This is a really hard day and I want to just add as WIRED's politics editor -- WIRED's politics reporting isn't going anywhere. We are very much here and won't stop. Please continue to read and support us - canceling your subscription to WIRED is not standing in solidarity with our journalists.

I was one of the four people who got canned. In the interim, you can subscribe to my newsletter, Straight From The Hut. No paywall, but feel free to choose the pay to support model. I'm not going anywhere — the show goes on, and I'll be back on MSNBC Saturday night. straightfromthehut.substack.com

have been eagerly anticipating this @carolinehaskins.bsky.social scoop on mark zuckerberg's illegal school based on 1,600 (!) pages of docs she got and it does NOT DISAPPOINT:

SCOOP (free, as it's FOIA-based!): I obtained 1,665 pgs of documents about "Bicken Ben," a growing private school the Zuckerbergs ran illegally out of their Palo Alto compound Neighbors complained the school for years. Then, in 2024, they reached their breaking point: www.wired.com/story/mark-z...

SCOOP w/ @dell.bsky.social: the FBI is warning law enforcement to look out for people impersonating ICE to facilitate other criminal acts Plus, some odd details I got via FOIA about a March incident in which an aspiring prank YouTuber allegedly impersonated ICE: www.wired.com/story/fbi-wa...

I had a great experience at the Whole Foods hot bar today :) very tasty!

reading a google white paper where a URL in the end notes still has the #:~:text for highlighting text from an AI search result.... lol

second time in less than a year we’ve had an Escaped Monkeys Incident lol www.cnn.com/2025/10/28/u...

last night I had a dream where I walked with Larry David through a strip mall and we complained about the clothes at Anthropologie together :)

genuine question like has anyone been able to solve an insurance problem, literally ever, by calling the insurance company? like why as a company would you even have people answering the phones if they are completely powerless to do anything lol

Scoop: I sent a public record request to the FTC for complaints mentioning ChatGPT. I got 200 complaints back, but a couple stood out. They described experiencing severe delusions, paranoia, and spiritual crises, and they attributed it to ChatGPT: www.wired.com/story/ftc-co...

NEW: there's been some chatter in recent days about an ICE purchase of "guided missile warheads and explosive components" in September. However, it appears ICE simply entered the wrong product code when it entered the payment record into a federal database: www.wired.com/story/no-ice...

@carolinehaskins.bsky.social got all of the complaints Americans sent to the Federal Trade Commission about ChatGPT. A handful of them are from people who said the chatbot reinforced their delusions and made psychotic episodes worse www.wired.com/story/ftc-co...

bombshell reporting from @carolinehaskins.bsky.social on the FTC complaints people have filed in the last year asking for help with AI psychosis:

Scoop: I sent a public record request to the FTC for complaints mentioning ChatGPT. I got 200 complaints back, but a couple stood out. They described experiencing severe delusions, paranoia, and spiritual crises, and they attributed it to ChatGPT: www.wired.com/story/ftc-co...

the things I would give to have ONE DAY riding the train where I don’t have to listen to someone else’s TikToks

NEW: A presentation that has been shared with the Trump administration references Tesla, Ikea, TSMC, and more in its plan to rebuild the region. Some of these companies say they had absolutely no idea they were mentioned.

When @carolinehaskins.bsky.social reached out to the companies listed in a "rebuilding Gaza" presentation that has circulated within the Trump administration, not a single one confirmed their involvement. The ones who replied had never even heard of it.

NEW: A proposal for rebuilding Gaza that's been shared with the Trump admin references Tesla, IKEA, TSMC, and tons of other companies. I reached out to them—none had discussed or agreed to any work in Gaza. Some had no idea they were mentioned in this proposal: www.wired.com/story/a-plan...

my latest investigation for @consumerreports.org is based on months of reporting and 60+ lab tests of leading protein supplements we found that most protein powders and shakes have more lead in one serving than our experts say is safe to have in a day (🧵) www.consumerreports.org/lead/protein...

right now, the nuclear option is the only thing that's keeping my inbox close to manageable -- AKA putting literally every single PR email I get to spam, and do a daily spam-scan to see if anything doesn't belong there

lately I've been craving breakfast sandwiches for whatever reason, but I don't like eggs + avoid pork which makes things difficult.... however!! I've discovered that a toasted bagel with a little cream cheese + turkey bacon + jalapenos + sun dried tomatoes tastes really great.... I endorse!

A public service from @cityandstateny.bsky.social www.cityandstateny.com/personality/...

In college, I'd always walk past an unremarkable store in Beijing that sold a variety of trendy, but tacky, toys. That store has turned into Pop Mart, the $45-billion Chinese toy empire behind Labubu, the biggest global fad of 2025. This is my big story/pilgrimage trip to explain how they got here

Amazon agreed to pay $2.5 billion to settle a FTC suit which claimed that sign-ups + cancellations for Prime are manipulative and confusing In the words of one Amazon customer quoted in an earlier court filing: "IT IS SNEAKY AND BLOODY DISHONEST" www.wired.com/story/amazon...

Impossible to even choose a pull quote in this oral history of DOGE!!! www.wired.com/story/oral-h...

This is how I described the Palantir t-shirt design in the piece, but someone very correctly pointed out that it also closely resembles the Lumon logo from Severance lol

And if you want some examples of said merch:

Huge week here @wired.com as we're rolling out our Politics Issue. First up, check out this cover, which we're also posting all over cities across the US.

You may know the software company Palantir as a contractor for ICE + the military. But in recent months, it's relaunched its merch store & said it wants to be a "lifestyle brand." What does it mean for Palantir to be a lifestyle brand...? I unpacked it here: www.wired.com/story/palant...

Looking forward to still writing about this drama next September. But for now, here’s what we know about the TikTok deal as of Friday. Reported with @jakelahut.writes.news

Thanks so much to Paris for having me on @techwontsave.us!! Definitely give the episode a listen if you wanna hear us talk about Palantir, Peter Thiel, the antichrist, and related matters :)

IDF sniper from Chicago who says he killed Gazan teenager just for trying to retrieve his brother's corpse: “They’re thinking, ‘Oh I don’t think [I’ll get shot] because I’m wearing civilian clothes and I am not carrying a weapon' and all that, but they were wrong. That’s what you have snipers for.”

BREAKING: Anthropic has agreed to pay at least $1.5 billion to authors in class action lawsuit for pirating their works www.wired.com/story/anthro...

When her son died in utero, a venture capitalist went to extremes to punish her surrogate. www.wired.com/story/the-ba...

How come after single time in my ENTIRE LIFE I’ve tried to walk around someone, they start drifting into the exact place I was going to pass them moments before I was gonna step there and just completely block off that route ❤️❤️

Bringing you the earnings report that matters! Pop Mart’s net profits grew 362% yoy in H1 2025 Revenue-wise: - the Labubu franchise grew 668% to $670 million (more than Barbie or Hot Wheels) - the Americas market grew 1100+% - the plush products grew over 1200+% & that’s not including Lafufus!

has anyone written something smart on this (seemingly) increasingly popular culture war tactic where women cringe and bad = lib and women pretty and good = conservative ...?

You may have seen Silicon Valley tech figures posting + panicking about Zohran Mamdani in recent weeks. I decided to talk to NYC-based tech execs who have actually sat down with him. They’re not panicking: www.wired.com/story/tech-e...

Were u on vacation / generally offline last week? If so, understandable — but icymi, here's my explainer about What Palantir Actually Does: www.wired.com/story/palant...

A bunch of big AI companies have landed major contracts with the US government this month. xAI was in position to join the list ... until MechaHitler. from @zoeschiffer.bsky.social @makenakelly.bsky.social and @telliotter.bsky.social

????? www.reuters.com/investigates...

Palantir is often called a data broker, a data miner, or a giant database of personal information. In reality, it’s none of these—but even former employees struggle to explain it. www.wired.com/story/palant...

guy at the grocery store checkout said that my shoes were "fucking weird" but that his girlfriend "would definitely love them" and asked for the brand + shoe name lmfao

there's approximately 1 billion insane details in this so it's impossible to share a pull quote but I would recommend reading this nymag.com/intelligence...

bald ann downd isn't active on here but I think it's crucial that the bluskyers see this and contemplate it

Even ex-employees struggle to provide a clear description of Palantir. It’s not that they literally don’t know what the company is selling. But when asked to, say, name its direct business competitors, some former Palantir employees have struggled to answer: www.wired.com/story/palant...

Really really good piece from @carolinehaskins.bsky.social on Palantir: www.wired.com/story/palant...