Miscellanea is the newsletter for the independent thinker, at the intersection of digital content, knowledge and culture. In this edition, the creator of the Analog Reader app, Lucas Schiavini, answers the Questionnaire.
Edition no 14. Date: 17 August 2026
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The Questionnaire is a collection of six questions featuring interesting people and their recommendations for books, apps, and media.
Lucas Schiavini is a full-stack engineer in São Paulo who builds small software for people who want their attention back. He makes Analog Reader, a tool that turns newsletters, saved articles, and social posts into a single weekly read with no infinite scroll. He also trains Muay Thai and is writing a comedic fantasy novel with six invented languages.
Follow him at https://lucas-schiavini.com
What is your favourite bookshop?
Unfortunately, it closed down. There was this huge bookshop in a shopping mall in Brasília, Brazil. The name was Livraria Cultura (Cultural Library is the closest translation). It had two floors, and the second floor had a door to a theater inside the bookshop.
They had plenty of couches and armchairs on the second floor, in isolated areas, with small tables on each side, so you could comfortably get 3-5 books and spend an afternoon reading.
On the first floor, it had a small coffee shop with great tables with electric plugs + wifi. I spent many weekends either working from the first floor or reading books on the second floor in one of the armchairs.
What piece of technology/gadget do you miss?
On Ubuntu 16.04, there was this feature that has not been brought back nor exists in any other operating system. You could swipe with two fingers on the touchpad and bring up 4 virtual desktops; you could then drag windows from one to another and even do work while on the screen. That means if you knew what you were doing, you could type things on a terminal (although on a very small screen), and have it execute things on another desktop.
I'm a visual person, so it's nice seeing things changing even if I can't see the details on them, and then zoom in when I need to see them.
I also miss my Game Boy Advance, haha.
What is the app or software you cannot live without?
Most of the software I cannot live without tends to have the goal of enhancing focus. There are a couple; some I built for myself.
The ones I use the most are: obsidian.md for collecting thoughts and building a second brain, freedom.to to block social media on all devices before 2 pm every day, and Tasknap as a Pomodoro timer.
I use Analog Reader to get news (newsletters, some people's posts on social media, and saved articles) every week without risk of doomscrolling. I was losing far too many hours of my day going through the same five apps. Now the days seem longer, and I'm far calmer.
I also heavily use my reMarkable tablet with their cloud- it's a lifesaver when I want to write without distractions. It's like a portable notepad + typewriter all in one.
What’s in your to-be-read pile?
Books: “Iliad” and “Odyssey” by Homer, “Behave” by Robert M. Sapolsky, “Vidas Secas” by Graciliano Ramos, “Zorba the Greek” by Nikos Kazantzakis.
Articles: several, but the only ones that come to mind are J.R.R. Tolkien's notes on fairy tales and Status as a Service.
Manga: Hunter x Hunter by Yoshihiro Togashi
How are you taking notes on things you find interesting?
Generally, I write everything I don’t want to forget in my Obsidian vault. I have a daily note page, and I just write a note inside of it. If it relates to other notes, I link to other notes as well.
If it's a to-do list thing, I write on a notepad where I keep all my other to-dos.
If it's a random thing, I just write in my journal by hand(on my reMarkable tablet).
What’s the last piece of media that made you feel something?
There's a scene at the end of a Hunter x Hunter arc in the manga where a villain has a very torturous death and becomes very human through his suffering; it brought a tear to my eye. It’s about how a monster can die so humanly, while a human can die like a monster.
via Wikipedia, by Wilfredor
Recommendations
A Gartner survey found that half of U.S. consumers “say they would prefer to give their business to brands that do not use GenAI”. Younger demographics found that content quality worsened due to the use of generative AI. The survey was conducted in October 2025 and published this spring.
Erik van Blokland, a Dutch type designer, has launched a variable sans-serif, called Action Grotesque. It was designed to be read on small-size screens, but also on paper. Comes with support for footnotes, titles, posters, and an extended Latin character set. Set it in action on its dedicated website.
Now you can send messages with pigeons. Ok, virtual pigeons that travel at 110 mph. You can follow the journey in the Carrier Pidge app. Depending on the distance, sending a message could take hours or days. And there is a 0.2% chance that the pigeons will not make it. No pigeons, no message. Found via Yahoo
Until next time,
Daniel
