Hi, this is Allison Sheridan of the NosillaCast Apple Podcast, hosted at Podfeet.com, a technology geek podcast with an EVER so slight Apple bias. Today is Tuesday, October 13, 2026, and this is show number 1119.
Yeah, I know it’s only been two days since the last show but I can’t leave you without an episode when we head off to Texas for the weekend to play with our grandkids. This does mean there will be NO LIVE SHOW on Sunday, 18 October.
This is one of those weeks I’m glad I named my podcast in such a way you can never say I’m off topic. We do start with an Apple bias, but then I might veer away from that kind of geek topic. We start with a deep dive into a 30-year-old app that was originally developed by NeXT and introduced to the Mac with the very first version of macOS 10.0, Cheetah. But then we take a sharp turn to learn about the career of a personal friend of ours, Dr. Bonnie Maldonado, and how she’s dedicated her career to saving babies from infectious disease. I’m so excited about this interview! I think you’ll love her too.
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TextEdit — the Unsung Hero of macOS
Support the Show
The vast majority of the income to support the work we do here at the Podfeet Podcasts is from Patreon. Lovely people who find value in our work have pledged continuing donations through the service. When I first signed up for Patreon, patrons would choose an amount they wanted to contribute per creation. I think it was designed this way to encourage creators to keep producing, or they wouldn’t get paid. Because I’m such a creature of habit, I have created a new NosillaCast every single week, so you could pretty much guarantee how much you were going to be paying if you pledged per creation.
Things change, though, and Patreon has chosen to move all podcasters to monthly contributions instead of per creation. A fair percentage of the Podfeet patrons have set a monthly maximum, and that will become their new monthly pledge. However, patrons who never set a monthly max will be affected by the change Patreon is making.
Patreon told me that I have to choose a multiplier, either 4 or 5, which will be applied to patrons’ per-creation pledge. I have to pick because they don’t “do” decimals, and there are 4.3 weeks in a month. Now here’s the rub. If I pick 5, then people will see a 17% increase in their pledge! I think it would violate the trust I have with patrons that they’re in control of their own money. On the other hand, if I pick 4, I would lose 7%. While I’m not fond of losing money, it’s the only honorable choice.
I wrote all of this up in a message to all active patrons and tried to send it out through the Patreon interface, but the message just popped back up on screen after I pushed send, but with a non-interactive send button this time. I tried again with the same result. Then I tried with a different browser, but still it didn’t seem to send.
I took screenshots of what I was seeing and asked Claude for help, and it happily explained that I had just sent the same message THREE TIMES. So, if you’re a patron, I apologize for the spam!
After annoying the very people I don’t want to annoy, I chatted with friend and patron Norbert about the multiplier issue, and he pointed out that if people choose a monthly max right now, then that should convert to the new monthly pledge when the changeover happens. Norbert also found a support article that explains how to add a monthly max at support.patreon.com/…
I expect the changeover to happen next week, but it could happen the following week. When it does, your monthly fee will now be on the day you first signed up. I think.
If you’re a patron and you have any trouble or concerns about this, please email me directly at [email protected], and we’ll figure out how to get you sorted. When the dust settles, if your monthly pledge is less than you were giving before, it would be swell if you bumped it back up!
CCATP #843 — Dr. Bonnie Maldonado on A Career Spent Saving Babies from Preventable Diseases
Transcript of NC_2026_10_13
That’s going to wind this up for this week. Did you know you can email me at [email protected] any time you like? If you have a question or a suggestion, just send it on over. Remember, everything good starts with podfeet.com. You can follow me on Mastodon at podfeet.com/mastodon. If you want to actually see Steve and my podcast work on YouTube, you can go to podfeet.com/youtube. If you want to join the conversation, you can join our Slack community at podfeet.com/slack where you can talk to me and all of the other lovely NosillaCastaways. You can support the show at podfeet.com/patreon or with a one-time donation at podfeet.com/donate with Apple Pay or any credit card, or through podfeet.com/paypal. And if you want to join in the fun of the live show, you’ll have to wait till October 25th to head on over to podfeet.com/live on Sunday nights at 5 PM Pacific Time and join the friendly and enthusiastic NosillaCastaways. Thanks for listening, and stay subscribed.