Pam Coughlan

Mother. Reader. Almost Librarian.

[Katherine Argent @effthealgorithm]

Search is full of ads and wrong answers. Every other email is an ad. Prime Video charges you and shows ads. Paramount? Ads. Peacock? YouTube? Hulu? Ads followed by more ads. Netflix full of ads. Meta and X, every other thing is an ad. Pinterest is nothing but ads. AI is in everything. AI finishes sentences incorrectly and won’t stop. AI reads your email and search history to target you with more ads. Every time you open an app or visit a site there’s an update making it worse. In a hurry? First, click here to agree to terms you don’t have time to read and must accept. You need an account to do that. Change your temporary password. Enter your 2FA code. Check your email and enter that code. Now use a passkey. Your password is too simple to remember. Change it. No, not like that. Now log on. Enter your 2FA code. Check your email for a code… Welcome back! We’ve updated our terms of service and privacy policy (you have none). Subscribe to the site. Subscribe to Netflix. Subscribe to toilet paper. Subscribe to these groceries. Pay a membership fee for the right to subscribe then tip your driver who delivers the subscriptions your membership lets you subscribe to. Time to work? We’ve got to update your laptop and will slow down everything you do until you agree to update. But first, click here to agree. Update installed — your laptop’s broken now. It doesn’t matter, since your boss just replaced you with AI. Go to your phone to complain on social media. Wait, your phone needs an update so we can add more AI. Click here. Oh sorry, your phone can’t handle this update. Now it’s useless. Go get the newest phone. Here’s a text from a friend, an email, a voice mail they left three days ago but you didn’t see until now because of sync problems with the cloud. It’s their GoFundMe. Their MLM. Their Patreon. Never mind, you didn’t respond to their text within 9 minutes and now you’re no longer friends. They blocked you. Make new friends. Download this app to find people in your area. In your neighborhood. On your street. Two doors down from you. Do you know this person yet, we think you’d get along. You need an account to use this app. That username is taken. Enter a password. Not that one, you used it on another site. You need to be connected to WiFi to download the app. Allow the app to connect to other devices on your network. Allow the app to access your contacts, know your precise location, store your credit card details. Oops, sorry, we got hacked now all that info is available on the web. There’s a class action suit. You can join. It’ll take a decade to get your $3.73 share of the ten billion settlement. We’ll send it via PayPal or deposit it to your bank, just tell us those details. Oh no, another hack. That info is circulating now, too. Here’s a spam call, a spam email, a spam text. Why are you angry? Why are you talking about getting rid of your phone? Why don’t you like AI, it lets us make all of this easier? Do you know how ridiculous that sounds? This is progress. You’ll be left behind. Do you want to be left behind? Do you???

[Lester @Chen]

the best 3 minutes of video I've watched this year

[Lydia Kauppi @lydiakauppi]

“Why would someone show up to a protest with a gun?”

He wasn’t at a protest. He was doing his normal life and then ICE showed up and turned the scene upside down in a matter of seconds. This is how we all live now. Whatever we carry we are potentially “bringing to a protest”

[Turnbull @cturnbull1968]

Since taking office, Trump has made:

$3B in sketchy crypto deals
$400M jet from Qatar
$24.5M from YouTube
$25M from Facebook
$10M from X / Twitter
$16M from CBS
$15M from ABC
$230M from DOJ

But he’s not taking a salary!

[Mike (not a) Rothschild @rothschildmd]

The dude who singlehandedly controls the government is demanding it pay him a quarter of a billion dollars of our tax money as restitution for having been caught committing crimes.

[MAGA Cult Slayer🦅🇺🇸 @MAGACult2]

I feel like they are all trying to tell us something. It’s on the tip of my tongue and the bottom of their signs.

[Barack Obama @BarackObama]

After years of complaining about cancel culture, the current administration has taken it to a new and dangerous level by routinely threatening regulatory action against media companies unless they muzzle or fire reporters and commentators it doesn’t like. https://t.co/uts7JpJZzN

[zoë rose bryant @zoerosebryant]

hi, pre-k teacher here. no need to worry nancy, it’s in our curriculum to cover all the letters eventually. this week we’re working on S-T-F-U

[CALL TO ACTIVISM @CalltoActivism]

Seth Meyers's opening tonight about Trump's chaotic tariffs is epic.

Holy hell. 🤣

[Kolleen @littlewhitty]

We could have just taxed billionaires

[Chris Murphy 🟧 @ChrisMurphyCT]

Good morning.

Today is the 80th day that the U.S. President is running a backdoor bribery scheme in which any CEO or foreign oligarch can send him money secretly through his crypto coin scam in exchange for favors.

It's the biggest scandal in the history of the Presidency.

[Rep. Anna Paulina Luna @RepLuna]

Those most vocal about no proxy voting all voted by proxy. Very odd position to take.

[Larry the Cat @Number10cat]

The stages in MAGA responding to a negative story:
1: It's all lies
2: Most of it is lies
3: Some of it's true, but it doesn't matter
4. It's all true, but it's fine when we do it
5. F**k you

[Hillary Clinton @HillaryClinton]

👀 You have got to be kidding me.

https://t.co/IhhvFvw6DG

[Richard Woodruff 🇺🇦 @frontlinekit]

If Ukraine 🇺🇦 really did attack Twitter, I think the only logical thing is for @elonmusk to sign a cease fire immediately, give them half of Twitter and make sure he says thank you to @POTUS.

[Emmanuel Macron @EmmanuelMacron]

There is an aggressor: Russia.

There is a victim: Ukraine.

We were right to help Ukraine and sanction Russia three years ago—and to keep doing so.

By “we,” I mean the Americans, the Europeans, the Canadians, the Japanese, and many others.

Thank you to all who have helped and continue to do so. And respect to those who have been fighting since the beginning—because they are fighting for their dignity, their independence, their children, and the security of Europe.

[Volodymyr Zelenskyy / Володимир Зеленський @ZelenskyyUa]

We are very grateful to the United States for all the support. I’m thankful to President Trump, Congress for their bipartisan support, and American people. Ukrainians have always appreciated this support, especially during these three years of full-scale invasion.

[Volodymyr Zelenskyy / Володимир Зеленський @ZelenskyyUa]

Thank you America, thank you for your support, thank you for this visit. Thank you @POTUS, Congress, and the American people.
Ukraine needs just and lasting peace, and we are working exactly for that.

[Symone D. Sanders Townsend @SymoneDSanders]

Tell me again how the message wasn’t “plain spoken” enough, but first watch this video