Reading list

• Now, this is a proper dive into one of the most advanced hack produced the past years, namely how the NSO hacked users by using zero click iMessage exploit. In this lengthy article, the authors show how they used a bug in the software that usually decodes GIFs. Hence they provides a mini system architecture wrapped in a GIF file that produced its own coding language.

Design of the week

• Achifolio presents a cool and useful library tool for the Royal College of Architecture students in London, which is available to anyone visiting the library. Just choose the relevant articles from the archive library and click to generate a customised reading list. This little gem of a tool was coded with nodeJS and C, developed by Kristian Johansen.
• To all designers out there! WCAG 3 is developing a new colour contrasting method that will solve problems with colour contrasts. This thread explains how this new method will take its starting point in how the eyes experience colours, taking into account the foreground and background, something which it does not do today.
• Have you ever wondered how AI-generated Pokémons might look like? Well, here's a thread with the answer. Warning: it might be a little harder to "Catch'em all!"

Tech of the week

• Versel is investing in tooling now and newly acquired Turborepo, a Monorepo which gives visibility of a company's entire toolbase. Many large companies such as Google use Monorepos to store all their code in a single monolithic repository. This could be highly relevant for some of our ongoing projects, and we look forward to exploring the consequences of this acquisition further.
• This OpenAI API makes it easier to generate and produce texts, whether needing help with copywriting, summarising or translation.
• Framer has introduced a Motion 3D animation library, which makes it simple to work with animation in your browser.

And now, a Web3 special to finish the year with a touch of the hottest and trendiest topic of 2021:

• ThirdWeb introduced a way of easily building web3 apps.
• An article about how Web3 can grow.
• Kickstarter will link crowdfunding to a new protocol, Celo, a carbon negative, public blockchain and open source.
• Check out how Shopify has started to sell NFTs.
• Coinbase, the crypto wallet, is looking into how they could be more relevant in discussions around the Metaverse.

That's all we had this week! Have a nice further dive into December, and don't hesitate to contact us should you want to make us aware of anything that you may find interesting.