🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Staffer with Elon Musk's DOGE amplified white supremacists online'



Starting to sense a pattern. https://www.reuters.com/world/us/staffer-with-elon-musks-doge-amplified-white-supremacists-online-2025-02-07/

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Trump’s FBI Pick Kash Patel Took Up to $5M in Stock From Chinese Ecommerce Giant Shein'



The rules seem to be that it’s okay to do whatever in the GOP, but no Democrat can even seem to be in a sticky situation. What a joke. https://www.wired.com/story/kash-patel-elite-depot-shein/

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'The Far Right Has a New Hero: Elon Musk'



Bookmarking for… sigh… teaching purposes. https://www.wired.com/story/far-right-new-leader-elon-musk/

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'First Cracks Appear: Some Conservatives Admit We’re In A Constitutional Crisis'



As usual, lots to like in this post from Mike Masnick. https://www.techdirt.com/2025/02/04/first-cracks-appear-some-conservatives-admit-were-in-a-constitutional-crisis/

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'AI-Generated Slop Is Already In Your Public Library'



I get a lot of reading done through hoopla, but this kind of story is starting to sour me on the platform. https://www.404media.co/ai-generated-slop-is-already-in-your-public-library-3/

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Can anyone stop President Musk?'



I’m teaching a social media research methods class this semester, and I’m pretty sure I need to bring this article up in this week’s class. https://www.theverge.com/politics/605609/musk-trump-doge-takeover-crisis

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'A 25-Year-Old With Elon Musk Ties Has Direct Access to the Federal Payment System'



Resubscribed to WIRED because despite my efforts to focus more on tech news than political news, THEY HAVE BECOME ONE AND THE SAME IN REALLY WORRYING WAYS. https://www.wired.com/story/elon-musk-associate-bfs-federal-payment-system/

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'The Twitter Files Playbook Comes For The US Government'



More good writing from Masnick on scary stuff coming out of DC. https://www.techdirt.com/2025/02/03/the-twitter-files-playbook-comes-for-the-us-government/

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'The NTSB chooses Elon Musk’s X to update the press on plane crashes'



Lots of bad things are happening right now, but this one stands out. There’s no good reason for this except to make Musk happy. https://www.theverge.com/news/604740/ntsb-x-elon-musk-media-communication

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'I Don’t Have Words'



I always appreciate Sam’s writing and especially here. I’m waiting to see what—if anything—my current church has to say about the current mess, but I have a deep fondness for the church I grew up in, and it’s deeply disappointing for a rich church that is willing to throw those resources behind its interests to decide that combatting the present cruelty is not one of those interests. https://bycommonconsent.com/2025/02/01/i-dont-have-words/

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Trump To Victims’ Families: ‘I’m Doing Everything Possible To Resegregate Flight Schools’'



I’m grateful for The Onion right now. https://theonion.com/trump-to-victims-families-im-doing-everything-possible-to-resegregate-flight-schools/

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Acting on Trump's order, federal officials opened up two California dams'



Bookmarking this because with the sheer quantity of nonsense that’s happened in just the last couple of weeks, I feel like I will eventually need reminders of just how dumb some of it has been. https://www.latimes.com/environment/story/2025-01-31/trump-california-dams-opened-up

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Elon’s Twitter Destruction Playbook Hits The US Government, And It’s Even More Dangerous'



Masnick pulls no punches. https://www.techdirt.com/2025/01/31/elons-twitter-destruction-playbook-hits-the-us-government-and-its-even-more-dangerous/

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'FCC demands CBS provide unedited transcript of Kamala Harris interview'



Government overreach is scary, but it can also be really, really petty. https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2025/01/fcc-demands-cbs-provide-unedited-transcript-of-kamala-harris-interview/

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Exclusive: Musk aides lock government workers out of computer systems at US agency, sources say'



Oh, he really is doing this like he did Twitter. That was a nightmare by itself. Exclusive:%20Musk%20aides%20lock%20government%20workers%20out%20of%20computer%20systems%20at%20US%20agency,%20sources%20say%20%7C%20Reuters https://www.reuters.com/world/us/musk-aides-lock-government-workers-out-computer-systems-us-agency-sources-say-2025-01-31/

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Treasury official retires after clash with DOGE over access to payment system'



Anyone who hasn’t should read one of two excellent books—Extremely Hardcore or Character Limit—on Musk’s takeover of Twitter, because I’m getting similar vibes here. Remember when Musk just refused to pay money Twitter owed because he didn’t feel like it? link to “Treasury official retires after clash with DOGE over access to payment system”

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Top 10 moments of RFK Jr.’s reality-bending confirmation hearings'



What a mess. link to “Top 10 moments of RFK Jr.’s reality-bending confirmation hearings”

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Trump Admin Deletes Video Explaining Grammatical Concept of Pronouns in War Against DEI'



This headline would be hilarious if it weren’t so infuriating. link to “Trump Admin Deletes Video Explaining Grammatical Concept of Pronouns in War Against DEI”

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'OpenAI Furious DeepSeek Might Have Stolen All the Data OpenAI Stole From Us'



Yeah, it’s really hard to have any sympathy here at all. link to “OpenAI Furious DeepSeek Might Have Stolen All the Data OpenAI Stole From Us”

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'The Technological Poison Pill: How ATProtocol Encourages Competition, Resists Evil Billionaires, Lock-In & Enshittification'



Saw someone link to this and remembered I should probably read the whole thing instead of just the first few paragraphs. I fall somewhere between Doctorow and Masnick on Bluesky optimism, but I really appreciate their dialogue on it. link to “The Technological Poison Pill: How ATProtocol Encourages Competition, Resists Evil Billionaires, Lock-In & Enshittification”

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Elon Musk, Video Game King? Well, Maybe Not.'



Reading all this recent coverage on Musk’s “gaming” has made me want to reread Cory Doctorow’s stories about gold farming—which is all the more fitting given that Doctorow uses gold farming to talk about exploited labor. gift link link to “Elon Musk, Video Game King? Well, Maybe Not.”

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'The Emptiness Of Zuck’s Promise To Move ‘Biased’ Trust & Safety From California To Texas'



This was one of the dumbest parts of all Meta’s announcements and now it’s… basically nothing, too? link to “The Emptiness Of Zuck’s Promise To Move ‘Biased’ Trust & Safety From California To Texas”

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Decentralized Social Media Is the Only Alternative to the Tech Oligarchy'



Yes to all of this. link to “Decentralized Social Media Is the Only Alternative to the Tech Oligarchy”

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'AI Dungeon Master experiment exposes the vulnerability of Critical Role’s fandom'



Digital labor issues abound in the context of generative AI, but fan labor issues make me particularly angry. link to “AI Dungeon Master experiment exposes the vulnerability of Critical Role’s fandom”

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Who Said It: Donald Trump or Martin Luther King Jr.?'



Darkly hilarious. link to “Who Said It: Donald Trump or Martin Luther King Jr.?”

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Donald Trump Has Mark Zuckerberg By the Balls'



Not the headline I would have chosen, but very interesting argument here. link to “Donald Trump Has Mark Zuckerberg By the Balls”

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Meta Is Blocking Links to Decentralized Instagram Competitor Pixelfed'



Directly out of Musk’s playbook. All the more reason to ditch Meta for the fediverse. link to “Meta Is Blocking Links to Decentralized Instagram Competitor Pixelfed”

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'An Amazon Delivery Confirmation Photo Is the Last Time a Palisades Resident Saw Her Burnt Down House'



The headline doesn’t really make the point, but the article is interesting; of course Amazon drivers would be sent into areas evacuated for fire. link to “An Amazon Delivery Confirmation Photo Is the Last Time a Palisades Resident Saw Her Burnt Down House”

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Meta Deletes Trans and Nonbinary Messenger Themes'



Meta’s cynicism and groveling is pretty appalling. link to “Meta Deletes Trans and Nonbinary Messenger Themes”

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Meta’s Moderation Modifications Mean Anti-LGBTQ Speech Is Welcome, While Pro-LGBTQ Speech Is Not'



Some more good writing on a bad situation. link to “Meta’s Moderation Modifications Mean Anti-LGBTQ Speech Is Welcome, While Pro-LGBTQ Speech Is Not”

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on '‘We’re Fine’: Lying to Ourselves About a Climate Disaster'



Chilling read. link to “‘We’re Fine’: Lying to Ourselves About a Climate Disaster”

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Facebook Is Censoring 404 Media Stories About Facebook's Censorship'



I especially appreciate this article in the wake of Meta’s recent announcements. There are cases in which content moderation is inconsistent or overreaching, and there are cases in which less moderation fixes the problem. However, it’s the arbitrary distinctions and self-serving nature of the changes that make the “free expression” argument so flimsy. link to “Facebook Is Censoring 404 Media Stories About Facebook’s Censorship”

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Researcher Turns Insecure License Plate Cameras Into Open Source Surveillance Tool'



Uggggggh, ALPRs suck. link to “Researcher Turns Insecure License Plate Cameras Into Open Source Surveillance Tool”

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'The Jawboning Double Standard: Brendan Carr’s Threats Are Way Worse Than What Biden Was Accused Of'



Yet more to demonstrate that “free speech” often means “right-wing speech.” link to “The Jawboning Double Standard: Brendan Carr’s Threats Are Way Worse Than What Biden Was Accused Of”

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Facebook Deletes Internal Employee Criticism of New Board Member Dana White'



Moderating employees but not users seems telling to me. link to “Facebook Deletes Internal Employee Criticism of New Board Member Dana White”

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Meta abandons fact-checking on Facebook and Instagram in favor of Community Notes'



Personally, I’ve come around to the idea that fewer restrictions, “Community Notes”-style responses, and lots of personal control over what one sees could work better as content moderation. It’s interesting to see Bluesky take some of these approaches, for example! Here, though, this seems like it’s bending the knee to the Trump administration, and I can’t imagine any of this being done in good faith. What a disappointment Meta continues to be.