And the winner for best split ergo board is...

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Hi *|FNAME|*,

This month, we bid a bittersweet farewell to the Planck EZ. In case you missed the post, it's linked below. It's definitely a learning experience for me, as a small business owner.

In response to my original announcement about the Planck EZ going away, we got a whole bunch of people professing their love for compact keyboards and wondering if we'll ever make another. To which I can say — we love small keyboards too, and… stay tuned. :)

In other news, this month's ZSA Loves post is about… Soap. The homemade kind, specifically, but not what you see at the farmer's market.

Oh, and one last thing: The Moonlander won "Best ergonomic split mechanical keyboard" from CNN. This wasn't sponsored or anything, I didn't know about it until they published. Feel free to share with friends. Fun times! :)

As always, thank you for reading, and email me anytime – just reply to this email, or ping me at ez@zsa.io.

All the best,
Erez

Goodbye, Planck EZ

What's next? 🍿

It was heartwarming to see the outpouring of support from everyone writing to share what a difference the Planck EZ made for them. Thank you! It means a lot. Here's the announcement post again in case you missed it.

Featured User Interview

Andrew Thompson

Tech Lead/Cloud Architect

Can you wear a Moonlander? How about using the Moonlander while you're in a hammock? Andrew has asked, and answered, both questions. With pictures.

"Along the way I’ve also worked as a video rental clerk, construction GM, Army officer and laser-tag ref, albeit not necessarily in that order. [...] I’ve been working at BMW since 2019, where I currently help our EVs charge smarter!"

Layout of the month: Chorded Layers

Hello! This layout has two main goals and one minor goal:

1. Reuse existing muscle memory from the full-size keyboard as much as possible
   2. Minimize the amount of travel your hands need to do
   3. Minimize reaching/stretching (e.g. avoid the top row for most things)
   
   I wanted to maximize my productivity gains from the Moonlander, without having to re-learn everything. I've been using this or similar layouts (for the Ergodox) for years. I've used it as a a dev, a manager, a writer, and a gamer, on both Mac and Windows. This is a general-purpose layout, though with a developer bias.

Things we liked

Visual Phenomena & Optical Illusions →

150 of them, with explanations

So many trippy optical illusions. These are interactive, and come with sliders so you can play around with what makes the illusion work. Each has a deep explanation. Web-based, works best on a computer or tablet (semi-usable on a phone).

Molecule of The Month Club →

Running since January 1996

Partly presented in glorious Comic Sans MS, this in-depth and long-running site makes chemistry accessible to the rest of us. I had no idea Nostrodamus was the one who first mentioned benzoic acid (a common food additive known today as E210). The write-ups don’t use much jargon and are interesting for kids as well.

Velja →

macOS Browser Picker

A powerful and free tool for macOS. This lets you pick a browser for a given link, but does much more: Figma links now open in Figma, and it can automatically strip tracking parameters from URLs you copy. So handy!

Cloth Simulation →

A cat toy for humans

It is a piece of cloth, a ball, and some wind. In your browser. You get to move the ball and control the wind to make the cloth wave around. So satisfying. I’m not going to tell you how long I spent “evaluating” this link.

Aeropress Dice →

but for your phone

This one’s for the coffee nerds and Aeropress users (high five!). It’s an open-source, browser-based, random brew recipe generator. Play with water volume, temperature, coffee weight, and more.

Tip: We have a subscriber-only link archive with all of the links we shared over the years. Just for you. ❤️

Wallpaper of the month

Taken by ZSA user Cosimo Streppone, whom we interviewed a while back. So gorgeous! You should also check out Cosimo's interview for his racing sim setup.

Thank you for reading!