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Casey Newton’s internet problems vs. platform problems
Casey Newton: How Facebook helps predators find each other
This year Stanford found equally disturbing CSAM issues at networks including X, Telegram, Mastodon, and decentralized networks generally. That Meta is subject to more scrutiny on this subject is less of a commentary on the company’s unique negligence than on its vast scale and the
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A blog without a website
theunderground.blog is a blog that only exists in RSS form. There is a home page, but that’s it. There aren’t any permalinks and you can’t link to a web page at all. It’s weird and it’s wild and I kinda love it, even if I think it’s impractical.
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How Be My Eyes is working with OpenAI to make a more accessible future
Steven Aquino writing for Forbes: Be My Eyes CEO Mike Buckley Talks OpenAI Boardroom Saga, ‘Life-Changing’ Tech, More
Specific to Be My Eyes’ application of OpenAI’s technologies, Buckley explained he and his team provided Open AI with “very direct feedback” based on needs of the Blind and low vision community, adding that OpenAI
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My review of the Steam Deck OLED
Valve came out of nowhere last month and announced a new OLED version of the Steam Deck (my favorite product
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Batman: Arkham Knight is another terrible port on Switch
Richard Leadbetter writing for Eurogamer: Arkham Knight on Switch is disastrously poor
Lighting is savagely downgraded, texture quality is a
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Decentralization is the cherry on top
Flipboard CEO Mike McCue on his new podcast, Dot Social:
Decentralization isn't a feature in and of itself. And you know, I think it's tough when, if you build a product that's just a clone of a closed product and it's decentralized, so you should care about
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Does Birchtree have the rizz?
Jennifer Schuessler for the New York Times: Oxford’s 2023 Word of the Year Is … ‘Rizz’
“Rizz” — Gen Z (or is it Gen Alpha?) slang for “style, charm or attractiveness,” or “the ability to attract a romantic or sexual partner” — has been named as Oxford’s 2023 Word of the Year, beating out contenders like
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Greenlight everything
Tim Wu for the New York Times : Mergers Like JetBlue’s Proposed Acquisition of Spirit Usually Turn Out to Be Bad
A comprehensive meta-analysis of 50 studies covering more than 3,000 contested mergers in the United States in recent decades found that “most studied mergers result in competitive harm, usually in the form
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Puzzmo, my favorite new website of 2023, has already been acquired
Andrew Webster for The Verge: Zach Gage’s Puzzmo gets acquired as the newspaper games space heats up
As part
Reviewing every new game I played in 2023
Let just jump into a bunch of micro-reviews of the video games I played this year, in the general order that they came out.
Dead Space
This remake of the 2008 original was a master class in video game horror. I hadn’t played the original, but this was not only the first new
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One woman, two mirrors, three looks…but I’m suspicious
Matt Growcoot: 'One in a Million' iPhone Photo Shows Three Versions of the Same Woman
Standing in front of two large mirrors, Tessa Coates’ reflection does not return the same pose that she is making, and not only that, but both reflections are different from each other and different from the pose Coates
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But what if like, I just don’t like it anymore?
Mike Masnick: Musk’s Faulty Vision Of ‘Free Speech’ Is Driving Speech Off ExTwitter
I mean, it’s not like we didn’t warn Elon Musk. Free speech is not about creating a single private space where everyone gets to speak, because that doesn’t support free speech. It enables the worst of society to
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My review of the Apple Watch Ultra 2
Without question, this is the most minor Apple Watch upgrade I’ve ever experienced personally (the Series 7 to 8 upgrade was tiny as well, but I never bought the Series 8). There are a few upgrades here that I’ll knock out quickly, and then I’ll discuss my experience with the new double
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Annoyed by the car market, defensive of the camera market
Lloyd Alter: How 'Skeuomorphism' Is Making U.S. Roads More Deadly — Streetsblog USA
The electric car revolution is a golden opportunity to redesign the vehicle from the ground up to make it smaller and safer. Instead, as Alissa Walker wrote in Curbed, [“]If “petro-masculinity” defined the past decade, as oversized, gas-guzzling
iA Writer 7 is here with a distinct way to “integrate” AI tools
iA Writer 7 is out today, and it’s a $50 one-time purchase on the Mac, and another $50 purchase for the iPhone/iPad version. They’ve been leading up to this release for a week now with a series of posts about AI and writing.
1. No Feature
2. Writing with AI
3.
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Plex started emailing your friends and family what you’ve been watching. People didn’t like that
Jason Koebler: Plex Users Fear New Feature Will Leak Porn Habits to Their Friends and Family
A new feature, called “Discover Together,” expands social aspects of Plex and introduces an “Activity” tab: “See what your friends have watched, rated, added to their Watchlist, or shared with you,” Plex notes. It also shares this activity in
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Robert De Niro is the best
Marianne Garvey for CNN: Robert De Niro claims his speech was censored by the Gotham Awards and Apple: ‘How dare they do that’
“The beginning of my speech was edited, cut out and I didn’t know about it. And I want to read it,” De Niro, prompting cheers from the room. He then pulled
