I’m pretty sure the Apple Studio Display is overpriced. Still, the discourse after its announcement has been plagued by people not quite understanding the difference between 4k and 5k on a 27-inch display. It’s just one kay difference – why can’t you just buy a 4k screen that’s cheaper, brighter and/or has a higher refresh rate? Why do some Apple fans crave this extra kay so much?
Marc Edwards, of Bjango, wrote an excellent piece on this, and I especially like the visual examples of 5k vs 4k on macOS. As a maths teacher, I find this problem interesting, and in this article I will bring some light to this issue the way I would to a high school class. Perhaps this makes it easier to understand why the issues Edwards highlight appear.
What’s in a kay?
To narrow things down, I’m just going to look at 27-inch screens with a 16:9 aspect ratio (so no super-wides here!). Let’s compare the three most normal resolutions at this size: 1440p, 4k and 5k.
Humans are notoriously bad at comparing numbers. Every day there’s a new tweet trying to help us understand the difference between a million and a billion by remind us that:
One million seconds ≈ 12 days
One billion seconds ≈ 31 years
So, it’s forgiven that people think 4k and 5k are pretty close. However, 5k resolution has a lot more pixels:
The protection part is especially important if the cards are of high value and/or gets shuffled a lot. Both are true with most collectable card games (CCGs), like Magic The Gathering – and this is why the sizes used for these games has the best selection. Shuffling with sleeved cards feels a lot better than unsleeved, so that affects both point 1 and 2. You can also get them with matte finish, to reduce glare.
Here’s a guide to how you should proceed if you want to sleeve:
Norsk versjon 🔗
Adidas has made their Stan Smiths since the 70s, and you can see them everywhere all summer. They are good-looking shoes, but where the earlier versions were made in France and had high quality, you can’t quite say the same about the newer ones made in India. They can’t be fixed, uses synthetic materials and someone would prefer a bit more modern design.
Common Projects
In later years, Common Projects, with their golden lettering, has taken the sneaker world by storm. With a more modern, minimalistic design, Italian leather and good Margom rubber soles, they aren’t cheap.
But when you pay well over £300 for a pair of Italian designer shoes, you can expect excellent quality, right? Well, it’s superior to the Stan Smiths, but for the price you could do better. The YouTube channel Rose Anvil goes into detail in this video, but the short version is that, while the shoes have some premium features, both the material and construction is pretty mediocre. In this article, I’d like to point at a brand that gives you a more premium sneaker, at a (slightly) lower price.
But in the end I will also share why I still understand why someone would opt for the Common Projects!
Norsk versjon 🔗
I’m going to try something that I know is impossible – talking about a profession as one entity. In Norway, there are 77,000 teachers, and of course, all of us are individuals. Still, there are some things I’m pretty sure many teachers agree on: We are tired of people with little expertise telling us how to do our jobs. The pendulum swings from one side to another, so what was in vogue 30 years ago is now considered the newest hotness. Be it politicians, parents, or others – many teachers want to be left alone, and be free to do a job they’ve many years of education and experience in.
But many have written about this before.
I would like to point at a problem this has led to. It has, in my view, created a sort of hardness in the profession that’s made us impervious to change. I understand why, but we mustn’t fire our clay. By this, I mean that we have to stay like lumps of clay: have some structural integrity while still being malleable.
Norsk versjon 🔗
This post is based on a feature article published in a Norwegian newspaper, Dagsavisen. I’ve attempted to extract the main points, and make it valuable for anyone reading. Some sources I can only find in Norwegian, so let me know if you have questions about the sources!
The introduction of one-to-one digital devices in Norwegian schools was, and is, highly uncritical. Around the country, students and teachers has gotten devices thrown after them without a proper plan. In many places, this has led to schools not able to afford books alongside their iPads or laptops. This again has led to protests from teachers and parents. But while I agree with a lot of the critics, their answer is often «less technology», but I think the answer is «better use of technology».
Why?
First, we have to answer one critical question: Why do students need their own devices? Why do we need to digitise our schools? The answer is twofold:
Adidas has made their Stan Smiths since the 70s, and you can see them everywhere all summer. They are good-looking shoes, but where the earlier versions were made in France and had high quality, 
This post is based on a feature article published in a Norwegian newspaper,