Direct Mail: Email Marketing That Feels at Home on Your Mac (Sponsor)

This week MacSparky is sponsored by Direct Mail for Mac. If you run a business, a side hustle, a podcast, or just want to stay in touch with a community, you know how important great email marketing can be.

The brand-new Version 7 is a huge leap forward. This update brings a host of new features, including a reimagined user interface, smarter list management, powerful email sign-up forms, upgraded reporting, and all-new tools to help your emails stand out. Whether you’re sending to 10 people or 10,000, Direct Mail gives you the tools to do it professionally and painlessly.

If you’ve ever been frustrated with clunky email marketing websites, or just want something that feels right at home on your Mac, I encourage you to check out Direct Mail. It’s free to download and try, and there’s no subscription required if you prefer a pay-as-you-go option. You can be up and running with your first campaign in just minutes. Get started today and grow your audience with powerful, Mac-first email marketing tools.

Mac Power Users 817: macOS Tahoe, visionOS, & watchOS 26

From Liquid Glass to a stronger Spotlight, macOS Tahoe reshapes the Mac. Spotlight now remembers your clipboard and taps into App Intents, while Apple’s apps gain updates to match their mobile counterparts. We got a lot to talk about on this episode of Mac Power Users. 

This episode of Mac Power Users is sponsored by:

  • Squarespace: Save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain using code MPU.
  • Indeed: Join more than 3.5 million businesses worldwide using Indeed to hire great talent fast.
  • SQLPro Studio: A simple, powerful database manager for macOS, iOS and Windows. Get 30% off with code RELAY30.

Building a Handwritten Text Converter with AI

Thus far in my life, my chicken scratch handwriting has defied all attempts at optical character recognition. This is one case where artificial intelligence comes to the rescue. In this video, I demonstrate how to build a custom AI engine using Claude (it would work with any major LLM) as a machine for converting my handwritten daily logs into text for importing into Day One.… This is a post for the MacSparky Labs Pathfinder and Insider members. Care to join? If you’re already a member, you can log in here.

September in the MacSparky Labs

We had a lot of fun in September in the MacSparky Labs. September 2025 highlights include various posts such as editing photos with Google Gemini, the Lab Report updates, a book club meeting, and events focused on digital minimalism and dictation technology. Key activities also feature video releases and member-exclusive content.

Here’s what took place in the Labs for the month of September 2025:

  • 2025-09-30 – Editing Photos with Google Gemini (M,I,P)
  • 2025-09-26 – The Lab Report for September 26, 2025 (M,I,P)
  • 2025-09-26 – Labs September Meetup (Media Release) (I,P)
  • 2025-09-25 – Vote Now: MacSparky Labs Book Club – Apple Books Edition (M,I,P)
  • 2025-09-25 – Editing Photos with Google Gemini (M,I,P)
  • 2025-09-25 – Book Club 004 – Liminal Thinking (Podcast Release) (M,I,P)
  • 2025-09-19 – The Lab Report for September 19, 2025 (M,I,P)
  • 2025-09-18 – Deep Dive – Digital Minimalism in 2025 (Event) (P)
  • 2025-09-18 – Using Karabiner-Elements with Your Magic Keyboard (I,P)
  • 2025-09-17 – Book Club: Liminal Thinking Meetup (M,I,P)
  • 2025-09-16 – Dictation Shoot-out 2025 (M,I,P)
  • 2025-09-12 – Labs September Meetup (Event) (I,P)
  • 2025-09-12 – The Lab Report for September 12, 2025 (Podcast) (M,I,P)
  • 2025-09-10 – Keyboard Maestro Text Cleaner Macro (And a Surprise Ending) (Video) (I,P)
  • 2025-09-08 – Tot 2.0 is Here (Video) (M,I,P)
  • 2025-09-05 – The Lab Report for September 5, 202 (M,I,P)
  • 2025-09-04 – Soft Block Scheduling (Video Release to Members and Insiders) (M,I)
  • 2025-09-03 – August Deep Dive – Using Freeform (Video Release) (P)
  • 2025-09-02 – Friends of Dave – Thomas Vander Wal (I,P)
  • 2025-09-02 – Last Month in The Labs Posts (M,I,P)

If you’d like to be a part of the MacSparky Labs, you can get more information and join right here.

Now Page Update

I’ve been real busy lately on the next Field Guide, and as a result, I have been negligent in updating my Now page. This morning I gave it a full update with some of my most recent MacSparky interests, along with what’s going on in the wood shop and in the garden. 

Hopes for Apple MCP Support

In the latest betas out of Apple, we’re beginning to see hooks in place for future implementation of model context protocol (MCP) on the Apple platforms. MCP is a protocol originally engineered by Anthropic, making it easy to connect your LLM of choice to your favorite software of choice.

I’m currently experimenting with MCP connections between Claude and Notion and OmniFocus. It has really been transformative for my use of artificial intelligence to do what I like to lovingly call “donkey work”.

For example, I had it set up a database for me in Notion with a list of all the recent Apple events and then go find YouTube links for the individual event to add to a field in the database. This is work I could have done myself but desperately wanted to avoid. Having the robot do it in the background is exactly the kind of use of AI that gets my blessing.

Bringing this back to Apple, MCP connections between Apple’s productivity apps and a more powerful LLM could become quite useful if implemented in a way that users can trust. This also indicates Apple is more willing to go outside of its own sandbox to give users AI assistance on their platforms. If done with intentionality by Apple, I would love to see this become a reality.