respectfully tapping the "support billionaire-free, worker-owned, independent media" sign again

Superman 2: President Luthor deadline.com/2026/02/netf...

The issue is most of the reasons they're using to gate this tech for kids has shown worse effects on adults. Decommodifying parts of the internet would accomplish a lot more than age gating ever will.

Another major corporate platform death in VR, following Microsoft spiking AltSpace in 2023. Corpo social VR is dead. Long live the actual Metaverse. techcrunch.com/2026/02/20/m...

Solidarity to the Cuban people as the US tries to paper over its own increasing prospects of regime collapse by attempting to provoke it elsewhere

Good read on the problem of Epsteinism or elite impunity or class struggle. However you want to label it, the ruling class gotta go.

No one has been unflinchingly covering this sport with the investigative depth and critical analysis of Karim. Can't wait to read!

This was always the logical outcome of the "disinformation" research program.

Since the pandemic I have learned so much about the supposed better angels of our nature and I will never forget

Flash mobbing isn't praxis yet, but could it be? pix11.com/news/local-n...

“.. Trump has come close to exploding one of the great myths of the investment world, namely that sovereign bonds are safe, risk-free assets. .. undermining the role of US Treasuries as the world’s ultimate capital market hedge.” @financialtimes.com www.ft.com/content/33df...

GOOD NEWS! Researchers at Stanford University have developed a UNIVERSAL vaccine known as GLA-3M-052-LS+OVA, that protects against a wide range of respiratory viruses, bacteria AND even allergens. The vaccine is delivered intranasally AND provides broad protection in the lungs for several MONTHS.

"Part of the reason I made a hard leftwing turn was because I was burned by my own techno-optimism. I am part of a generation that believed it could change the world, and then was taught a harsh lesson about money and power." The Left Doesn't Hate Technology, We Hate Being Exploited

New hauntology just dropped

Guess Palantir wants their data cleaned before they run the STM. More noise in the data needed.

So when thousands of women (and children) were being duplicated--including in non-consensual AI porn--it was no big deal. But it took "only a 15-sec clip" of these two famous white men to draw outrage and fear. Gotcha. Cool cool.

(1/11) If you live in NY, you’ve probably started seeing a new warning: “THIS PRICE WAS SET BY AN ALGORITHM USING YOUR PERSONAL DATA.” This mandatory disclosure went into effect late last year, and it’s the first attempt by a US state to grapple with a new generation of surveillance pricing.

Finally Xennials exist and are the #1 at something.

I think about how when they sang La Marseillaise they were still in the midst of a war they did not know they were going to win.

AOC: "Extreme level of wealth inequality leads to social instability and drives authoritarianism, right-wing populism, and really dangerous domestic internal politics. That is a direct outcome of the failure of democracies over decades to deliver."

Glasses promising to lower your cognitive load that depend on you being too cognitively overloaded to realize you shouldn't be wearing them

Incredible closer to the Moltbook moment. www.complex.com/life/a/backw...

This is really part of the moment- there is an emboldened and extremely wealthy, connected class of people explicitly saying "we'll put you out of work" and, well, that your local misery is social & human progress.

We are truly living in frictional times. The time to read this book is immediately.

xAI is a more extreme version of what's wrong with OAI: making a machine for everything, with the understanding that posting is the highest and most universal form of human labor.

Was TikTok just training data for Seedance? All of web 2.0 (and maybe all our lives?) is gradually being reduced to this one dimension

The US is starving Cuba to death www.aljazeera.com/economy/2026...

We are murdering people and it is basically just background noise at this point. www.nytimes.com/2026/02/09/u...

Between this warehouse acquisition spree and the data center build out, it seems like one common thread is juicing rural commercial real estate markets. The other is appearing to be a job engine for distressed communities. Both are mirages, but a counteroffer is needed. What will we build instead?

There are no TV endings in fascism.

Nonymization=more precise identification for advertising, surveillance and digital twins. The goal of unmasking the people online is to replace them under the guise of being responsive to potential regulation. Is Riskwashing a term? It should be.

Tech deployed at the border “includes everything from hyper-visible tethered aerostats — massive blimp-like detection platforms hovering thousands of feet over the desert — to stealthy devices like unattended ground sensors to detect footsteps, and license plate scanners disguised as traffic cones.”

Highlighting the speaker who stood in front of the Surprise mayor and told him to consider what the Mayor of Ohrdruf must’ve thought before he died by suicide: “He might have thought ‘how is this my fault I had no jurisdiction over this’ maybe he said ‘this site was not subject to local zoning.’”

"It's the fascism, Stupid."

A beloved workers' rights organizer in Minnesota, known for *successfully* fighting against wage theft and labor trafficking, has been detained by federal immigration agents and is now locked up in New Mexico. His family is calling for his urgent release. inthesetimes.com/article/work...

The same pundit who told us not to judge people who overlook child rape also told us that working-class communities were "destroyed by a plague of nonjudgmentalism." fair.org/home/for-nyt...

My latest @newscientist.com column for subscribers and library patrons is about Elon Musk’s attempts to co-opt Star Trek and how Mars is actually a hostile planet 🧪🔭 www.newscientist.com/article/mg26...

Gamers, like comic fans, should be almost organically virulent haters of capitalism because of how markets have distorted their ability to enjoy the medium. The reason to try propagandizing both to the right early was to neutralize this radical capacity

What we've seen recently with the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and the Washington Post have revealed what should be obvious. Journalism cannot be a toy of the billionaire class if we want an informed public. As @victorpickard.bsky.social has long been saying, we need to take it out of the market.

I can't believe I have to type these words but @Shaboozey you didn't have to apologize for a thing. Later for the FBA trolls! They neither represent the interests of nor speak for black Americans! www.yahoo.com/entertainmen...

The Epstein files reveal what powerful people see in video games: profit, coercion, and control aftermath.site/jeffrey-epstei...

Everyone unraveling the Epstein network

Word. Every person who's ever tried to do anything needs to be sitting with our failures right now. All I've really thought about for all of 2025 is everything I thought and did wrong up til that point. Last year was the time for the ruthless critique of everything existing. Now it's back to work

A beautiful statement of integrity from @ianhamilton.net upon exiting his editorial role at Upload VR for their turning to AI writing with few guardrails: "The only thing that’s real about VR is the people." Let's keep that focus lest VR become a prison. goodvr.substack.com/p/ian-is-typ...

At least it's all for the worst possible reasons!

"The bill, HB246 ... instructs the director of vehicles of Kansas to identify every license issued to a trans person and send written notice that the license must be surrendered and reissued. Driving with a license that has been canceled, suspended, or revoked is a misdemeanor in Kansas."

Incredibly good work from @techpolicypress.bsky.social - an inventory of the known AI and data surveillance arsenal being used by ICE and the Department of Homeland Security. www.techpolicy.press/dhs-ai-surve...

ICYMI @hebagowayed.bsky.social wrote about the companies profiting from ICE’s ethnic cleansing campaign and why a bipartisan consensus keeps the out-of-control agency funded for our newsletter Group Threat (please subscribe).

We gonna have to bring back #DonLemonOn but for good this time. Truly a cursed world.