Strangers on a Bench

Hi |FNAME|,

One of the most beautiful, pure and affecting things I've heard all year is this podcast called Strangers on a Bench. The host, Tom, sits down at a bench by a random stranger every time. He asks if they'd be willing to be on his podcast — and then they start chatting. Names are not exchanged, nor is any other identifying information. Tom doesn't run through a list of prepared questions; he's got a knack for listening and for asking the right questions. Conversations turn deep within just a few sentences.

The episodes regularly bring me to tears. Not because they're sad, but because they are real. It's such an powerful reminder of how much of an inner world every person around us has. We all have this depth of humanity within us, with dreams and traumas and everyday joys. I don't normally do podcast recommendations on The Ergo (this might be my first), but Strangers on a Bench is worth a listen (and if you listen to it, tell me what your favorite episode was).

In more ZSA-related news, below you can find a guide written by Robin all about your first month with a new ZSA keyboard. While we have Getting Started guides, this post covers a longer period of time and helps set expectations. Finally, this month I wrote a love letter about my favorite classic card game which also includes some app recommendations.

And with that we come to the close of the last newsletter for the year. We get to see another year! I'm quite excited for what I'll get to share with you in 2025. Thank you to everyone who supported us and said nice things about us in 2024 — that is literally what keeps us going, since we don't advertise (see our new why trust us page for more on this). And a double thank-you to everyone who takes the time to reply to the newsletter or just email me randomly with nice things. :) Happy holidays!

All the best,
Erez

“In terms of the build quality, customization experience, this is usually the best of any of the keyboards that I’ve used.”

- David Demaree, Moonlander User

Your first month with a ZSA Keyboard

A practice routine

Using a ZSA keyboard is a joy; you get into a flow state and the keyboard disappears. It just works the way it "should" because that's how you set it up for your own use. Getting there, though, takes a bit of work. This post is all about the initial learning curve and what you can expect, with suggestions for activities you can do in each milestone (Day 1, week 1, weeks 2-4, and the months and years to follow).

Featured User Interview

Ming Thien

Co-founder, Horologer MING

How does the co-founder of one of Asia's very few high-end watch brands use his Moonlander and Voyager? He bends them to his will, designing things like CNC aluminum keycaps for the Voyager as well as a "unibody" foundation to keep both halves at the angle and distances that are perfect for him.

"I’m a product designer and unashamed about my preferences for tactility and haptics. It’s one of the reasons I landed up with the current keycaps."

Layout of the month

Programmer Dvorak

Explore this custom layout, optimized for developers. Based on Programmer Dvorak developed by Roland Kaufmann, it enhances coding efficiency with two key features: Auto-Shift for Letters and Hold Action on Symbols. It is designed to transform your coding experience, making it more intuitive and efficient.

Things we liked

Pascal Getreuer's QMK keymap →

Who knew a keyboard could do so much?

This is a wonderful study of how far you can take the Voyager and the Moonlander when you’re comfortable working directly in code. I’m a big fan of Pascal’s work, and his personal layout puts it all in context. If you’re considering going beyond what Oryx can do, this repo is worth checking out.

ROVR →

Human DJs playing real music for free

This is ad-free Internet radio curated by talented DJs. As I write these lines, I’m listening to the Weather Report by Ken Fan, which features a “top-drawer selection of fuzzy beats to carry you into the night”. So good. There’s an app, too.

Books We Love →

Curated recommendations from NPR

Over 4,000 book recommendations from NPR, neatly arranged. It seems to cover only books published recently (earliest publication year is 2013), but you can browse by year and filter the list by many useful tags. An excellent source for non-algorithmic recommendations, worth checking out even just for the beautifully presented book covers.

TOS About →

This site is a massive compendium of the terms of service of many different companies and software products, each analyzed with the highlights broken down into human-readable language, and then ranked.

World Food Atlas →

Ever had Menemen?

This Web-based tool starts out as a big map of the world, with pictures of food. You can zoom in on different regions and countries and see more of the dishes associated with those places. That’s cool in itself— but then you can click a dish, and get into a whole page all about it! Turns out Menemen comes from Turkey and has tomatoes, eggs, and peppers. You use bread as the “utensil” to eat it. Now I want some.