Johnny On The Spot

Too clever by half

[Brittany Wallman @BrittanyWallman]

Shunned, minimized, sabotaged. The few law enforcement heroes in the Epstein saga. (And the @MiamiHerald editor - @caseyfrank1 - who vowed to quit if the paper bent to Epstein's influence). Exclusive from @jkbjournalist https://t.co/daHE90EKoI

[Johnny On The Spot @djsynoptic]

@EoinHiggins_ It’s the longest paragraph in the 8-paragraph article…

[Cory Doctorow NO LONGER ON TWIT TER @doctorow]

Like you, I'm sick to the back teeth of talking about AI. Like you, I keep getting dragged into AI discussions. Unlike you‡, I spent the summer writing a book on why I'm sick of AI⹋, which @fsgbooks will publish in 2026.

‡probably

⹋"The Reverse Centaur's Guide to AI"

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[The A.V. Club @TheAVClub]

The fingerprints of the Riefenstahl model of fascist aestheticism are everywhere, and a new documentary makes for a timely portrait of a propagandist.

https://t.co/6GCMHyNar2

[Laura Albast @Lau_Bast]

I’ve been working on this for months! It is now out. Read. Read. Read. The stories I collected reveal the extent of bias tactics in U.S. newsrooms, even those we wouldn’t expect Palestine to be muzzled in. Thank you for trusting me to report!

[Rick Perlstein @rickperlstein]

“The raspy-voiced lunatic is not just one of MAGA’s myriad sideshows, but a tentpole: something that we can use to understand the thinking that holds the whole weird thing up." a column of mine from last year that might hit the spot.

https://t.co/Ja0vCvBdYt

[Sarah Kendzior @sarahkendzior]

It is the third of June, so I wrote about Bobbie Gentry and "Ode to Billie Joe" https://t.co/9CFMuY94vC

[Cory Doctorow NO LONGER ON TWIT TER @doctorow]

This is my last Pluralistic post of the year, and rather than round up my most successful posts of the year, I figured I'd write about why it's impossible for me to do that, and why that is by design, and what that says about the arts, monopolies, and creative labor markets.

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[Cory Doctorow NO LONGER ON TWIT TER @doctorow]

AI's ability to make and assist important decisions is fraught: on one hand, AI *often* classifies things very well, at speed and scale outstripping any reasonably resourced group of humans. On the other, AI is sometimes *very* wrong, in ways that can be terribly harmful.

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[Barton Gellman @bartongellman]

Please read this important thread by my Brennan Center colleague.

[Cory Doctorow NO LONGER ON TWIT TER @doctorow]

Denise Prudhomme's bosses at Wells Fargo insisted that the in-person camaraderie of their offices warranted a mandatory return-to-office policy, but when she died at her desk in her Tempe, AZ office, no one noticed for four days.

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[Cory Doctorow NO LONGER ON TWIT TER @doctorow]

My latest @LocusMag column is "Marshmallow Longtermism"; on conservatives' self-mythologizing as standards-bearers for deferred gratification and hard trade-offs, and their lack of these traits when it comes to climate change and inequality:

https://t.co/br1iRDzYJp

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[Jeet Heer @HeerJeet]

If you are an American, you are paying for this. Your government is deeply committed to making sure there will be no accountability for this.

[Johnny On The Spot @djsynoptic]

@flmfrkcentral To be fair, he starts with glue and works his way up to model-airplane gas

[Hope Corrigan @hopecolette]

"One episode neglected the inspiration and admiration a friend had for her mother, who’d been sober for decades, and instead portrayed her mom as an alcoholic."

Incarcerated writer Kwaneta Harris on being exploited by true crime shows for the @theappeal: https://t.co/Dv6LSMVYnU

[The author, Séamas O'Reilly @shockproofbeats]

I never knew any of this - the stars of the Blair Witch filmed and improvised the entire film themselves, were barred from doing publicity or taking other jobs before its release, and then completely cut out of the film's insane profits afterward.

https://t.co/49zE22P3t0

[Carl Wilson @carlzoilus]

Just caught up with Dan Charnas’ @slate piece about the musical sources of “Espresso” and the rebirth of musical segregation in the 1980s: epic, heartfelt, indispensible. https://t.co/ZVusJqoK1U

[Rick Perlstein @rickperlstein]

Ain't this a pip. Somehow Facebook decided my scourging of an amoral tech billionaire is NSFW!

[Cory Doctorow NO LONGER ON TWIT TER @doctorow]

If AI has a future (a big if), it will have to be economically viable. An industry can't spend 1,700% more on Nvidia chips than it earns indefinitely - not even with Nvidia being a principle investor in its largest customers:

https://t.co/xEVf8UPcA1

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[MZS @mattzollerseitz]

From last week – one of my favorite pieces I’ve done this year – the great Ken Loach, who is retiring from filmmaking, talked to me about his politics and his aesthetic, and how they are intertwined