A friend recently asked me for some advice on books to read about writing. I got rather carried away and decided to write this blog post. It's about what writing books are for, and which titles I've found most useful in my own life. davelee.me/the-best-boo...

Michael Carrick with the greatest job interview of all time

SCOOP from Douglas Macmillan Medical examiner believes death of man in ICE custody was homicide, recording says www.washingtonpost.com/immigration/...

Okay, wait, but someone told Grok to put a bikini on the Bluesky logo... and Bluesky folks... made it their pfp. And then... the bio:

She then performed CPR on her baby.

And there it is.

Former FTC chair Lina Khan on Meta’s deal to shut down its fitness app Supernatural, less than three years since acquiring it

Nothing says “principles” like geoblocking

Really important question to ask as the US removes the leader of one country and threatens to forcibly acquire another

Is there a "stages of grief" for loved apps shutting down? Denial > Anger > Here's a (vastly inferior) alternative > Suggestion it will be bought up > "It's very simple to make it open source" > Acceptance.

I think the lesser appreciated part of this is that if ministers are on X, they are also *reading it*. And that's just terrible for a policymaker -- having their phones (i.e mind) invaded by the most hateful, bad faith constituents possible. We've seen how that network has scrambled great brains.

Why not just a number? This seems really odd.

The only good app in VR is being killed off

Thought I could use AI to quickly crop 6 or so images. ChatGPT does it fine, but the download functionality is broken, so I can't get them. Gemini's downloading works, but the images have been subtly edited in bizarro ways. One book title went from: "How to Tell A Story" to "How Tell Stories"

You can't tell me Mamdani didn't predict the extraordinary reaction meme potential when setting this up

Huge fire around Queen's Road, Peckham, according to u/zinbwoy www.reddit.com/r/london/s/Y...

errrrrrr

Kind of a flex in 2026

The quality of Claude Code makes me think the first phase of AI in the workplace will be non-developers using AI to create software to handle largely non-AI tasks. Solving little hassles of the office day.

Progress? *SENATE PASSES BILL TARGETING NONCONSENSUAL DEEPFAKE IMAGES

“But as the number of prominent tech figures who voice dissent grows, the tech left may see a return to its strength in numbers.” @davelee.me on resurgent tech “left” www.bloomberg.com/opinion/arti... tip @techmeme.com

There's an anonymous person on YouTube remastering and extending Michael Jackson's albums using ONLY material from the original (and leaked) master tapes. The quality is so high I'm half convinced its Bruce Swedien's secret retirement project www.youtube.com/watch?v=4iLK...

What should a smarter Siri actually *do*? I'm yet to hear much beyond just "be better."

Banning companies "they don't like" is the new "doing it for political reasons". Yes, the politics of being against child abuse.

NEW: GoFundMe strictly bans fundraisers for “the legal defense of financial and violent crimes,” yet is currently running one “to help pay for any legal services” for the ICE agent who killed Renee Nicole Good. Its conflict is not even the least bit contestable.

AI in Gmail, AI in shopping, GeminiPhone ... Google's starting to flex its muscle.

"The median jerk" is such a great expression -- and very useful when talking about the context of Grok/CSAM etc. Sure, other tools can do the same thing. But good policy stays focused on the median jerk.

CNBC confirms earlier @markgurman.bsky.social scoop that Apple is turning to Google for help in smartening up Siri. for @opinion.bloomberg.com, here's a column of mine on why that's a terrific idea: www.bloomberg.com/opinion/arti...

Rushing at the gym this morning and didn't put my beard trimmer guard on. You can guess the rest. Clean shaven for the first time in eight years, and instantly reminded why I grew it in the first place arrgghh

Gonna request New York doesn't follow the UK's lead and do the whole "open urinal in the street" thing. Our great national shame

POWELL: “The threat of criminal charges is a consequence of the Federal Reserve setting interest rates based on our best assessment of what will serve the public, rather than following the preferences of the President.” youtu.be/KckGHaBLSn4

It’s also the intellectual equivalent of having kebab and chips for breakfast every day. It’s just straight up making you worse.

The best time to quit X was two years ago, the second best time is now...

Checking in on Glasgow, European city of culture

A little dramatic 😂 And is that a swole King Charles II? Looks like the sort of thing you’d find on packaging for a sausage roll

Steve Kerr has never wavered. Wish he’d run for something.

Free speech doesn’t mean being allowed to generate revenge porn on a crowded social network

New from @kattenbarge.bsky.social: X influencers are using Grok to unveil Muslim women in hijabs and show them being beaten by men. Women in sarees are also being stripped: www.wired.com/story/grok-i...

Seems MAGA Republicans don't turn up to the opera www.nytimes.com/2026/01/09/a...

Breaks every rule of Putting Things On The Internet, but I enjoy the naming convention for posts on my "blog"

About that "good" jobs report... "The number of US workers who have been unemployed for 27 weeks or more rose to 1.95 million in December, the most since December 2021. ...that means about 26% of the unemployed have been in that condition for half a year or more." www.bloomberg.com/opinion/arti...

EXCLUSIVE: Leaked WhatsApp messages show Labour MPs urging govt to leave X, arguing that it should "show direction to others in the UK" The MPs said X owner Elon Musk is "fascist" and that the platform's AI tool, Grok, had put "children in harm's way"

Notion is a sleeper cell for a great AI play. Easily my most used AI app day-to-day.

Some remarkable new demo recordings by Michael Jackson have been leaked. Made ~2008. This one’s so raw you can hear a smoke alarm battery beep at the 21 second mark 🥴 youtu.be/z385e-oPT3M?...

Federal Agents Shoot 2 in Portland, Ore., Police Say www.nytimes.com/2026/01/08/u...

2018: “Tumblr has been removed from Apple's app store because it let some users post images of child sexual abuse.”

Let's not forget the fee %-age Apple takes from premium sign-ups made through the app...

I'm glad to see this pressure on Google and Apple. If any other company was running an active CSAM generator in public you better believe it would have been removed from their app stores by now www.wired.com/story/x-grok...

Martinelli's yellow card for aggressively pushing an injured player off the pitch .... seems VERY lenient.