I guess one good thing to say about being online this week is that we learned that the war guy also has terrible form on kettlebell swings

Armed ICE agents trapped US citizens in a restaurant and demanded their papers. Federal agents walked into East African restaurants in Cedar-Riverside, MN. They closed and blocked the doors. Then they demanded to see everyone’s papers. Every person present was a US citizen.

“It’s a story about volume, value, and what journalism becomes when “content” grows functionally infinite.” - @davey.bsky.social www.niemanlab.org/2025/12/in-2...

New from me: The internet promised the democratization of information, power, and expression. Now there are vanishingly few ways to be online that don't involve being a billboard. I wrote about the weird — and sometimes devastating — experience of being *influenced* www.theverge.com/cs/features/...

people, you have the chance to put my book ahead of Olivia Nuzzi’s on the bestseller list. put aside all other considerations and think how objectively funny this would be. #1, that Mountain Goats guy. #2, Antivax Man Has My Heart. funniest list of the century. We can do this if we try

SCOOP from me + @makenakelly.bsky.social: despite recent reports, DOGE isn’t dead—it’s actually everywhere. @wired.com www.wired.com/story/what-i...

I really wanna know nuzzi's salary at vanity fair esp given recent layoffs maybe the NYT could have tracked down info like that instead of taking beach pics i dunno

One analytical model shows that, as of November 5th, the dismantling of U.S.A.I.D. has already caused the deaths of 600,000 people, two-thirds of them children. https://newyorkermag.visitlink.me/jUzNSc

Six of the nine Nobel Prize winners this year work in the U.S. Three of the six were born outside the U.S., which is the pattern most years. No country has benefited more from welcoming immigrants from around the world. www.nobelprize.org

if the state of journalism and its capture by the right wing also has you in despair, a real, tangible thing you can do to push back is support/subscribe to worker-owned indie news media!! @coyotemedia.org (bay area) @51st.news (dc) @racketmn.com (mn) @autonomynews.co @505omatic.bsky.social (nm)

“The injections Suza needed had traveled thousands of miles to the Central African nation, USAID and other records show, only to be stranded in a regional distribution warehouse in the same city where she was gasping for air.” wapo.st/489jGvd

New: ICE has bought a tool that tracks the locations of hundreds of millions of phones globally, updates every single day. Usually harvested from apps and advertising www.404media.co/ice-to-buy-t...

Response from @karenattiah.bsky.social counsel, @normeisen.bsky.social et al, at @democracydefendersfund.org: "She did precisely the job you hired her to do as an opinion writer ... She spoke truthfully and forcefully about ... difficult truths at a challenging time"

YouTube removed a channel that was dedicated to posting AI-generated videos of women being shot in the head following 404 Media’s request for comment. The videos were clearly generated with Google’s new AI video generator tool. 🔗 www.404media.co/ai-generated...

If someone goes from a media outlet to a government agency and then implements a policy attempting to prevent the media from reporting on the agency, what does that tell you about their media outlet?

If you use Facebook and are seeing surprising recommendations in your suggested groups when they come up in the News Feed, could you do me a favor and 1) screenshot them 2) click through to see if those groups show up on your full list of suggested groups and 3) DM me? I'm curious about something.

it feels so good to write again, to play games again, after the worst year of my life. i picked a ridiculous game (that i love!) to relearn controller skills with, but taking my time makes it possible aftermath.site/silksong-hol...

Freelance illustration gigs drying up. Ad agencies using Midjourney instead of hiring human artists. Costume design turned over to AI wholesale. Good work vanishing. These are the stories of working visual artists, who describe losing jobs, wages, and hope as their clients and bosses embrace AI.

This is a book everyone should read, ASAP.

internet culture desks aren't just for cute meme trend stories. ever since gamergate, understanding how and why info moves online is critical to seeing how we got *here*

I wrote about Charlie Kirk and the viral content machine that sprang to life in the wake of his shooting — and how this time, even people running the country are partaking in the churn. www.theverge.com/analysis/776...

Most of the people whose thoughts I want to hear about this right now have either left the beat or quit journalism

“Vulnerable people turning to AI chatbots instead of professional therapists for mental health support could be ‘sliding into a dangerous abyss’, psychotherapists have warned.”

Here in Baltimore this morning, where clergy and activists have gathered in support of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who is set to check in with ICE this morning. Heavy faith presence in addition to, just, a lot of people for 6:45am. Kilmar himself is about to speak.

Citizen Is Using AI to Generate Crime Alerts With No Human Review. It’s Making a Lot of Mistakes 🔗 www.404media.co/citizen-is-u...

This is the inside story of how Tea's male founder convinced millions of women to share their most intimate secrets on his app, then exposed those secrets in devastating security breaches www.404media.co/how-teas-fou...

Going on vacation tomorrow so spent Saturday night making maps of all the places in Ohio, West Virginia and South Carolina with higher violent crime and murder rates than D.C. Perhaps better places for those governors to focus resources! www.pbump.net/o/more-peopl...

SCOOP from me: FEMA is planning to order states to immediately stop activities intended to combat domestic violent extremism - the latest in a broad federal move to downplay the threat:

This is propaganda that uses the image and voice of someone who is unable to consent, seems like a basic thing journalists shouldn't do, but what do i know man

I guess none of the 4 bylines on the NYT story about Brown's deal with the Trump admin thought that its exclusion of trans women from all women's housing, facilities, programs and activities was worth more than a single reference to requirements to comply on "matters like transgender athletes"

After a five-day halt due to a lack of supplies, our team at WCK’s Deir al-Balah Field Kitchen has resumed limited hot meal service in Gaza. #ChefsForGaza (1/3)

I don't miss the 2015 media environment generally but I do kind of wish I could effortlessly fire up a 1000-word story on the person who filmed themselves placing a labubu on the grave of Karl Marx

Google's AI summaries are - killing traffic to legitimate sites - producing summaries that can be wrong - in the long run probably making you a dumbass www.404media.co/googles-ai-i...

come and read this perfect romp about TikTokified online shopping that suddenly becomes an extremely readable primer on Harvard Law Review level cutting-edge intellectual property law issues www.theverge.com/cs/features/...

“A city fire marshal used FDNY’s access to a facial recognition software to help NYPD detectives identify a pro-Palestinian protester at Columbia University,” in order to work around policies restricting the PD’s use of facial rec.

The LGBTQ-specific option on the 988 lifeline gave queer youth immediate access to trained counselors. Now, Trump is shutting it down, despite widespread support and need. This story was originally published in @unclosetedmedia.bsky.social, an LGBTQ-focused investigative news outlet.

I'm a reporter at WIRED, and I'm wondering if anyone out there initially hesitated to vaccinate their kid against measles but has changed their mind during the current outbreak. I'd love to speak with you for a possible story: [email protected] or emullin.06 on Signal.

“They are not political opponents or neighbors with whom we disagree; they are literally the instruments of evil," @robertpjones.bsky.social says. @tessowen.bsky.social reports on the deep ties the suspected Minnesota shooter has to Christian Nationalism www.wired.com/story/christ...

Meanwhile Comey Barrett's concurring opinion opens the door to uphold laws across the country that essentially discriminate against trans people because we should not be a "suspect class" that has faced historic discrimination. Another way to limit Bostock's scope.

Breaking: The Trevor Project received a stop-work order last night on its contract with the national 988 suicide prevention hotline. The Trump administration is eliminating the option for LGBTQ callers to the hotline to press 3 and connect with someone who specializes in LGBTQ mental health.

We've updated and republished our guide to surveillance-resistant protest, first published in the summer of 2020. Paywall is down for this. www.wired.com/story/how-to...

I wrote about people with cognitive decline establishing that they don't want to become social media content as their illness progresses a few years ago, and now I'm just like "how long until some AI firm pitches their digital replica services to family members of living people with dementia"

The undocumented migrant community in the United States is using social networks and other digital platforms to send alerts about raids and the presence of immigration agents around the US. www.wired.com/story/the-ri...

Here's another angle from Fox News reporter Bill Melugin of Sen. Alex Padilla getting roughed up by law enforcement after he tries to question Kristi Noem at her presser: “I’m Senator Alex Padilla. I have questions for the secretary. Because the fact of the matter is, a half dozen... Hands off!”

Google is burying the web alive nymag.com/intelligence...

The Rehearsal season 2 is some of the best TV I've ever watched and also just one long Mythbusters episode

How the Chicago Sun-Times wound up distributing an AI-generated summer reading list that contained made-up books written by real authors: www.404media.co/viral-ai-gen... Generative AI mishaps keep happening because the 'humans in the loop' don't realize they need to be in the loop.

I spoke to the person who AI-generated the Chicago Sun-Times reading list. Says he's very embarrassed. This was part of a generic package inserted into newspapers and other publications, so likely to run elsewhere. He didn't know it'd be in Chicago Sun-Times www.404media.co/chicago-sun-...

New: They stormed the Capitol. Now they’re selling merch. Pardoned by President Trump, many Jan. 6 rioters are now working to capitalize on the attention through podcasts, speaking tours and new lives as online influencers www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2... @byelliesilverman.bsky.social