Recently updated blogs

I’m slipping in another Austin Philips story before Winter Tales season begins. “The Murder at Silchester Post Office” is a fictional reconstruction of the real-life case of George Fell, the caretaker of the Birkenhead Post Office, in Merseyside, England. Fell was brutally murdered on the job in September, 1900. The killer was never found. Philips had written extensively about the case in a previous article for The Strand, called “Crime …

We’ve had freezing weather all week, mostly dry and bright and rather beautiful. Here’s a frosty sweet pea, some frosted rose leaves and a ruby frosted rose hip: Today was forecast to thaw and turn to heavy rain but instead we woke up to heavy snow and the garden transformed again. Here’s a selection that I posted for #SixOnSaturday Including Bella’s little footprints as she padded across the snow to …

Here’s an excellent article from Christine Lemmer-Webber that takes a deeper technical look into some of the criticisms I had in my previous piece. The article is long, but very much worth a read. From the conclusion: Bluesky is built by good people who care, and it is providing something that people desperately want and need. If you are looking for a Twitter replacement, you can find it in Bluesky …

Laura Deming on understanding Interesting uses of AI The memes of the wealthy Elon dreams and bitter lessons Nabeel on Palantir Scott reviews Deep Utopia Meditation, considered harmful There is no placebo effect Dwarkesh interviews Gwern Restoring fertility with iMSC transplantation in monkeys Profile of James Fickel, a not very well known crypto backer of many impactful projects in the longevity space The King and the Golem, by Richard Ngo …

One of my fave beaches. And most of 2023 it had sand. All rocks again now but how lovely it was with the sand. I loved this photograph, so it's been a plan to cut it since I took the picture. The combination and strength of the foreground shapes makes it quite an unusual composition. I have found this my most confusing puzzle of a print so far. I got …

Sometimes, people ask me, “What’s your favorite swear word?” I don’t know why. Also, I don’t know what to say. I’m interested in profanity but not especially invested in one word over another. It’s not a competition. They all have their uses, or we wouldn’t use them. I’d have to say something like, “Well, Fuck! is best when I’m frustrated beyond words, and my favorite profane put down is probably …

Grow (1970) by Linda Brewer.Via. • The week in work-related reviews: Raymond Tyler reviewed the Bumper Book of Magic at Religious Socialism, while James Palmer did the same at Foreign Policy. Meanwhile, Rob Latham at the Los Angeles Review of Books examined the legacy of the New Wave of science fiction with reviews of New Worlds 224, and The Last Dangerous Visions, Harlan Ellison’s long-delayed story collection. • “Incline Press …

Now What? Meanwhile, the BM’s political reporters decided that inflation was Biden’s fault because of all the government spending on COVID relief, infrastructure and bringing manufacturing jobs back to the US. This was a lie. This post-election analysis resonates with me. It does feel like many of my own habits, patterns, and assumptions need to change.

In my doctoral seminar last Monday, I started class as I always do – with a “This Day in History” moment. Essentially Nicole Oster and I spend a bit of time digging through that date’s Wikipedia page finding interesting nuggets that connect with topics we are discussing in the course. Since the course is a […]

DC has posted several preview pages from next week’s issue of The Flash, and you can see them at Adventures In Poor Taste. The preview features things going haywire on Earth and the Sun, and it may be connected to what’s going on in Skartaris…time will tell. Check it out at the link! THE FLASH #15 Written by SIMON SPURRIER Art by VASCO GEORGIEV Cover by MIKE DEL MUNDO Variant …

The Internet Archive was allegedly hacked1, and their crawler stopped updating conveniently prior to the election2. Although the Wayback Machine was partially restored, most of the archive’s services were down for a considerable amount of time3. The Internet Archive has recently gone through a substantial amount of legal trouble, and some of their content has disappeared after they restored all their services. For an organization that has preserved so much …

[Mike Masnick at MSNBC]As Mike Masnick points out here, the hypocrisy from Elon Musk about collusion between tech and government is staggering:"Before, we were told that White House officials’ merely reaching out to social media companies about election misinformation was a democracy-ending threat. Now, the world’s richest man has openly used his platform to boost one candidate, ridden that campaign’s success into the White House himself, and ... crickets. The …

Sometimes it is hard to make direct eye contact with art. It is hard to meet it on its own terms, for many reasons. 1: I often know what I am going to see before I see it. It is rare that I walk into a gallery, into a room, and feel surprised by what’s in there. If I am surprised, I am surprised that I’m surprised. 2: the thing …

As someone who spent more than two years tracking down the greatest lost Jasper Johns painting, you’d think I would have already identified all the other lost Johnses. But I had not. Though the list of destroyed Johns works is certainly longer and more mysterious—the artist is famous for destroying things he made before 1954, and the fire in his Edisto Island, SC home in 1966 wiped out many works …

Sliding Messages by Hitsuono Historical strategy meets puzzle game in this 2048-like sliding game. Determine which messages get delivered when and where and see the consequences play out. Play game on itch.io The post Sliding Messages appeared first on Weird Fucking Games.