Friday links for May 8th 2026

It’s Friday, another link day:

1. Chrome silently installs a 4 GB local LLM on your computer

Chrome installs a 4GB AI model in the background, because consuming all your RAM wasn’t enough I suppose. There are many reasons to avoid Chrome, this is just an extra one. If you like the way Chrome works, install Helium instead, it’s the same but without the uninvited guests.

2. Woman covertly filmed for 'humiliating' social media content - then told to pay

Extortion via smart glasses is a thing now. A woman in London was covertly filmed by a man wearing them, who then requested payment to remove the video from social media. At this rate, every Black Mirror episode will have become reality by Christmas.

3. All my clients wanted a carousel, now it's an AI chatbot!

Very relatable. And before that, every company wanted a blog that they never updated. Request the shiny new thing, lose interest, repeat.

4. Architypes

Anthony Nelzin‑Santos takes photographs of old French shop signage from the days before digital printing and laser cut typography. There’s warmth to those old imperfections compared to the sterile led-lit signs of today.

Talk to you Monday,
Colin