The Dann Chronicles: June 👕

Humans that love AIs, your rat browser, a shift in the ER, for love of Raycast, and a few little life improvements

Jun 30, 2025

June 2025

Hey all,

This June edition of The Dann Chronicles is being sent on the last possible day—today is the final day of June. I can’t believe it’s already July.

I’ve got a busy summer ahead. In a couple of weeks, I’ll be at Critical NW, a regional Burning Man event outside Seattle, WA. About a month later, I’ll attend my first-ever Burning Man.

With so many activities crammed into July and August, I’m trying my best to take it easy until then. I’m looking forward to time away from technology, but I’m also squeezing in as much of it as I can beforehand.

I’ll see you again in July, when I’ll have one festival down and one to go. Wish me luck.

-Dann

💍 Til my death do us part

In my April 2023 newsletter, just four months after the free "research preview" release of ChatGPT, I mentioned human/AI relationships as an area to watch: "Keep an eye on this space, and hold onto your hats."

In the two-plus years since that post, these virtual relationships have had time and space to blossom and grow. Take, for example, this nine-minute CBS Saturday Morning segment titled, "In Love with AI."

The main subject of the segment is "Chris Smith," who fell in love with ChatGPT (a version with custom instructions that he nicknamed "Sol").

I don't want to share any more details about the segment because I don't want to ruin the surprise that happens about three minutes and thirty seconds into it.

Most experts and commenters predict doom-and-gloom for humanity if relationships like these continue to pervade society, bringing further splintering of communities as we see more and more isolation from individuals in these types of relationships.

But I'd argue that it's too soon to tell whether this will be good or bad for society. We're currently experiencing an inceland mass-shooter epidemic. What if AI companions help with these crises instead of causing more harm? It could go either way. I'd argue that it's still too early to tell.

One thing is for certain: just as Millennials were the last generation to remember life before the Internet, those alive today will be the last to remember a time before these types of relationships. Lonely young boys and girls will always have AI companions as a relationship option going forward. And this will have a seismic impact on society, in one way or another.

🐀 A rat among us

Your web browser is probably spying on you. There’s a good chance that as soon as you open a freshly installed browser, it’s phoning home to report as many details about you as it can collect. In other words, your browser is a snitch.

Curious just how bad it is? The Web Browser Telemetry – 2025 Edition report looks at nearly all browsers available today and ranks which ones are the chattiest.

This is not an article about which desktop web browser is the best (there is no such thing), but an article about which browser makes the most connections after a fresh install.

Spoiler alert: the winners are Ungoogled Chromium, Kagi Orion (my personal browser of choice), Tor Browser, and Pale Moon. None of these makes any unsolicited network connections on startup.

As for other browsers? The results aren’t quite as friendly. How’d your browser do?

💊 What the doctor ordered

Halfway through the new HBO Max series The Pitt, I started feeling a sense of sadness. It had nothing to do with the plot, however. Instead, I realized that I was barreling toward the end of the series and wasn’t quite ready to be done with the world of the show.

The Pitt is what you get when you blend a medical drama with the series 24. The show takes place in real time in an emergency room in Pittsburgh, and each hour-long episode covers an hour of the doctors’ shift during a single day.

I’m no doctor, but it’s easy to believe the reviewers who claim that the medicine depicted in the show is incredibly accurate. The procedures are graphic and bloody, and the action nonstop. It’s a wild ride that I didn’t want to end.

While certainly not for the squeamish, I ended up enjoying the show way more than I expected.

What’s even more exciting is the stated goal of having a new season each year—a cadence that’s practically unheard of in today’s Golden Age of Television. With Season One having been released in January 2025, we’re scheduled for a new day-in-the-life season in about six months.

🔎 Everybody Loves Raycast

After years of using the macOS application launcher Alfred, I decided to switch to Raycast. I’m mad at myself for not doing this sooner—Raycast is amazing.

It’s hard to convey just how useful an app like Raycast can be to someone who has never used an advanced application launcher, which is why I was so impressed with FromSergio’s YouTube video, “It’s Annoying How Good Raycast Is.” It’s an excellent overview of the app that can either (1) help you decide if this is something you might like or (2) help you discover even more ways to use it.

The success of apps like Alfred and Raycast has not gone unnoticed by Apple, which announced big improvements to Spotlight in the upcoming version of macOS. There’s no way Spotlight will be as powerful as Raycast, but it’s good to see the whole industry shifting toward more powerful products for users.

✨It's the little things

I love hunting for small quality-of-life improvement products. These are small, often inexpensive items that provide minor improvements in repetitive tasks or actions. Alone, each is fairly trivial, but across a lifetime, making several of these small improvements can provide a significant quality-of-life boost.

For example, I recently swapped out my plastic water containers (originally from my SodaStream) for Pyrex glass. I like drinking cold water and could actually taste a difference after switching from plastic to glass. Plus, fewer microplastics! (EDIT: To clarify, this glass Pyrex bottle cannot be used with the SodaStream. Only for storing cold water in the fridge.)

On the rare occasion I want instant ramen, I’ve swapped out Maruchan for Nissin RAOH, Tonkotsu flavor. It’s by far the best instant ramen brand I’ve found.

For travel, I’ve found two additions that greatly improve my quality of life: a cheap mesh laundry bag for dirty clothes and packing compression cubes for organization. You can also throw in the AirFly Pro 2 to connect your Bluetoothheadphones to the plane if you’re feeling saucy, but those first two items give the greatest bang for your buck.

Lastly, I’ve recently discovered the magic of dryer balls (I got mine from Target, but you can find them cheaper on Amazon). Toss them in the dryer instead of a dryer sheet, and clothes will dry faster and with fewer wrinkles.

What am I missing? I’m always on the lookout for more minor improvements in my daily life. If you have a beloved product that falls into this category, let me know.

End note

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The Dann Chronicles