Bobby Allyn
@bobbyallyn.bsky.social
📤 22597
📥 1083
📝 708
NPR correspondent covering tech Signal: ballyn.77
https://www.npr.org/people/638550790/bobby-allyn
reposted by
Bobby Allyn
Ryan Mac 🙃
2 days ago
In 2021, I reported on an internal meeting at Facebook about discussions to put facial recognition on new smartglasses. One of their execs complained about the coverage and said the co would have a "very public discussion" about the tech. They never did. And now:
www.nytimes.com/2026/02/13/t...
loading . . .
Meta Plans to Add Facial Recognition Technology to Its Smart Glasses
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/13/technology/meta-facial-recognition-smart-glasses.html
4
151
65
reposted by
Bobby Allyn
Sheera Frenkel
2 days ago
New story up on the Homeland Security Department’s new tactic: flood social media companies with subpoenas to unmask anonymous accounts that criticize ICE or monitor the movements of ICE agents.
www.nytimes.com/2026/02/13/t...
loading . . .
Homeland Security Wants Social Media Sites to Expose Anti-ICE Accounts
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/13/technology/dhs-anti-ice-social-media.html
182
2066
1325
During the social media addiction trial today in LA, a lawyer for Meta pressed psychiatrist Anna Lembke on the witness stand about what apps besides Instagram can hook people. “Can people become addicted to Netflix? Can someone get addicted to outtakes of American Idol?”
3 days ago
1
4
3
reposted by
Bobby Allyn
Drew Harwell
3 days ago
Meta's plan for launching glasses that people can use to secretly identify strangers on the street is to do it "during a dynamic political environment" when people who care about why that's bad are "focused on other concerns."
www.nytimes.com/2026/02/13/t...
loading . . .
Meta Plans to Add Facial Recognition Technology to Its Smart Glasses
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/13/technology/meta-facial-recognition-smart-glasses.html?unlocked_article_code=1.L1A.6h9s.hor0Clrqgb2I&smid=nytcore-ios-share
76
1127
733
reposted by
Bobby Allyn
NPR
3 days ago
The Tel Aviv indictment is the first publicly known instance of people being accused of leveraging military secrets to place bets on the popular prediction market.
n.pr/4kvG3yW
loading . . .
Israel accuses two of using military secrets to place Polymarket bets
The Tel Aviv indictment is the first publicly known instance of people being accused of leveraging military secrets to place bets on the popular prediction market.
https://n.pr/4kvG3yW
12
343
146
“Such bets can put your own military at greater risk because you are signaling to your enemies what may happen, and that puts your own troops in danger"
www.npr.org/2026/02/12/n...
loading . . .
Israel accuses two of using military secrets to place Polymarket bets
The Tel Aviv indictment is the first publicly known instance of people being accused of leveraging military secrets to place bets on the popular prediction market.
https://www.npr.org/2026/02/12/nx-s1-5712801/polymarket-bets-traders-israel-military
3 days ago
2
2
2
reposted by
Bobby Allyn
Danny Funt
4 days ago
You could talk for hours about the bizarre ways prediction markets could go wrong. Enjoyed exploring that on
@whyy.org
along with
@bobbyallyn.bsky.social
:
whyy.org/episodes/pol...
loading . . .
What happens when you can bet on everything? - WHYY
Today, we pull back the curtain on prediction markets: who’s using them, how they make money, and the real risks and rewards beneath the hype. We also ask a bigger question: why does it feel like bett...
https://whyy.org/episodes/polymarket-kalshi-betting/
0
3
2
Apple News is an enormous driver of traffic for many publishers that have seen link referrals crater with the rise of AI Overviews/LLMs. If Apple News responds to this by promoting a fever swamp of far-right partisan outlets, many news sites are gonna get utterly walloped
4 days ago
3
34
19
Kalshi loves to say it is federally regulated. But here’s some perspective. Before the Kalshi boom, the CFTC listed around a dozen or so new event contract markets *a year* for crude oil futures etc Today there are 346,056 active Kalshi event contracts. 4/5 CFTC commissioner seats remain vacant.
5 days ago
1
5
1
“If I was a different person I would launch a crypto scam right now, because there’s no cops on the beat,” said one laid-off CFTC lawyer
finance.yahoo.com/news/cftcs-t...
loading . . .
CFTC's 'Top Cop' Legal Team Eliminated Amid Embrace of Crypto, Prediction Markets: Report
The agency’s flagship Chicago office now has zero enforcement attorneys, according to a report. In the last year, monetary relief secured by the CFTC plunged by over 99.9%.
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/cftcs-top-cop-legal-team-161236038.html
6 days ago
0
5
4
appears to have been a degen, but this is the new norm: large anomalous trades are made on world events, creating speculation about whether it’s intel or speculation, which could in theory influence whether officials do act or not, if it is insidered. impossible to distinguish signal from noise
add a skeleton here at some point
6 days ago
0
19
9
In prediction market spaces, traders are debating whether the person who has placed a $115k Polymarket bet on the US striking Iran tonight is a pseudonymous military insider or a “degen,” a degenerate nihilist trader. If the strike happens, the payout is $4M.
6 days ago
3
8
3
Days ago someone bet $500k on Kalshi Gaga would perform at halftime show. Wow what luck. Had to be random!!
7 days ago
0
87
25
reposted by
Bobby Allyn
Peter Baker
8 days ago
The Super Bowl in Silicon Valley "is tech billionaires who got picked last in gym class paying $50,000 to pretend they’re friends with the guys who got picked first in gym class." Ken Belson
@mikeisaac.bsky.social
www.nytimes.com/2026/02/07/b...
loading . . .
A Super Bowl in Silicon Valley Filled With Valley Billionaires
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/07/business/super-bowl-tickets-billionaires.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share
5
166
31
OK so now the former CEO of Tumblr is running the Washington Post. Tumblr. A company whose history is a textbook case study in corporate value destruction.
8 days ago
29
1536
454
This is a doozy: "If Plaintiffs want to argue Musk bought Twitter to make money rather than to promote free speech, they may do so without dragging DOGE, Trump, and allegations of racism into the courtroom."
www.documentcloud.org/documents/26...
loading . . .
MOTION IN LIMINE NO. 3
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/26881650-motion-in-limine-no-3/
10 days ago
1
12
6
reposted by
Bobby Allyn
Ryan Mac 🙃
11 days ago
One of
@ering.bsky.social
's great file finds: Epstein tried to help create an tech fund shortly before he was arrested in 2019 with two tech types. One of his partners, however, was worried about the "optics" of telling founders that Epstein was involved. So they suggested Epstein conceal himself.
4
377
106
not that time in 2013 when someone strongly recommended Epstein go to Berghain…
11 days ago
3
24
10
wonder what Bezos could possibly want from the WH
11 days ago
0
21
6
reposted by
Bobby Allyn
Jesse Eisinger
11 days ago
Today, the Washington Post laid off more than 300 people. If you think this is abt Jeff Bezos's concern that the paper losing money, you're wrong. So wrong that you should be disqualified from expressing opinions in public. Billionaires *like* losses. They *need* losses.
1
77
28
reposted by
Bobby Allyn
nitasha tiku
12 days ago
My story on Elon Musk cutting safeguards at xAI is on the front page of today's
@washingtonpost.com
. I’m also among 100’s of reporters laid off. I absolutely loved my job my brilliant coworkers & the thrill of reporting @ the center of forces upending the world: AI & Silicon Valley’s political power
161
6675
2253
reposted by
Bobby Allyn
Drew Harwell
13 days ago
A retiree wrote this email to a DHS attorney. Within five hours, DHS demanded Google turn over records for his account. A Kafkaesque form of domestic surveillance, intimidating Americans for lawful speech. New from us at the Post:
www.washingtonpost.com/investigatio...
@johnwoodrowcox.bsky.social
46
2756
1375
"Every American should be worried about that, because if they can lie about this, what else could they lie about? And if it's your family member who gets killed, what recourse do you have?"
www.npr.org/2026/01/31/n...
loading . . .
DHS keeps making false claims about people. It's part of a broader pattern
Trump administration officials have falsely linked Alex Pretti and Renee Macklin Good to domestic terrorism. It's part of a larger pattern by the Department of Homeland Security.
https://www.npr.org/2026/01/31/nx-s1-5690124/ice-alex-pretti-immigration-unproven-claims-dhs-enforcement-arrests
16 days ago
0
20
10
reposted by
Bobby Allyn
kate conger
17 days ago
Jeffrey Epstein asks Elon Musk if Solar City can electrify his island or ranch.
www.justice.gov/epstein/file...
6
314
121
Kalshi and the prediction market industry are thriving now, but their future is uncertain — the company is locked in 19 federal lawsuits over its status in the U.S., where they argue state laws don’t apply to them and that betting on sports is not a “game”
www.npr.org/2026/01/30/n...
loading . . .
Kalshi in court over 19 federal lawsuits. What's the future of prediction markets?
Apps that let people wager on current events have experienced explosive growth in Trump's second term. But one of the leading markets is tied up in lawsuits that cloud the industry's future.
https://www.npr.org/2026/01/30/nx-s1-5691837/lawsets-prediction-market-kalshi
17 days ago
2
15
5
reposted by
Bobby Allyn
Julia Simon
17 days ago
Please listen to this story from my
@npr.org
colleague Adrian Florido about a fruit seller named Jesus
loading . . .
He sold me fresh fruit for years. I was there when immigration agents took him
NPR's Adrian Florido has been buying fruit from the same fruit cart vendor in his LA neighborhood for years. On Tuesday, Adrian was there when federal immigration agents swooped in and arrested him.
https://www.npr.org/2026/01/29/nx-s1-5690351/he-sold-me-fresh-fruit-for-years-i-was-there-when-immigration-agents-took-him
1
23
13
"Although the list of prohibited [Super Bowl ad] categories is not public, it’s known to include tobacco, pornography, firearms" and now prediction markets
frontofficesports.com/nfl-wont-all...
loading . . .
NFL Won't Allow Prediction Market Super Bowl Commercials
Prediction-market platforms have exploded in popularity and raised billions of dollars. But they’re not allowed to buy Super Bowl ads.
https://frontofficesports.com/nfl-wont-allow-prediction-market-super-bowl-commercials/
18 days ago
1
10
2
A source close to TikTok tells me that the local Oracle data center outage would've bounced to Singapore, which was a "failover backup," under old TikTok setup. The thing that made everything go haywire was losing that Singapore backup under the only-in-the-US new structure.
19 days ago
3
12
1
The Trump admin has quietly gutted nuclear safety regs amid a big reactor push that could expose workers to more radiation before an investigation is triggered, slash groundwater rules and scrap record keeping.
@gbrumfiel.bsky.social
has the goods
www.npr.org/2026/01/28/n...
loading . . .
The Trump administration has secretly rewritten nuclear safety rules
The rewrite was done to speed up the construction of a new generation of nuclear reactors. Critics warn it could compromise safety and public trust.
https://www.npr.org/2026/01/28/nx-s1-5677187/nuclear-safety-rules-rewritten-trump
19 days ago
3
38
32
Twitter shareholders are taking Elon Musk to federal court next month in a big securities fraud trial and hooo boy jury selection should be interesting. Here’s a sampling of some proposed voir dire questions:
19 days ago
0
17
3
"Bitcoin is down...the crash sapped energy and attention from the crypto scene. Prediction markets, by contrast, are pulling in the same speculative crowd, offering a sharper hit: binary odds, real-world stakes, fast resolution."
www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
20 days ago
11
170
38
TikTok tells me they have no rules against using “Epstein” in DMs & that they’re “investigating why some users are experiencing issues.” It does appear anecdotally and from what TikTok can tell to be happening inconsistently. Some can’t send it in DMs, some can. Strange indeed.
20 days ago
4
15
4
reposted by
Bobby Allyn
makena kelly
21 days ago
SCOOP: Palantir Defends Work With ICE to Staff Following Killing of Alex Pretti WIRED obtained Slack conversations + an updated internal Palantir wiki defending the company's work for ICE to outraged workers. More here:
www.wired.com/story/palant...
loading . . .
Palantir Defends Work With ICE to Staff Following Killing of Alex Pretti
“In my opinion ICE are the bad guys. I am not proud that the company I enjoy so much working for is part of this,” one worker wrote on Slack.
https://www.wired.com/story/palantir-ice-dhs-alex-pretti-killing-workers-slack-minneapolis/
226
2939
1675
i often hear “Bezos just doesn’t care” as an explanation of his looming evisceration of the paper, but is that really the leading theory here? he’s approving this out of apathy? a man worth $249B who oversees a global business empire is giving a 🤷🏼♂️ to this being an unforgettable part of his legacy?
21 days ago
1
13
7
good to be vigilant about content moderation / algo changes with new TikTok ownership, but also good to hold creators to a burden of proof when they say they’ve been newly “censored,” which creators claim for all sorts of reasons all the time, often with no evidence.
21 days ago
5
58
13
A 911 call WaPo obtained through a public records request reveals that when detention center staff reported the death of Lunas Campos in El Paso, employees told the operator it was a suicide, when the medical examiner concluded someone else killed him.
www.washingtonpost.com/business/202...
loading . . .
ICE detention staff reported death of restrained man as a suicide
The statements to 911 operators the night Geraldo Lunas Campos died appear to conflict with autopsy’s later finding of ‘homicide.’
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2026/01/23/ice-detainee-death-911-calls/
23 days ago
0
10
0
China is outlawed from having an "operational relationship" w TikTok, but the finalized deal keeps ByteDance a minority investor & lets them own the algorithm. Far from a clean break from China. What it DOES do is hand Larry Ellison's Oracle, the Emiratis and Silver Lake enormous sway over the app.
24 days ago
2
65
23
Kalshi CEO Tarek Mansour on a Reddit AMA a year ago, before it had partnerships with CNN and CNBC in which Kalshi markets are read on live television alongside real polls: "Artificially inflating the odds of your preferred candidate doesn’t help them win the election"
25 days ago
0
2
0
Polymarket's CEO has called it a "global truth machine," but its X strategy is anything but. It pushes bogus stuff, like the Bezos example below, mixed with real news, and warped nuggets of news. It's shitposting for its audience, which juices engagement leading to, they hope, more brand awareness.
add a skeleton here at some point
25 days ago
0
5
1
"Nearly half of all American men aged 18 to 49 maintain an online sports-betting account...Emerging research suggests that the spread of sports gambling portends a huge increase in gambling addiction, which has the highest rate of suicide of any addictive behavior."
harpers.org/archive/2026...
loading . . .
On Tilt, by Jasper Craven
America’s new gambling epidemic
https://harpers.org/archive/2026/02/on-tilt-america-gambling-epidemic-jasper-craven/
25 days ago
1
43
27
well this could get interesting
25 days ago
10
92
13
it’s times like these when i really miss old twitter, a single site where everyone can post their Davos selfies and i could not open the app for five days
27 days ago
1
9
0
reposted by
Bobby Allyn
NPR
30 days ago
Prediction market apps are thriving in Trump's second term, with traders betting on migrant deportations to election outcomes. A community of young, mostly male and very online traders are driving the industry's bonanza.
n.pr/4b3JdYb
loading . . .
They quit their day jobs to bet on current events. A look inside the prediction market mania
Prediction market apps are thriving in Trump's second term, with traders betting on migrant deportations to election outcomes. A community of young, mostly male and very online traders are driving the industry's bonanza.
https://n.pr/4b3JdYb
43
83
54
i talked to die-hard traders on Kalshi and Polymarket and spent some time in prediction market spaces on Discord and Reddit to try to understand how this techno-financial wild west is utterly flourishing right now
www.npr.org/2026/01/17/n...
loading . . .
They quit their day jobs to bet on current events. A look inside the prediction market mania
Prediction market apps are thriving in Trump's second term, with traders betting on migrant deportations to election outcomes. A community of young, mostly male and very online traders are driving the...
https://www.npr.org/2026/01/17/nx-s1-5672615/kalshi-polymarket-prediction-market-boom-traders-slang-glossary
30 days ago
6
33
17
one of the funnier federal court docket updates i’ve gotten recently
about 1 month ago
0
3
1
An AI search engine that claims its value-add is having a real human follow up with you is bilking hundreds of thousands of consumers with dark pattern trickery that locks people into reoccurring monthly fees, the FTC alleged today
www.npr.org/2026/01/13/n...
loading . . .
FTC accuses AI search engine of 'rampant consumer deception'
Federal officials say a company that operates hundreds of landing pages for AI answers is running an operation that has duped thousands of users, who were unable to stop costly monthly charges.
https://www.npr.org/2026/01/13/nx-s1-5676150/ftc-lawsuit-just-answers-consumer-deception
about 1 month ago
0
9
0
reposted by
Bobby Allyn
Geoff Brumfiel
about 1 month ago
NEW: Here is the alleged video from Jonathan Ross's cell phone synched with the main eyewitness video we've all seen. As you can see it synchs perfectly. I don't think any internal cuts were made. I have left audio for both videos in this synch so that you can hear them aligned.
loading . . .
32
405
222
reposted by
Bobby Allyn
Kat Tenbarge
about 1 month ago
I reached out to more than three dozen X advertisers, xAI investors, politicians, and government agencies about the growing library of sexualized deepfakes generated with Grok—now including Renee Good. I only heard back from four, with three declining to comment.
spitfirenews.com/p/grok-deepf...
loading . . .
Why isn't there a bigger Grok boycott?
Advertisers, politicians, and investors are still all-in on X, despite a sexual abuse crisis.
https://spitfirenews.com/p/grok-deepfakes-x-advertisers-investors-take-it-down
148
5592
1926
it’s utterly grim that i got this push alert from gen ai
about 1 month ago
0
4
2
reposted by
Bobby Allyn
Philip Bump
about 1 month ago
The image of the blood-soaked airbag next to the glove compartment overflowing with stuffed animals is going to stick with me for a very long time.
187
10455
2407
Load more
feeds!
log in