JUL.26.2025 - #34

Hi all 👋, a few updates on previous features—Record Club (#11) is now out of TestFlight and available for everyone (for those who were interested but didn't want to install a beta), and the Font Awesome (#28) icon set Version 7 has released!!

This week I've been trying to keep up with the nerd news coming out of SDCC this weekend, watching Guillermo del Toro be presented with a key to the city of Toronto, and reading in-excess about Game Boy cartridges.

In keeb-related news, the Osume's Nemui board (#04) is back in stock with a brand-new colour, and BeaverKeys (one of my fave Canadian vendors) and Keychron both have a solid selection of deals ongoing right now.

Let's begin!

clicks 🔗

Local AI in your favourite browser

→ NativeMind is a browser extension that ticks all my boxes for AI—local, private, and transparent. If you've been itching to try out the rising trend of agentic browsers like Comet or Dia but want a better solution regarding privacy, the environment, and hesitance switching to an unknown product, this is a great alternative. Using your browser of choice (supports Firefox and Chromium right now) this extension allows you to interact with your tabs with AI, powered by Ollama. I am using it in Zen (yes I’m flip-flopping back and forth between many browsers right now) and it’s working splendidly. It's obviously a little slower at thinking/results, but is a fantastic option that even includes features like web-searches for query sourcing. NativeMind doesn’t have all the bells and whistles that other options have (can't interact with on-screen content, fill out forms, etc.) but is fantastic for basic tasks—searching, summarizations, and translations. Depending on your system you may need more power to run this (systems with more RAM and dedicated graphics card will perform better), I have a M1 MacBook and it's performing flawlessly with qwen3:4b installed.

Rising from Pocket's ashes

→ Not long ago, Mozilla announced its popular read-it-later app, Pocket, would be shutting down. Never fear, Pocket's previous VP of Product Nick Chapman is here to save the day with Folio! Folio is a modern alternative to its now inactive predecessor, with a similar interface and a revamped feature set. Launching as soon as Pocket officially shuttered, the idea was to make it super easy to import your Pocket data into Folio, bringing along all your saves, tags, and reading highlights. Adding to the ease-of-use are its simple Android and iOS apps, desktop browser extension, and a web-app to access saves anywhere. I personally was never a fan of Pocket after Mozilla acquired it back in 2017, but Folio, the dedicated team behind it, and bringing the app back to simplicity makes this a hopeful choice for me.

Making a splash

→ Uno is my favourite card game to play with family/friends—it's quick, easy, and everyone has their own rule-variations (if you're not arguing about the minutia of the rules are you really playing at all?). This SPLASH version of the classic game is a recent purchase of mine that will hopefully get its use on an upcoming end-of-summer cruise trip I'm embarking on. These cards are durable, waterproof, semi-translucent, float on the surface of water, and have a plastic karabiner so all those cards won't go flying away in a beach-bag or carry-on. I'm thinking these will be a perfect companion for in-pool or beach-side activities.

clacks ⌨️

Modular magic

→ This first clack is an interesting modular keyboard concept brought to life by TMICE with their X mechanical keyboard. It's a fully aluminum, hot-swappable switch, wired keyboard with custom connectors along each edge of the keyboard for a plethora of different attachments. These add-ons include a numpad, a row of FN keys, docking station, knob, and macro pad. The docking station—adding USB ports and pass-through charging—and the macro pad are the most interesting items as these are usually completely separate products and integrating them into the aesthetics/workflow of the keyboard seems intuitive. I was pleasantly surprised by the build quality of this board and even the typing test sounded not too shabby. The biggest drawback for me is every modular piece being a separate cost, which adds up to be pricey—I would have liked to see at least one or two of the more basic modules included in the base price.

For all time. Always.

→ Inspired by the MCU's retro-futuristic, time-travelling, chrono-enforcement organization, the Time Variance Authority (or TVA for short)—this keycap set jumps straight out of the sacred timeline right onto your desk. Designed by York Chan, these capture the essence and aesthetic of the outside-of-time-dwelling bureaucratic establishment from Marvel's Loki TV show (which I loved, and maintain that Season 2 is slept on/not talked about enough). The orange and grey match perfectly together with their pixel-fonts and artwork on the novelty keys, along with some striking semi-transparent extra modifier keys. For myself, I would classify these under the “really want it but don't have a board I can use them on yet and I can't justify buying every awesome set I see but dang they look so cool” category. You can check them out from retailer UniKeys who I linked above, or directly from manufacturer KeyKobo themselves.

Paper-thin premium board

→ The mikecinq keyboard by Mike Hölscher is an impossibly thin low-profile board made with Kailh PG1316S switches (last seen on another amazing keeb build in Issue #14). At only 5mm at its thickest (3mm near the front of the slanted-design case), the mikecinq is a slender keeb that also rocks a fancy all-aluminum body, giving it a weighty, premium feel. As I mentioned, this build includes the PG1316S switches, which I am finding across more and more builds recently and it's interesting to dive deep into this fascinatingly-unique switch—more info on the switch and Mike's personal modifications here.

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!!