",
"_id": "47378670",
"_source": "2778"
}
{
"type": "entry",
"published": "2026-02-15T00:06:02-08:00",
"url": "https://beesbuzz.biz/blog/6676-Still-I-persist",
"category": [
"mental health",
"chronic pain",
"cars",
"corolla"
],
"name": "Still, I persist",
"author": {
"type": "card",
"name": "fluffy",
"url": "https://beesbuzz.biz/",
"photo": "https://beesbuzz.biz/static/headshot.jpg"
},
"post-type": "article",
"_id": "47360962",
"_source": "2778"
}
A San Diego mutual aid organizer I’m connected with needs some urgent jaw surgery and treatment after the last surgery didn’t go so well. gofund.me/3fa8dcf45
Any amount helps and boosting is much appreciated. 💛
Previously
{
"type": "entry",
"published": "2026-02-14 12:20-0800",
"url": "https://gregorlove.com/2026/02/a-san-diego-mutual/",
"category": [
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"SanDiego"
],
"syndication": [
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],
"content": {
"text": "A San Diego mutual aid organizer I\u2019m connected with needs some urgent jaw surgery and treatment after the last surgery didn\u2019t go so well. gofund.me/3fa8dcf45\n\nAny amount helps and boosting is much appreciated. \ud83d\udc9b\n\nPreviously",
"html": "<p>A San Diego mutual aid organizer I\u2019m connected with needs some urgent jaw surgery and treatment after the last surgery didn\u2019t go so well. <a href=\"https://gofund.me/3fa8dcf45\">gofund.me/3fa8dcf45</a></p>\n\n<p>Any amount helps and boosting is much appreciated. \ud83d\udc9b</p>\n\n<p><a href=\"https://gregorlove.com/2025/09/yall-this-one-is/\">Previously</a></p>"
},
"author": {
"type": "card",
"name": "gRegor Morrill",
"url": "https://gregorlove.com/",
"photo": "https://gregorlove.com/site/assets/files/6268/profile-2021-square.300x0.jpg"
},
"post-type": "note",
"_id": "47358573",
"_source": "95"
}
May you be cozy and safe this Caturday.
{
"type": "entry",
"published": "2026-02-14T09:50:18-0500",
"url": "https://martymcgui.re/2026/02/14/095018/",
"photo": [
"https://res.cloudinary.com/schmarty/image/fetch/w_960,c_fill/https://media.martymcgui.re/13/0c/a4/bf/e82c14f722513a5e1c3c03a6c9a609a16230f51d7969133d6630fde8.jpeg"
],
"syndication": [
"https://fed.brid.gy/"
],
"content": {
"text": "May you be cozy and safe this Caturday.",
"html": "<p>May you be cozy and safe this Caturday.</p>\n\n \n <a href=\"https://media.martymcgui.re/13/0c/a4/bf/e82c14f722513a5e1c3c03a6c9a609a16230f51d7969133d6630fde8.jpeg\"></a>"
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"author": {
"type": "card",
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"photo": "https://martymcgui.re/images/logo.jpg"
},
"post-type": "photo",
"_id": "47357195",
"_source": "175"
}
Inspired by some #indieweb folks creating /caw pages on their websites, I made one of my own! Here you can listen to the most recent crow recorded from my house:
https://aaronparecki.com/caw/
{
"type": "entry",
"published": "2026-02-13T14:30:12-08:00",
"url": "https://aaronparecki.com/2026/02/13/10/caw",
"category": [
"caw",
"indieweb"
],
"syndication": [
"https://bsky.app/profile/aaronpk.com/post/3merkndb3ac22"
],
"content": {
"text": "Inspired by some #indieweb folks creating /caw pages on their websites, I made one of my own! Here you can listen to the most recent crow recorded from my house: \n\nhttps://aaronparecki.com/caw/",
"html": "Inspired by some <a href=\"https://aaronparecki.com/tag/indieweb\">#indieweb</a> folks creating /caw pages on their websites, I made one of my own! Here you can listen to the most recent crow recorded from my house: <br /><br /><a href=\"https://aaronparecki.com/caw/\"><span>https://</span>aaronparecki.com/caw/</a>"
},
"author": {
"type": "card",
"name": "Aaron Parecki",
"url": "https://aaronparecki.com/",
"photo": "https://aperture-media.p3k.io/aaronparecki.com/41061f9de825966faa22e9c42830e1d4a614a321213b4575b9488aa93f89817a.jpg"
},
"post-type": "note",
"_id": "47350607",
"_source": "16"
}
{
"type": "entry",
"published": "2026-02-12T10:05:17-0500",
"url": "https://martymcgui.re/2026/02/12/100517/",
"category": [
"Thingiverse"
],
"syndication": [
"https://fed.brid.gy/"
],
"content": {
"text": "Holy wow!!\nhttps://www.thingiverse.com/blog?p=thingiverse-joins-the-myminifactory-family\n\n\nThanks Michael for the heads up!",
"html": "<p>Holy wow!!</p>\n<p><a href=\"https://www.thingiverse.com/blog?p=thingiverse-joins-the-myminifactory-family\">https://www.thingiverse.com/blog?p=thingiverse-joins-the-myminifactory-family</a></p>\n<a href=\"https://media.martymcgui.re/c8/30/c4/2e/7ab677e128e01b57485806986054eeb65c4b25fe01ca6d509502f231.png\"><img src=\"https://res.cloudinary.com/schmarty/image/fetch/w_480,c_fill/https://media.martymcgui.re/c8/30/c4/2e/7ab677e128e01b57485806986054eeb65c4b25fe01ca6d509502f231.png\" alt=\"Announcement image reads 'MyMiniFactory has acquired Thingiverse. Help us shape what comes next. Join the AMA - 17th Feb. Dare to be human. On the right is the blocky MyMiniFactory logo. On the left is an updated Thingiverse logo, also blocky.\" /></a>\n\n<p>Thanks <a href=\"https://michaelweinberg.org/\">Michael</a> for the heads up!</p>"
},
"author": {
"type": "card",
"name": "Marty McGuire",
"url": "https://martymcgui.re/",
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},
"post-type": "note",
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}
Today was a lot... shades got installed, dumbwaiter guy was here and almost finished, electrician was here running wires for the water heater, hopefully we'll be over the drama this week
{
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"triplex"
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"photo": [
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],
"content": {
"text": "Today was a lot... shades got installed, dumbwaiter guy was here and almost finished, electrician was here running wires for the water heater, hopefully we'll be over the drama this week"
},
"author": {
"type": "card",
"name": "Aaron Parecki",
"url": "https://aaronparecki.com/",
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},
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long day of teaching a workshop followed by meetings so here's a cat
{
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],
"content": {
"text": "long day of teaching a workshop followed by meetings so here's a cat"
},
"author": {
"type": "card",
"name": "Aaron Parecki",
"url": "https://aaronparecki.com/",
"photo": "https://aperture-media.p3k.io/aaronparecki.com/41061f9de825966faa22e9c42830e1d4a614a321213b4575b9488aa93f89817a.jpg"
},
"post-type": "photo",
"_id": "47331864",
"_source": "16"
}
{
"type": "entry",
"published": "2026-02-06T11:12:14-08:00",
"url": "https://aaronparecki.com/2026/02/06/15/",
"category": [
"olympics",
"365"
],
"photo": [
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],
"content": {
"text": "that was cool"
},
"author": {
"type": "card",
"name": "Aaron Parecki",
"url": "https://aaronparecki.com/",
"photo": "https://aperture-media.p3k.io/aaronparecki.com/41061f9de825966faa22e9c42830e1d4a614a321213b4575b9488aa93f89817a.jpg"
},
"post-type": "photo",
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}
Part 2 of the last bit of this wall
{
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],
"content": {
"text": "Part 2 of the last bit of this wall"
},
"author": {
"type": "card",
"name": "Aaron Parecki",
"url": "https://aaronparecki.com/",
"photo": "https://aperture-media.p3k.io/aaronparecki.com/41061f9de825966faa22e9c42830e1d4a614a321213b4575b9488aa93f89817a.jpg"
},
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Turns out these tankless water heaters are just not up to the task. We failed the plumbing inspection today because they can't supply hot water to all the fixtures at the same time. More details on that here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0KnENLf-AQ
{
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"photo": [
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"https://aperture-media.p3k.io/aaronparecki.com/17562576d598365bdb11e92031380293c17ecc6ca60aa1f03cb76a2a5af3f7d7.jpg",
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],
"content": {
"text": "Turns out these tankless water heaters are just not up to the task. We failed the plumbing inspection today because they can't supply hot water to all the fixtures at the same time. More details on that here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0KnENLf-AQ",
"html": "Turns out these tankless water heaters are just not up to the task. We failed the plumbing inspection today because they can't supply hot water to all the fixtures at the same time. More details on that here: <a href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0KnENLf-AQ\"><span>https://</span>www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0KnENLf-AQ</a>"
},
"author": {
"type": "card",
"name": "Aaron Parecki",
"url": "https://aaronparecki.com/",
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},
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The last of the back wall is getting done the slow way, hand-mixing concrete. The conduits are not going anywhere now.
{
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],
"content": {
"text": "The last of the back wall is getting done the slow way, hand-mixing concrete. The conduits are not going anywhere now."
},
"author": {
"type": "card",
"name": "Aaron Parecki",
"url": "https://aaronparecki.com/",
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}
Driveway pavers are done!
{
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"content": {
"text": "Driveway pavers are done!"
},
"author": {
"type": "card",
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Progress on the driveway pavers!
{
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"content": {
"text": "Progress on the driveway pavers!"
},
"author": {
"type": "card",
"name": "Aaron Parecki",
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},
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"_id": "47331766",
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}
{
"type": "entry",
"published": "2026-01-26T13:21:29-08:00",
"url": "https://aaronparecki.com/2026/01/26/11/",
"category": [
"365"
],
"photo": [
"https://aperture-media.p3k.io/aaronparecki.com/82cd296543a8341a47bc9e98dd25876011d0c6a4fa3ab29b758cafe54b281b06.jpg"
],
"syndication": [
"https://www.swarmapp.com/user/59164/checkin/6977dad9bfadbe38507807ef"
],
"name": "at Concourse C",
"author": {
"type": "card",
"name": "Aaron Parecki",
"url": "https://aaronparecki.com/",
"photo": "https://aperture-media.p3k.io/aaronparecki.com/41061f9de825966faa22e9c42830e1d4a614a321213b4575b9488aa93f89817a.jpg"
},
"checkin": {
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"name": "Concourse C",
"latitude": "45.589342",
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Sometimes the difference between critic and listener reviews for music is wild. I’m trying to listen to A Grand Don’t Come for Free from the 1001 Albums project. It apparently has a 91/100 on Metacritic, but a slew of 1-star listener ratings. I’m definitely leaning towards the 1-star crowd.
{
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"published": "2026-02-10 13:44-0800",
"url": "https://gregorlove.com/2026/02/sometimes-the-difference/",
"category": [
"music"
],
"content": {
"text": "Sometimes the difference between critic and listener reviews for music is wild. I\u2019m trying to listen to A Grand Don\u2019t Come for Free from the 1001 Albums project. It apparently has a 91/100 on Metacritic, but a slew of 1-star listener ratings. I\u2019m definitely leaning towards the 1-star crowd.",
"html": "<p>Sometimes the difference between critic and listener reviews for music is wild. I\u2019m trying to listen to <i>A Grand Don\u2019t Come for Free</i> from the 1001 Albums project. It apparently has a 91/100 on Metacritic, but a slew of <a href=\"https://1001albumsgenerator.com/albums/365ETCJBUmEWroc4UGBS1u/a-grand-dont-come-for-free\">1-star listener ratings</a>. I\u2019m definitely leaning towards the 1-star crowd.</p>"
},
"author": {
"type": "card",
"name": "gRegor Morrill",
"url": "https://gregorlove.com/",
"photo": "https://gregorlove.com/site/assets/files/6268/profile-2021-square.300x0.jpg"
},
"post-type": "note",
"_id": "47320632",
"_source": "95"
}
{
"type": "entry",
"author": {
"name": "Jared White",
"url": "https://jaredwhite.com/",
"photo": null
},
"url": "https://jaredwhite.com/articles/love-of-love-of-art",
"published": "2026-02-10T09:04:40-08:00",
"content": {
"html": "<img alt=\"\" src=\"https://res.cloudinary.com/mariposta/image/upload/w_1200,c_limit,q_65/hip-hop-artist.jpg\" /><h2>Learning to embrace the rewarding messiness of making art while human.</h2>\n\n<p>For all of my life, I have loved art. All of the creative arts. When I was a young boy wandering the corridors of the local mall with my parents, I was briefly interviewed regarding the latest \u201cG.I. Joe\u201d action figures at which point I proudly informed the pollster I wasn\u2019t \u201cinto\u201d that sort of thing. I was an <em>artist.</em> \ud83d\ude06</p>\n\n<p>There aren\u2019t very many art forms I haven\u2019t at least dabbled in. Even the ones you might not think of at first, like building a garden feature out of stone (at the direction of my mother who was the real green thumb) or live painting to a musical performance in a house of worship.</p>\n\n<p>That\u2019s not to say I <em>personally</em> love all creative arts equally. There are certain ones I gravitate to, same as any artist. For a long time, I thought music was my primary talent. But I\u2019ve cycled through a plethora of others over the months and years and decades. To be honest, if there\u2019s been any one constant, it\u2019s writing. <a href=\"https://jaredwhite.com/articles/i-am-a-writer\">I fear I\u2019ve never taken it as seriously as I should.</a></p>\n\n<p>Oh, and let\u2019s not forget: <strong>programming</strong>.</p>\n\n<p>I\u2019ve been writing computer code since I remember being a conscious human being. I learned how to program little graphical sprites and make them move around the screen of the family\u2019s Commodore 128 when using our <a href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KoalaPad\">KoalaPad</a>. Before that of course, I wrote the quintessential BASIC program:</p>\n\n<pre><code>10 PRINT \"HELLO WORLD!\"\n20 GOTO 10\n</code></pre>\n\n<p>and giggled gleefully as the computer acted silly and printed out the same sentence over and over again until I made it stop.</p>\n\n<p>But you know what? You know what I love <em>just as much as art??</em></p>\n\n<h3>Sharing my love of art with others \ud83e\udd70</h3>\n\n<p>Perhaps growing up right as the Age of the Personal Computer dawned\u2014and the Internet in short order\u2014made it seem completely obvious to me I could, and should, share my love for art with others. Try as I might, I can\u2019t remember a time when I haven\u2019t been a total nerd reveling in my enjoyment of one art form or another in spaces both online and off, and there\u2019s rarely been a moment of my teenage or adult life when I haven\u2019t been discussing or debating or teaching or learning the minutiae of some kind of art along with others.</p>\n\n<p>Perhaps nothing exemplifies my appreciation of love for art more than the first thing I did when I got on the World-Wide Web in 1994 and discovered you could, like, just write web pages. You could just write them?! ANYBODY CAN???!!</p>\n\n<p>(Hey, did you know you can STILL JUST WRITE THEM? Open your favorite plain text editor of choice, write some paragraphs, <a href=\"https://www.htmlforpeople.com/\">wrap them in a few HTML tags</a>, and <strong>tada!</strong> \ud83c\udf89 You\u2019ve just created a web page! <em>Eat a bag o\u2019 dicks, Mark Zuckerberg!</em>)</p>\n\n<p>Anyway, the first thing I did was figure out how to create a website for the Celtic music family band I was in at the time, <strong>Distant Oaks</strong>. And the second thing I did was <strong>create my own blog</strong>. Yes, friends, I do believe I may have had one of the very first blogs in Internet history, first called <em>Jared White\u2019s Internet Review</em> and then just <em>The Internet Review</em> (and then <em>iReview</em> many years before Apple trotted that name out). It was great fun recently to pore over saved pages in the Internet Archive and revive <a href=\"https://theinternet.review/\">The Internet Review</a> as a retrotech-themed blog, where the first blog post is dated September 1996 (published when I was only 13 years old!).</p>\n\n<p>Because, you see, I couldn\u2019t simply \u201clove the Internet\u201d and then stop there. I had to <em>share my love for the Internet</em> with everyone else because that\u2019s what you do when you\u2019re a nerdy kid with a new network connection.</p>\n\n<p><strong>I\u2019m still that nerdy kid at heart! And I\u2019ve never stopped sharing!</strong></p>\n\n<ul><li>I\u2019ve never been \u201cjust a musician\u201d, I\u2019ve also taught music (to kids! when still a kid!) and written reviews of music and run fan clubs of musicians.</li>\n <li>I\u2019ve never been \u201cjust a 3D graphics artist\u201d, I\u2019ve hosted online art galleries where I show off the work of other 3D artists.</li>\n <li>I\u2019ve never been \u201cjust a writer\u201d, I\u2019ve helped lead writing worships and host writing groups and <strong>I am currently writing this very article as a participant in a totally awesome Portland writing group run by a dear friend</strong>.</li>\n <li>I\u2019ve never been \u201cjust a programmer\u201d, I\u2019ve run multiple programming blogs and forums and open source projects and chatrooms and have taught programming workshops and <a href=\"https://www.whitefusion.studio/\">I work among other things as a consultant</a> where I educate on the topic of coding as much as I write code personally.</li>\n <li>And so on and so forth, etc., etc.</li>\n</ul><h3>Yet somehow, this concept has become a target of, er, controversy? \u2639\ufe0f</h3>\n\n<p>So imagine my surprise when the \u201cAge of AI\u201d is suddenly upon us somehow for some reason, and I am told, repeatedly, by multiple parties on LinkedIn and elsewhere, that finally, <em>finally</em>, <strong>FINALLY</strong> the gatekeepers are gone, the stingy artists with their stuck-up ways no longer hold influence, and the people, the PEOPLE have been liberated at last. \ud83d\ude03 Now you can create music and 3D graphics art and writing and code and all sorts of things, and it\u2019s all thanks to the <em>miracle</em> that is AI. \u2728</p>\n\n<p>?</p>\n\n<p>????</p>\n\n<p>?????? ??? ? ??? ???</p>\n\n<p>???? ?</p>\n\n<p>?? ??? ??</p>\n\n<p>? ????? ?? ???</p>\n\n<p>??? ???? ?</p>\n\n<p><strong>I don\u2019t get it.</strong></p>\n\n<p>Thankfully I don\u2019t have to, because it\u2019s utter bollocks and <a href=\"https://buttondown.com/theinternet/archive/down-with-the-gatekeepers-apparently/\">I already debunked it in an issue of Cycles Hyped No More</a>. That\u2019s not what this essay is about!</p>\n\n<p>What I\u2019d <em>much</em> rather talk about is how vitally important it is that now, more than ever, <strong>we stand together in solidarity as artists.</strong> And I don\u2019t mean than in a highfalutin way, I mean literally anyone who likes to self-identify as a creative person. We need to band together to strengthen and form communities where artists young and old are supported\u2026whether they\u2019re just getting started or they\u2019ve been in the game for 50 years.</p>\n\n<p>We must celebrate traditions and breaking from those traditions, and relish the truth that most great art comes from the inherent tension between the two.</p>\n\n<p>We must advocate for safe spaces where slop is out and craft is in and people know they are welcome to participate as their authentic selves without the specter of extractive capitalist overlords dictating the terms of engagement.</p>\n\n<h3>Fighting the \u201cLone Wolf\u201d syndrome</h3>\n\n<p>All right. I\u2019ve been making all these grandiose statements about loving art and being joyful in community, but I have an uncomfortable truth to share with you: I haven\u2019t always <em>felt</em> like how I\u2019m now describing myself. \ud83d\ude2d</p>\n\n<p>At times I have suffered from a syndrome\u2014not Imposter Syndrome, that\u2019s an affliction I don\u2019t usually suffer from (make of that what you will!)\u2014which I call <strong>Lone Wolf</strong> syndrome. When I\u2019m in the throes of Lone Wolf syndrome, I somehow think there\u2019s nobody around to support me, or that apparently there\u2019s nothing valuable I have to offer. \u201cThey\u201d don\u2019t \u201cget me\u201d and that must be why I\u2019m not successful. I don\u2019t know how to collaborate with anybody in a meaningful way. I must be destined just to make art in a vacuum, experienced by an audience of virtually no one as I sink into an ever-darkening void. \ud83d\ude35\u200d\ud83d\udcab</p>\n\n<p>Yeah yeah I know! That pity party better be over soon and enough with the <em>stinkin\u2019 thinkin\u2019</em>. But perhaps we all go through those sad times when the Lone Wolf has taken hold in our psyche and we can\u2019t seem to shake the bastard.</p>\n\n<p>Finding (or starting!) artistic communities where you feel like you can really fit in is <em>hard</em> sometimes. And maybe for you, right now, it\u2019s <em>been</em> hard for much longer that you ever thought possible.</p>\n\n<p><strong>Time to give up, throw in the towel, call it a day! Stick a fork in it, you\u2019re done!</strong> \ud83e\udd69</p>\n\n<p>Just kidding. \ud83d\ude02 Sometimes it helps to name your worst fears and embrace them for a split second before you realize they are silly and unhelpful.</p>\n\n<p>The best way that I\u2019ve found to fight Lone Wolf syndrome is to declare it is <em>unacceptable</em> for you to live in that state. Because it is unacceptable, you will of course need to make some changes in your life in order to <strong>get the results you deserve</strong>. But that\u2019s a topic for another day\u2026</p>\n\n<p>I will share <em>one</em> potential remedy however, as it dovetails with the theme of this essay.</p>\n\n<h3>How can you share the love? \ud83d\udc9e</h3>\n\n<p>Instead of the \u201cnobody loves my art, I\u2019m all alone\u201d pity party, the inverse question you can start to ask yourself is \u201chow might I share the love of my art with others?\u201d And don\u2019t mean the love of your own art per se, I mean the love of the art form(s) you work in.</p>\n\n<ul><li>Maybe you can write more about the techniques you like to use.</li>\n <li>Maybe you can make a video about your greatest creative inspirations.</li>\n <li>Maybe you can join a fanclub dedicated to other artists who are in the same overall genre as you.</li>\n <li>Maybe you can start a meetup group where people work on their art or the ideas for their art.</li>\n <li>Maybe you can launch a review blog where you highlight other artists\u2019 work.</li>\n <li>Maybe you can work up the courage to reach out to that \u201cfamous\u201d artist who makes you feel weak in the knees and see if they\u2019re actually just a regular person who would love to offer you a collaborative opportunity or at the very least a word of wisdom.</li>\n</ul><p>And all of this is 2X, 3X, maybe even 10X as vitally import in the \u201cAge of AI (Slop)\u201d when real art and artists feel more devalued and unappreciated than ever. The best way to fight slop? It\u2019s to <em>love</em>. The Beatles were right after all: all you (we) need is love, and love is all we need.</p>\n\n<p><strong>Love art. Love your art. Love their art. Love artists. Love the messy, difficult, fun, rewarding, challenging, frustrating, liberating process of making art while being human.</strong> \ud83e\udde0</p>\n\n<p>And at the risk of sounding totally hippie-dippie, your love of art, and your love of the love of art, <em>can spark the change you wish to see in the world.</em> \ud83c\udf38\u270c\ufe0f\ud83e\udd70</p>\n\n<p><br /></p>\n\n<p><em>Photo credit: <a href=\"https://pixabay.com/photos/music-hip-hop-night-concer-singer-7974197/\">L\u01b0\u01a1ng \u0110\u1ea1t Nguy\u1ec5n on Pixabay</a></em></p>\n\n\n\n <br /><p>\n \n <a href=\"https://jaredwhite.com/tag/creativity\">#creativity</a>\n \n </p>",
"text": "Learning to embrace the rewarding messiness of making art while human.\n\nFor all of my life, I have loved art. All of the creative arts. When I was a young boy wandering the corridors of the local mall with my parents, I was briefly interviewed regarding the latest \u201cG.I. Joe\u201d action figures at which point I proudly informed the pollster I wasn\u2019t \u201cinto\u201d that sort of thing. I was an artist. \ud83d\ude06\n\nThere aren\u2019t very many art forms I haven\u2019t at least dabbled in. Even the ones you might not think of at first, like building a garden feature out of stone (at the direction of my mother who was the real green thumb) or live painting to a musical performance in a house of worship.\n\nThat\u2019s not to say I personally love all creative arts equally. There are certain ones I gravitate to, same as any artist. For a long time, I thought music was my primary talent. But I\u2019ve cycled through a plethora of others over the months and years and decades. To be honest, if there\u2019s been any one constant, it\u2019s writing. I fear I\u2019ve never taken it as seriously as I should.\n\nOh, and let\u2019s not forget: programming.\n\nI\u2019ve been writing computer code since I remember being a conscious human being. I learned how to program little graphical sprites and make them move around the screen of the family\u2019s Commodore 128 when using our KoalaPad. Before that of course, I wrote the quintessential BASIC program:\n\n10 PRINT \"HELLO WORLD!\"\n20 GOTO 10\n\n\nand giggled gleefully as the computer acted silly and printed out the same sentence over and over again until I made it stop.\n\nBut you know what? You know what I love just as much as art??\n\nSharing my love of art with others \ud83e\udd70\n\nPerhaps growing up right as the Age of the Personal Computer dawned\u2014and the Internet in short order\u2014made it seem completely obvious to me I could, and should, share my love for art with others. Try as I might, I can\u2019t remember a time when I haven\u2019t been a total nerd reveling in my enjoyment of one art form or another in spaces both online and off, and there\u2019s rarely been a moment of my teenage or adult life when I haven\u2019t been discussing or debating or teaching or learning the minutiae of some kind of art along with others.\n\nPerhaps nothing exemplifies my appreciation of love for art more than the first thing I did when I got on the World-Wide Web in 1994 and discovered you could, like, just write web pages. You could just write them?! ANYBODY CAN???!!\n\n(Hey, did you know you can STILL JUST WRITE THEM? Open your favorite plain text editor of choice, write some paragraphs, wrap them in a few HTML tags, and tada! \ud83c\udf89 You\u2019ve just created a web page! Eat a bag o\u2019 dicks, Mark Zuckerberg!)\n\nAnyway, the first thing I did was figure out how to create a website for the Celtic music family band I was in at the time, Distant Oaks. And the second thing I did was create my own blog. Yes, friends, I do believe I may have had one of the very first blogs in Internet history, first called Jared White\u2019s Internet Review and then just The Internet Review (and then iReview many years before Apple trotted that name out). It was great fun recently to pore over saved pages in the Internet Archive and revive The Internet Review as a retrotech-themed blog, where the first blog post is dated September 1996 (published when I was only 13 years old!).\n\nBecause, you see, I couldn\u2019t simply \u201clove the Internet\u201d and then stop there. I had to share my love for the Internet with everyone else because that\u2019s what you do when you\u2019re a nerdy kid with a new network connection.\n\nI\u2019m still that nerdy kid at heart! And I\u2019ve never stopped sharing!\n\nI\u2019ve never been \u201cjust a musician\u201d, I\u2019ve also taught music (to kids! when still a kid!) and written reviews of music and run fan clubs of musicians.\n I\u2019ve never been \u201cjust a 3D graphics artist\u201d, I\u2019ve hosted online art galleries where I show off the work of other 3D artists.\n I\u2019ve never been \u201cjust a writer\u201d, I\u2019ve helped lead writing worships and host writing groups and I am currently writing this very article as a participant in a totally awesome Portland writing group run by a dear friend.\n I\u2019ve never been \u201cjust a programmer\u201d, I\u2019ve run multiple programming blogs and forums and open source projects and chatrooms and have taught programming workshops and I work among other things as a consultant where I educate on the topic of coding as much as I write code personally.\n And so on and so forth, etc., etc.\nYet somehow, this concept has become a target of, er, controversy? \u2639\ufe0f\n\nSo imagine my surprise when the \u201cAge of AI\u201d is suddenly upon us somehow for some reason, and I am told, repeatedly, by multiple parties on LinkedIn and elsewhere, that finally, finally, FINALLY the gatekeepers are gone, the stingy artists with their stuck-up ways no longer hold influence, and the people, the PEOPLE have been liberated at last. \ud83d\ude03 Now you can create music and 3D graphics art and writing and code and all sorts of things, and it\u2019s all thanks to the miracle that is AI. \u2728\n\n?\n\n????\n\n?????? ??? ? ??? ???\n\n???? ?\n\n?? ??? ??\n\n? ????? ?? ???\n\n??? ???? ?\n\nI don\u2019t get it.\n\nThankfully I don\u2019t have to, because it\u2019s utter bollocks and I already debunked it in an issue of Cycles Hyped No More. That\u2019s not what this essay is about!\n\nWhat I\u2019d much rather talk about is how vitally important it is that now, more than ever, we stand together in solidarity as artists. And I don\u2019t mean than in a highfalutin way, I mean literally anyone who likes to self-identify as a creative person. We need to band together to strengthen and form communities where artists young and old are supported\u2026whether they\u2019re just getting started or they\u2019ve been in the game for 50 years.\n\nWe must celebrate traditions and breaking from those traditions, and relish the truth that most great art comes from the inherent tension between the two.\n\nWe must advocate for safe spaces where slop is out and craft is in and people know they are welcome to participate as their authentic selves without the specter of extractive capitalist overlords dictating the terms of engagement.\n\nFighting the \u201cLone Wolf\u201d syndrome\n\nAll right. I\u2019ve been making all these grandiose statements about loving art and being joyful in community, but I have an uncomfortable truth to share with you: I haven\u2019t always felt like how I\u2019m now describing myself. \ud83d\ude2d\n\nAt times I have suffered from a syndrome\u2014not Imposter Syndrome, that\u2019s an affliction I don\u2019t usually suffer from (make of that what you will!)\u2014which I call Lone Wolf syndrome. When I\u2019m in the throes of Lone Wolf syndrome, I somehow think there\u2019s nobody around to support me, or that apparently there\u2019s nothing valuable I have to offer. \u201cThey\u201d don\u2019t \u201cget me\u201d and that must be why I\u2019m not successful. I don\u2019t know how to collaborate with anybody in a meaningful way. I must be destined just to make art in a vacuum, experienced by an audience of virtually no one as I sink into an ever-darkening void. \ud83d\ude35\u200d\ud83d\udcab\n\nYeah yeah I know! That pity party better be over soon and enough with the stinkin\u2019 thinkin\u2019. But perhaps we all go through those sad times when the Lone Wolf has taken hold in our psyche and we can\u2019t seem to shake the bastard.\n\nFinding (or starting!) artistic communities where you feel like you can really fit in is hard sometimes. And maybe for you, right now, it\u2019s been hard for much longer that you ever thought possible.\n\nTime to give up, throw in the towel, call it a day! Stick a fork in it, you\u2019re done! \ud83e\udd69\n\nJust kidding. \ud83d\ude02 Sometimes it helps to name your worst fears and embrace them for a split second before you realize they are silly and unhelpful.\n\nThe best way that I\u2019ve found to fight Lone Wolf syndrome is to declare it is unacceptable for you to live in that state. Because it is unacceptable, you will of course need to make some changes in your life in order to get the results you deserve. But that\u2019s a topic for another day\u2026\n\nI will share one potential remedy however, as it dovetails with the theme of this essay.\n\nHow can you share the love? \ud83d\udc9e\n\nInstead of the \u201cnobody loves my art, I\u2019m all alone\u201d pity party, the inverse question you can start to ask yourself is \u201chow might I share the love of my art with others?\u201d And don\u2019t mean the love of your own art per se, I mean the love of the art form(s) you work in.\n\nMaybe you can write more about the techniques you like to use.\n Maybe you can make a video about your greatest creative inspirations.\n Maybe you can join a fanclub dedicated to other artists who are in the same overall genre as you.\n Maybe you can start a meetup group where people work on their art or the ideas for their art.\n Maybe you can launch a review blog where you highlight other artists\u2019 work.\n Maybe you can work up the courage to reach out to that \u201cfamous\u201d artist who makes you feel weak in the knees and see if they\u2019re actually just a regular person who would love to offer you a collaborative opportunity or at the very least a word of wisdom.\nAnd all of this is 2X, 3X, maybe even 10X as vitally import in the \u201cAge of AI (Slop)\u201d when real art and artists feel more devalued and unappreciated than ever. The best way to fight slop? It\u2019s to love. The Beatles were right after all: all you (we) need is love, and love is all we need.\n\nLove art. Love your art. Love their art. Love artists. Love the messy, difficult, fun, rewarding, challenging, frustrating, liberating process of making art while being human. \ud83e\udde0\n\nAnd at the risk of sounding totally hippie-dippie, your love of art, and your love of the love of art, can spark the change you wish to see in the world. \ud83c\udf38\u270c\ufe0f\ud83e\udd70\n\n\n\n\nPhoto credit: L\u01b0\u01a1ng \u0110\u1ea1t Nguy\u1ec5n on Pixabay\n\n\n\n \n\n \n #creativity"
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"name": "Sharing the Love of the Love of Art",
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📗 Want to read The Handheld Club by Rodrigo Copetti ISBN: 9798233612978
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"published": "2026-02-09T17:17:07-0500",
"summary": "\ud83d\udcd7 Want to read The Handheld Club by Rodrigo Copetti ISBN: 9798233612978",
"url": "https://martymcgui.re/2026/02/09/171707/",
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"author": {
"type": "card",
"name": "Marty McGuire",
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This week's Lego build progress
{
"type": "entry",
"published": "2026-02-08T11:24:21-08:00",
"url": "https://aaronparecki.com/2026/02/08/6/",
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"lego"
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"content": {
"text": "This week's Lego build progress"
},
"author": {
"type": "card",
"name": "Aaron Parecki",
"url": "https://aaronparecki.com/",
"photo": "https://aperture-media.p3k.io/aaronparecki.com/41061f9de825966faa22e9c42830e1d4a614a321213b4575b9488aa93f89817a.jpg"
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