Wednesday, May 21, 2025

Today's news and jokes







("The head of a paediatric infectious diseases unit at a Hong Kong public hospital has said his ward is now full of young, unvaccinated Covid-19 patients, urging parents to get their children inoculated to prevent severe symptoms")







None of the 278 men sent to CECOT have been returned. Meanwhile their lawyer has been arrested and "disappeared" in El Salvador.

[image or embed]

— Carl T. Bergstrom (@carlbergstrom.com) May 19, 2025 at 3:22 PM
("Neither [her] family nor her legal team knew where she was taken after police removed her from her home shortly before midnight on Sunday")







Where to even begin with this?

[image or embed]

— George Pearkes (@peark.es) May 20, 2025 at 5:04 PM
("The U.S. attorney’s office in Washington is now run by Jeanine Pirro...The two have a long history in New York politics — in 2006, Ms. Pirro unsuccessfully ran against Mr. Cuomo for state attorney general.")



The funniest part of this excellent story on Musk making bank off of Trump's visit to the Gulf is how thoroughly the Musk family is now in on the grift. www.nytimes.com/2025/05/20/w...

[image or embed]

— Noah Shachtman (@noahshachtman.bsky.social) May 20, 2025 at 10:18 AM








Sweden has gone ahead and passed their draconian "Nordic Model" bill criminalizing online creator content. As of July 1, consumers who purchase an OnlyFans clip, a cam show or other creator content will be subject to arrest and a year in prison All in order to "protect" women from exploitation.

[image or embed]

— Mike Stabile (@mikestabile.bsky.social) May 20, 2025 at 1:31 PM
("Under the new law, it will be illegal to pay someone to carry out a sexual act remotely — such as on a live video stream — for the specific purpose of that act being viewed by the buyer...Watching and paying for pre-recorded adult content will remain legal.")









(Pleasantly surprised whenever one of these LLM disasters hasn't been deleted by Twitter by the time I look)



This list includes fake books, but also I'm irritated by the description of Dandelion Wine cramming the word "summer" into one sentence three times, as if desperately trying to prove a thesis. Also three fake titles have the same family vs natural disaster plot? Nobody edited the plagiarism engine.

[image or embed]

— Sarah Pinsker (@sarahpinsker.bsky.social) May 20, 2025 at 5:59 AM


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-...

[image or embed]

— Jason Koebler (@jasonkoebler.bsky.social) May 20, 2025 at 7:47 AM


I updated this to note that there are other clearly AI-generated parts in the Heat Index section, which seemed pretty clear when I first went through it but I wanted to spot check a few things before including them. Shout out to @joshuajfriedman.com, who has been documenting some of them

[image or embed]

— Jason Koebler (@jasonkoebler.bsky.social) May 20, 2025 at 8:32 AM




Fact that AI apparently lends itself more readily to making a bot-army to scam 10 million bucks worth of streaming revenue than it does to writing a song people actually want to listen to makes me a bit skeptical about the much vaunted productivity gains...

[image or embed]

— Geoffrey Hughes (@geofffhughes.bsky.social) May 20, 2025 at 6:52 AM




without judging whether or not the future depicted here is either desirable or possible, simply as a narrative this is a rich and fascinating text. the introduction and deployment of the wife character e.g. is very [steeples fingers in the manner of a psychologist] interesting...

[image or embed]

— Max Read (@maxread.info) May 20, 2025 at 11:49 AM


sorry but only a DAD would think to plan a birthday party for 20 people ONE WEEK in advance smh

[image or embed]

— Katie Notopoulos (@katienotopoulos.bsky.social) May 20, 2025 at 11:05 AM




This is a really important point because everyone is imagining "the world as it is, but I have an AI", and consequently not thinking about the regulatory and other infrastructure needed to stop huge amounts of daily life degenerating into the disaster area that is restaurant reservation apps.

[image or embed]

— Dan Davies (@dsquareddigest.bsky.social) May 20, 2025 at 1:12 PM








("The shutdown of Diamond Select Toys seems to be even more sweeping – Gentle Giant, a separate toy brand at Diamond, was much smaller and hasn’t been mentioned, but one would assume it is also done")























Imagine being Thomas Keller and thinking this was a normal way to behave!!!!!! www.sfchronicle.com/food/restaur...

[image or embed]

— Jaya Saxena (@jayasaxena.com) May 19, 2025 at 9:01 AM
("Between courses, a waiter sets our table with fresh silverware, and I notice my butter knife is placed the wrong way, blade out. My brain reels with paranoia. What does it mean? At a place like the French Laundry, such mistakes are not made.") (The detail about the tree is particularly pathetic)







Another Herblock cartoon with a very 2025 vibe. "What's this about your letting the common people come in here and read books?" Syracuse Herald-Journal, 6/18/1954.

[image or embed]

— Randall Stephens (@randalljstephens.bsky.social) May 15, 2025 at 8:31 AM
























@spydarmann i can only imagine what my hair has seen out there 🫠 #london #londonlife #londontiktok #londontube ♬ QKThr - Aphex Twin








@verstappie4life ❤️❤️❤️ #f1tiktok #f1 #formula1 #f1edit #maxverstappen #maxverstappenedit #fyp ♬ hurricane - mette








@riddickbowe_ 😭😭 #mlb #baseball ♬ original sound - Riddick Bowe








@louise.caron the hair net was my last straw #sidehustle again #familybonding ♬ Club Penguin Pizza Parlor - Cozy Penguin








@pawzandall Mari vs Tink 🐶 IG @groomingbymari #pawzandall #mobilegrooming #mobilegroomingorlando #orlandomobilegrooming #petgroomer #petgrooming #doggrooming #doggroomer ♬ Take My Hand - Matt Berry








@kristinamckennaa We ride at dawn. Yeehaw. By popular demand, here’s Grizzly saddling up 😂 #dogsoftiktok #fyp #fypシ #dog #cowboys #fypシ゚viral #shihtzusoftiktok #shihtzu ♬ Cowboy Town - Atomica Music




*More funny posts.
Labels: