Typing Mind, Storytelling, and RW
A Better UI for Chat GPT, A Masterclass on Writing and Storytelling, A Film With Incredible Cinematography, and Thoughts on Reader, Readwise, and Bear
Hey guys! Let’s jump into a few things I want to share with you from my previous week:
On Chat GPT
Up until now there’s been a LOT of Chat GPT apps coming out, I’ve tried several of them and I’ve mentioned some in previous newsletters. For many, the official Chat GPT App or the web interface is more than enough. For me, though, one of the use-cases I have for Chat GPT has to do with brainstorming for fiction writing. In this very specific case, the website or official app seem to be extremely sensitive and often censor things that do not sound ‘happy’ or ‘positive.’ There’s several ways to get around it. A popular method is using jailbreak prompts, but by far the easiest way I’ve found to have a bit more freedom and less censoring—as long as you are not too extreme in the content—is by using your Chat GPT API token outside of the official app or web interface. A great way to do this is with Shortcuts, but for an actual experience similar to the official app where you can have multiple chats side-by-side there’s not a lot of options. For over month I had been using ChatAi Unlimited, and to be honest it has been mostly great, except for one thing: lack of sync between devices.
This week I discovered Typing Mind and it has exactly what I needed. It’s a web app for Chat GPT where you can use your own API token and it has a lot of useful features—you can have a library of characters and prompts, upload documents, specify GPT models, their settings and context limits, and more—but what mattered the most to me was the ability to hold multiple conversations, be able to search through them, and have them synced between devices. An important thing for me was also finding something that was not a subscription. This web app seems almost too good to be true, it has everything I was looking for, and it is getting with constant updates.
On Learning
This week I started watching Salman Rushdie Masterclass on storytelling and writing. I am enjoying his very personal approach to teaching. Up until now what has made this class stand out from the others I’ve already watched is his approach to creating compelling characters.
I watched this street photography walk with Siegfried Hansen. I always enjoy watching street photographers in action and this one had some very practical tips. Some of the work of Siegfried is that kind of street photos that is too smart and always makes me think ‘I wish I had their patience.’
I watched this masterclass with film director Michel Franco. It’s in Spanish with French subtitles. Michel Franco is a very interesting figure in the cinema of Mexico and I love his work. If you don’t understand the masterclass because of the language I’d still encourage you to go ahead and watch any of his films—After Lucía is a great introduction.
On Reader, Readwise, and Bear
I’ve made some big changes in how I use Readwise this year. It all started when I tried to figure out the best way to handle the things I consume in Reader and came up with some ideas on how to tag specific highlights. My workflow is still a work in progress, but I’ll try to share some more whenever I get a chance. Basically, I now do most of my progressive summarization inside Readwise itself, on a per-highlight basis. Did you know you can use markdown to format your highlight content in their web app? Along with reviewing my highlights every day I also interact with them—by tagging, making phrases in bold, underlining & writing personal notes—this method has been much better than just trying to keep everything organized in Bear and barely ever touching it.
A few days ago someone on YT asked me a couple of questions that I thought would be great to share here, as an introduction of how I think of these amazing learning tools.
How do you use Readwise? I simply add articles/videos in corresponding areas in Things. Why Readwise is better?
I think you may be mistaking Reader and Readwise, two products from the same company. Reader is their app for managing content to consume/read/watch. In that sense yes, Reader can help you plan or organize like Things 3 allows, but I’d say Reader is more like a Read-it-later app like Pocket or Instapaper. It has some extra functionality like managing RSS feeds, creating filters, highlighting, etc. But Readwise… I think there’s just nothing quite like it. It’s only useful for those that like to highlight or annotate. It is like a “highlights manager” that allows for your highlights to be tagged, searched, annotated, and resurfaced for review—among other things. At first I’d only use it to export highlights in Markdown format from articles I was highlighting online, but it’s been about a year that I do their daily highlight reviews and I think it’s an amazing tool for knowledge retention. It just integrates perfectly into my note-processing workflow.
Thank you! I’ll give it a try. Bear is not that good for highlighting as far as PARA is concerned (I guess). But don’t they duplicate each other in that sense, Bear and Readwise?
PARA is an organization method. I do have all my notes setup with that. I think it works great in Bear and their tagging organizational system. What I think Bear is not so good at is as a web clipper, or for bringing content in there for direct consumption. Reader is the ideal tool for that. Once you bring highlights or notes from content you consume into Bear, that’s also a great place to do progressive summarization, which involves more highlighting and maybe writing your own thoughts or reflection in the content. Bear is great for saving and organizing all your notes (with PARA), and Bear also is great for ‘creating’ content: writing articles, outlines, or connecting pieces of information or highlights you have in other notes. The problem is that a lot of what you do in Bear can get buried in the past after used. So here is where Readwise excels. It’s a tool to resurface highlights and bring them to you randomly (or not so randomly), day by day, for you to interact with them. So while Bear and Readwise are both good for organizing highlights, I think Bear is good for creating stuff with them and Readwise is best at making those highlights part of your everyday thinking process.
On Cinema
Athena (2022). An action-packed film that has some of the most amazing camera work I’ve seen in a long time. The story is simple, but the experience of watching this film was just something else. Synopsis: Hours after the tragic death of their youngest brother in unexplained circumstances, three siblings have their lives thrown into chaos. When the unexplained circumstances raise questions among them, they go in search of answers.
Robe of Gems (2023). I was waiting for this film for a long while. Natalia López, the director, is the wife of Carlos Reygadas and has edited several of his films. You can definitely find similarities in the cinema language. Watch if you like slow cinema. Synopsis: In rural Mexico, three women from different social classes become tragically involved with a missing person case tied to organized crime.
Reprise (2006). I loved this one, much more than The Worst Person in the World by the same director. Synopsis: Phillip (Anders Danielsen Lie) and Erik (Espen Klouman Høiner) have been best friends since childhood. Both young men share a passion for the works of reclusive novelist Sten Egil Dahl, and both harbor literary ambitions. However, fate deals differently with the friends as each strives to make his dream come true.
Castle of Purity (1973). I had heard that Dogtooth had been inspired by this Mexican film from the 70’s. I didn’t think twice when I saw it in the MUBI catalog, and it was quite a good surprise. Synopsis: Determined to protect his loved ones from the evils of the world, Gabriel keeps them locked up at home, where his wife Beatriz and their children help run the family business-making rat poison.
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