Hi all 👋, welcome back to clicks ’n clacks and Happy New Year! I hope everyone enjoyed the holidays, got some time to rest, and is looking forward to leaping right into 2025! (quarter-century—it’s a big one, huh)
Over the past two weeks, while on holiday and writing this issue, I’ve been binge-watching both Avatar: The Last Airbender & The Legend of Korra (very excited to read all the tie-in comics as well), configuring my iPhone home-screen to look “dumb”, claiming my daily free game on the Epic Games store, reading about the origin of the “Jingle Bells, Batman Smells” jingle (shoutout to Cassidy and her newsletter for leading me to this one), and signing up for the new social app Surf (by the folks who made Flipboard). With all that said and done, let’s jump right into the clicks of Issue #05!
clicks 🔗
→ First up this year is a pocket-sized, magnetic, and customizable gaming controller for any phone. This nifty little device was built by Josh over at M-Con Innovations, and the Kickstarter for this project was launched this past week on January 2nd. M-Con teamed up with ohsnap (who have launched many Kickstarters before, and are pretty reputable in the Mag-Safe/phone holder scene) to make this a reality, and I am very excited to see how this device competes with others in this space. I myself have a Backbone controller, but there are some irks that I have with it (namely the size, connector methods, and the phone case limitations). Hopefully, this new device will rectify those limitations and offer up some exciting features. I personally love the snap to open mechanism of the M-Con (it looks like something I would just fidget with all day), and the Hall effect joysticks (meaning no stick drift). It’s so nice to see someone’s personal project/dream come to life and have people really resonate and connect with it. That seems to be the case with Josh and the M-Con, and I’d really love for this project to succeed.
→ Next is a simple note-taking app currently in TestFlight beta—Rift Notes, by Jon Soini. This retro, sacred.computer inspired creation is the perfect vibe for what I am aiming for in 2025—fast, no-frills, minimalist, and built-to-last. I am really looking forward to trying this soon, as I have recently been (finally) completing my migration over to Obsidian from Craft docs. That means Markdown (.md) files (also what Rift uses), are my new go-to for 2025. Additionally, I am super into Jon’s other app, memcam, which looks like an intriguing new way to track, organize, and store images, voice notes, or reminders.
→ Last on this week's list of clicks is a small update for one of my favourite weather apps, (Not Boring) Weather. This app, built by Andy Allen, is part of a larger suite of applications (Timer, Habit Tracker, Calculator, etc.) meant to gamify the boring routines you complete with your phone—“Built like a game, runs like an app.” The update brings a Lego, sorry building blocks, not trying to get sued here, theme/skin to the entire interface of the app. Just like unwrapping a new toy on Christmas morning, this theme is meant to bring the joy, color, and nostalgia of these little bricks into the (not) boring task of checking the weather.
clacks ⌨️
→ This clack is an absolutely bonkers keyboard from Serene Industries. It’s a solid block of aluminum milled to shape, keycaps and all. Aptly named the Icebreaker, this thing definitely looks like it could do some damage to ice, rocks, wood, granite, your desk, me, you name it. Menacing looks aside, the initial sale of this keyboard sold out quickly and Serene Industries is holding another pre-order period until January 28th (if you are really itching to spend $1500 on a keyboard that could undoubtedly be mistaken as an axe). Thanks to alexotos and captain.sterling for posting about this crazy board so I could bask in its glory.
→ Here’s something a little more tame and reasonable than Mr. Icebreak(your desk and your wallet)er keyboard over there. This proof-of-concept writerDeck made by Justin Mitchell (creator of Cleft Notes) is a cozy little device to help you crank out those writing sessions and ideas, no matter where you are. Justin is building this to accompany another app-in-progress, Amber, which is an AI-assisted writing companion. I am super intrigued by the promises made by Amber (fyi I currently use Ulysses for all my creative writing), and this mini writerDeck is just the cherry on top.
→ The last clack this week is a set of beautiful keycaps called AP-1, AKA Aperture Priority. AP-1 was designed by Timothy Achumba at Akuko Labs, in collaboration with Keyreative Keycaps and Cannon Keys. This keycap set is modeled after analog cameras, manual photography settings (like ISO, shutter speed, aperture, etc.), and the Helios 44-2 lens. This is the second PBS profile keycap set to really catch my attention (the first being MVKB’s Classic)— I love the uniform profile of the keys and I can’t wait to try typing on them myself. If you’re interested, this set is going on sale January 6th on Cannon Keys’ website (in North America, they have a few worldwide distributors as well).
That’s all for this week! I hope you enjoyed it, and now it’s time to hear from YOU 🫵. I want to know your opinion—what you liked, what you loved, what you didn’t like, what you skipped. Reach out at mail.clicksnclacks.com (or reply to this email!) and have a great weekend!!
