2026-06-09

Worthy

• The Absurdly Optimized Pancake: Leavening Chemistry, Acid-Base Stoichiometry, and an Interactive Calculator

etc

• Earthquake of magnitude 7.8 strikes off southern Philippines

  • 7.8 magnitude earthquake shakes part of southern Philippines. Tsunami possible

• Major earthquake off Cuba's coast felt across Florida

Horseshit

• Cancelling Billionaires: A Review

  It’s a bit difficult for me to read this book. That’s not the fault of the book, it’s well written and presents a solid case. It’s just that when you’ve seen Hamlet 50 times, the 51st might be a bit anticlimactic. The basic story is one that, in my old age, I have seen many times. The rich are getting an ever-larger share of society’s income and wealth. The size of their fortunes does not in any plausible sense correspond to their contributions to society. In fact, as McQuaig and Brooks (MB) show, it often stems from corrupt deals.

• Age verification tech could put children at greater risk, says think tank

• Gen Z turn to 'dopamine sites' for quick comfort

• Denmark midfielder Eriksen collapses on pitch during international friendly

• You Can Walk to the World Cup in New Jersey. But Should You?

• Why this year's World Cup ball may not fly as far

• How the "Perfectionism Pandemic" Is Crushing Young People

• There are reliable ways to tell if someone is lying to you

  • If they work for a major media business, for example

• New paper on the iPhone and fertility

  The U.S. general fertility rate has fallen by 22% since 2007, a sustained decline not readily explained by economic conditions, contraceptive use, housing or childcare costs, or other commonly cited factors. We assess the potential role of a different shock: the diffusion of the smartphone. ... Taken together, these cohort effects imply that the diffusion of the iPhone deepened the decline in births among women under 30 while suppressing the rise in births among older women. Overall, the diffusion of the iPhone explains 33–52% of the decline in the general fertility rate among women aged 15–44. National-survey evidence on time use and sexual behavior is consistent with the iPhone reducing in-person interactions, increasing pornography use, and reducing sexual frequency.

  • Two New Studies Ask: Did the iPhone Cause Birthrates to Decline?

  • The iPhone explains 33–52% of fertility decline among women aged 15–44

• "All your base are belong to us" Anti-social: It's fads, not friends, which now dominate social media feeds

• Restaurant Stopped Charging for Food. and Profits Are Up

• Passenger used suspected fake boarding pass to sneak onto United flight

• U.S. Cities Lost the Economic Development Plot

• The Cattle Empire That Turned Out to Be a Giant Ponzi Scheme

• US millionaire big-game hunter dies after being crushed by elephants

celebrity gossip

• Andrew Tate's Empire of Abuse

Musk

• NYU's 'Dean of Valuation': Elon Musk's SpaceX Isn't Worth $1.77T

• $1.77 trillion! SpaceX is about to become the 7th-most valuable American company.

• Elon Musk says SpaceX doesn't need 'magic' to put AI data centers up in space

• SpaceX has just officially unveiled its AI1 satellite

  Overall Specs: + 150 kW peak compute payload + 120 kW average compute payload + 70 kW per ton + Compute provider interchangeable

  Thermal System: + 110 m² deployable liquid radiator

Electric / Self Driving cars

• Driverless Trucks Are Here–and They're Delivering Bags of Doritos

  • PepsiCo has 41 driverless trucks on the road bringing technology into mainstream

• Uber Opens London Waitlist for Wayve Robotaxis Ahead of Launch

• EVs are getting more affordable worldwide – except in the U.S.

Robot uprising / Humanoid Helpers

• Robots could soon be delivering your pizza

• Nvidia partners with LG robotics to build humanoid robots in South Korea

• China's Unitree Will Dominate Global Robotics

Religion / Tribal / Culture War and Re-Segregation

• Attitudes toward same-sex marriage and transgender issues are shifting

Edumacationalizing / Acedemia Nuts

• String theory may be inevitable from basic assumptions about the universe

• How much of Thermo Fisher's antibody data has been manipulated?

• SDSU Wired Its Dorms with 1,300 AI Cameras Without Telling Students

Info Rental / ShowBiz / Advertising

• Nex Playground: the family game-night gadget that revives the spirit of the Wii

• Has Microsoft Lost Its Mojo (Again)?

• Netflix Is Done Coddling Hollywood

• Hackers likely hijacked over 20k Instagram accounts with Meta's AI chatbot

• Massachusetts bans sale of precise location data in new privacy rights bill

• Apple's Orwellian device controls for tots also mean more work for parents

• Apple drops support for a long list of Apple Watches with latest OS updates

• Meta Deletes Face-Recognition System from Smart Glasses App After Wired Report

Space / Boomy Zoomers / UFO

• NASA Provides Update on Space Station Leak

  The week of June 1, during Progress 95 spacecraft cargo operations, Roscosmos noted an increase of the previous leak rate to two pounds per day and identified new suspected leak areas in the PrK. Following this observation, Roscosmos made the decision to begin work toward a more extensive inspection and structural repair effort Friday morning. This revised approach involved cutting a bracket to better access an area identified as a possible leak source for further inspection, using a method that could have resulted in elevated risk to the structure in the area. In response, NASA directed the four SpaceX Crew-12 members and NASA astronaut Chris Williams, who flew to station aboard the Soyuz MS-28 spacecraft, to take a heightened safety posture, known as a safe haven, inside the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft during the procedure. Later Friday morning, Roscosmos paused and did not perform the structural repair work in favor of conducting additional measurements and data assessments, which included inspection of suspected areas of interest and review of areas where sealant was previously applied. NASA strongly supported that decision, and as a result, following that decision, Crew-12 and Williams ended their safe haven activities and returned to normal operations aboard the orbiting laboratory.

  • "did not perform the repair work..." so it's going to have to be done later?

AI Will (Save | Destroy) The World

• Guardrails around powerful AI models may be too late

• Is This the Dawn of the Tokenpocalypse?

• The Small-Business Owners Managing Whole Armies of A.I. Employees

• Software buyout deals collapse to lowest level since pandemic after AI rout

• The Mythmaker at Anthropic

• OpenAI plots biggest ChatGPT overhaul since launch

  • "Chat is dead": OpenAI preps overhaul of ChatGPT

• We must not grant AI agents legal personhood

• The coming rise of anti-AI populism

• A New Ad Campaign Tries to Make A.I. A Little Less Scary

• Guardrails around powerful AI models may be too late

• Let us filter AI slop, you cowards

• 'Poisoned' AI: the ChatGPT shopping scams that lead to fake websites

• AI bills can be as big as a postdoc salary. Is the cost worth it?

• Reality-mimicking AI fuels spike in scams, Visa cyberthreat finds

• Majority of US's new AI datacenters to be built on drought-hit land

• Apple's Meeting That Led It to Take AI Seriously

• The lawsuits that could give AI its 'Big Tobacco' moment

• Bring Your Own Power, Ireland Tells Tech Titans Hungry for Data Centers

• Democrats Unveil Flood of AI Proposals in Potential Challenge to Tech Giants

• The Butlerian Jihad Has Begun

  I originally entitled this essay Who Will Declare The Butlerian Jihad? but then, well, someone did. And it just so happened to be the fucking Pope.

  the key point that is missed in most of the popular discourse surrounding the ‘Butlerian Jihad’ as a kind of subcultural anti-AI meme: the target of the Jihad was never the tools, but the craftsmen. It was a war on technocracy, not technology.

• Artists are making ‘anti-slop’ to rebel against AI: ‘It’s been rammed down our throats’

• AI "content creators" are getting harder to spot

• AI is masking America's "post-literate" workforce

• A Farmer Donated Land to Turn into a Park. The City Is Building a Data Center

• There should have been an op-ed here but you filed AI slop

  In the last few weeks, running copy filed by those I thought were reputable contacts through AI detection software has become a core, and unloved, part of my job. This week alone, I have gone back to three ‘writers’ asking why their copy has been flagged as 100 per cent AI-generated with high confidence, per our software’s rating. Some feign shock – “how strange!” – though most, I’ve been surprised, fess up immediately, usually with caveats they think absolve them.

• Terry Tao Became an Evangelist for AI in Math

• Amid a flood of AI advances astrophysicists are questioning soul of their field

• AI Is Slowing Down

  Last week I went on Bloomberg and discussed the state of the AI bubble with a clarity that rattled even the sweatiest boosters, mostly because I spoke with clarity about an investment frenzy whipped up through hype, deceit and mythology. Some were equal parts frustrated and angry that I don’t have money in the market, or, as they’d put it, “skin in the game.” I get it! When your entire worldview is dictated by what a series of venture capitalists and psuedo-journalists on Twitter want you to believe, it must be difficult to imagine someone having “morals” or “beliefs” or that one might hold a position that wasn’t entirely based on greed or tribalism. It must be confusing — upsetting, even! — to hear that somebody is willing to accurately and vociferously tear into a tech industry largely controlled by people with no regard for their users or workers, who are willing to bathe their products in mediocrity all because it’s the thing that everybody else is doing. This is a hysterical era perpetuated by liars, cowards, imbeciles, craven boosters and the easily-fooled. Those excited about generative AI are either the victim or the perpetrator of a con centered around a technology to ingratiate at the highest cost possible.

• The AI vibe shift is real: Why the backlash is growing

• Slop, productivity, and why the AI-fueled world is going nowhere mighty fast

• Sanders' AI sovereign wealth fund plan is good. But we think this is better

• We need to learn how to argue with AI

• Instead of Taking Your Job, A.I. Might Transform It

• Why Isn't AI Taking Our Jobs?

• Apple introduces Siri AI, a profoundly more capable and personal assistant

• They Spent Years on a Math Problem. Then They Were Scooped by A.I

• The weather and climate science AI revolution isn't revolutionary

• AI Is Upending One of Finance's Cushiest Jobs

• AI Has Broken Hiring

• OpenAI Confidentially Files for IPO

  • OpenAI Kicks Off IPO Process in Test of Investor Appetite for Top AI Labs

  • OpenAI Files S-1

Neo Gambling / Crypto con games

• Bitcoin pump to $63,700 triggers the most short liquidations since late April

• Prediction markets are fueling a new era of political graft

• 'Unbelievable how accurate': How paid influencers hype Polymarket's odds

• Sam Bankman-Fried files for a presidential pardon from Trump

  • SBF Applies for Pardon

  • Sam Bankman-Fried applies for a pardon from Trump

  • Jailed crypto founder Sam Bankman-Fried seeks Trump pardon

  • Sam Bankman-Fried files for a presidential pardon from Trump

  • Sam Bankman-Fried seeks Trump pardon

Economicon / Business / Finance

• IMF warns inflation risks remain elevated ahead of Fed meeting

• Texas grid flags risks as data centers, crypto sites fail voltage tests

• Tech sell-off widens as South Korea index plunges

• The Korean Stock Market Just Crashed Sunday Night but the Nasdaq Is Rising

• ASML is now Europe's most valuable company at around $650 billion.

• Global stock markets fall as concerns persist over tech firms

• Bending Spoons, Owner of AOL and Eventbrite, Files for IPO

  • Italy's Bending Spoons, Owner of AOL and Vimeo, Files for Nasdaq IPO

• Half of Americans say they're worse off financially than a year ago

• BofA Warns It's Time to 'Take Profits' as Red Flags Multiply

• Airline profits set to halve this year as fuel costs jump by $100B: IATA

Gubmint / Poilitcks / Law Making

• NY lawmakers vote to ban 'surveillance pricing,' but digital price tags survive

• Nithya Raman knocks Spencer Pratt off second place in LA mayor's race

  Nithya Raman has overtaken Spencer Pratt for the first time in the race for second place in Los Angeles’ mayoral contest. New results released by Los Angeles County show Raman with 196,198 votes, or 27.12%, compared with Pratt’s 193,085 votes, or 26.69%. The latest tally gives Raman a 3,113-vote lead after she trailed Pratt by 7,494 votes just one day earlier. Raman picked up 19,096 votes in Sunday’s count, more than double Pratt’s gain of 8,489 votes. The latest batch of ballots produced a 10,607-vote swing between the two candidates, erasing Pratt’s advantage and moving Raman into second place.

  • Die-hard Spencer Pratt supporters devastated by late vote surge as faith in election falters.

  New election results show Pratt’s lead over Raman shrinking to just 7,494 votes, down from more than 20,000 votes one day earlier. Raman picked up 23,514 votes in the latest ballot count, more than double Pratt’s gain of 10,336 votes.

  • Decision Desk HQ Declares Nithya Raman Second in LA Mayor Race, Overtaking Spencer Pratt

  • The LA Mayoral Election is Being Stolen

  Last time around, Karen Bass lost the mayoral election both rounds and then won it with ‘late arriving ballots’. The way the game is being played this time is even sleazier with an attempt to knock out Spencer Pratt, who finished second on Election Night, in the first round with a whole lot of ‘late arriving ballots’ for the third place candidate, Nithya Raman. It’s not remotely credible for a third place candidate who finished on Election Night in the twenties to be picking up 40% of late arriving ballots. The previous defense that Democrats pick up more late arriving ballots doesn’t work either because it turns out that the Democrat who gets the most late arriving ballots is… the one who needs them more.

• The SPLC Indictment Is Probably The Start Of A Legal Marathon

  A complex case with a long list of felonies can easily take a year and a half to get to trial, but it can take longer with procedural delays like extended legal combat over pre-trial motions. And we’re having a presidential election in two and a half years, after which we may have a president and an attorney general who are Democrats. If a trial date can be pushed beyond the next inauguration, the SPLC might beat the charges simply by getting a friendlier administration.

• Lawmakers Abandon Trump on Warrantless Wiretapping

• County to pay $192,783 to 3 employees who lost their jobs over Covid vaccine

• Trump's $100k H-1B visa fee is unlawful, US judge rules

  • Judge blocks Trump's $100k H-1B visa fee

  • Federal judge rules Trump's $100k fee for H-1B visas unlawful

  • Judge Strikes Down $100k Fee for Skilled Foreign Worker Visas

  • Federal judge voids Trump's $100k fee requirement for H-1B visas

  • $100,000 fee on H-1B visas for highly skilled workers struck down in court

Trump

• Trump Storms Out of ‘Meet the Press’ Interview – PJ Media

  The exchange started to unravel when the topic of election integrity came up. Trump made clear that he views the media's handling of these stories as part of a larger systemic problem, one that the press has deliberately chosen to ignore. He told Welker that her network actively works against him and that he had the receipts to back it up.

  "You play right into their hands with this stuff," Trump said. "You know that these elections are rigged. Your network knows that they're rigged. Do you know that I won an election in a landslide and I got 94% bad press." Welker tried to redirect the conversation toward acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, but Trump wasn't having it. Every time she jumped in, he pushed through it. He insisted the evidence of problems with election integrity runs deep: "You have more evidence, there's more evidence than ever presented."

  "Your elections in this country — we're like a third world country," he said. "Your elections are crooked and you're crooked, and Meet the Press is crooked." He didn't stop there. "And so is ABC and CBS and CNN," Trump continued. "You're a one-sided crooked network." That's when he made his move. "Sorry. Let's call it quits because I've had enough," Trump said. "Thank you, darling. Have a good time." Welker scrambled to keep him in his seat, reminding him of the effort it took to set up the interview. "Mr. President, let's — please, I traveled all the way to Wisconsin," she said.

  • Video of the rant

  • "There's no evidence of Capitol Police escorting protesters into the Capitol on J6"

  • Trump storms off ‘Meet The Press’ interview after fiery exchange with NBC’s Kristen Welker over 2020 election.

• When Trump Jawbones the Market, Bet Against Him at Your Peril

Left Angst

• For the Nation's Birthday, Making It Harder to Become an American

• Silicon Valley including Meta has embraced MAGA politics, says Nick Clegg

  • "apolitical" wouldn't fly; "silence is violence" and so on, remember?

• New Medicaid work rule worries patient advocates, states

• Lawsuit Seeks to Stop the UFC Fight on the White House South Lawn

• Congress wants to tie the United States to Israel with this new legislation

• The sneaky way companies get new chemicals into our food

• 'The rich are living a golden age under Trump'

• How America Gave Up on Its Own History

Law Breaking / Police / Internal Security

• Man jailed for a month despite Flock showing he was 5 miles from crime scene

External Security / Militaria / Diplomania

• Tests suggest Russian satellites can jam GPS on a continental scale

World

• Tech firms must stop kids sending and receiving explicit images or face new laws

  • UK PM tells Apple and Google to ban nude images on children's phones

  • Plans to stop children taking nude images

• Social media ban: Keir Starmer set to impose internet restrictions on millions of British children within days

• Argentina's 'Madman': Inside the World of Javier Milei

• UK PM Starmer set to ban 'harmful' social media for under-16s

• A 'Miraculous Transformation': How Kim Jong-Un Fortified North Korea

  • The Most Surprising Economic Success Story Is North Korea

• Barcelona's Sagrada Família Nears Completion–and Inflames a Tourism Backlash

• Meta loses High Court challenge to possible €430M fine

• Japanese city shuts down nearly 100 schools after unprecedented bear sighting

• France took the nuclear option to make Putin think twice

• France and Germany abandon joint fighter jet program

  The leaders "reached the shared assessment that the companies will not be able to come together on building a joint combat aircraft," a government official told Agence France-Presse about the Future Combat Air System (FCAS) project. "They acknowledge this reality." The FCAS program was launched in 2017 to replace France's Rafale jets and the Eurofighter planes used by Germany and Spain. But the multi-billion-euro project was beset by disagreements between the firms involved – France's Dassault Aviation and Airbus, which represents Germany and Spain.

  • Berlin pulls plug on Franco-German fighter jet

• New Referendum Would Flip Brexit Result 10 Years On, Poll Finds

• Could Switzerland Become the First Country to Cap Its Population?

• Armenia's pro-West government wins election despite Russian pressure

Iran / Houthi

• Israel says it has struck Iran after taking missile fire

• President says Netanyahu will have 'no choice' but to accept a deal with Iran

Russia Bad / Ukraine War

• Ukraine hits St. Petersburg again after Putin rejects talks.

• New AI espionage powers trigger Putin camera scare

China

• Sanctioned Chinese Firm Releases U.S. Tech HQ Images

• China is killing Europe's chemicals industry. Brussels wants to intervene

• China expands its spy networks across the European Union and beyond

• China's Lab-Grown Diamonds Emerge as Unlikely Winner in AI Boom

Health / Medicine

• New drug 'functionally cures' many hepatitis B virus infections

• GLP-1 Drugs: Things We've Learned About Their Effects

Pox / COVID / BioTerror AgitProp

• What ProPublica Found in the Genetic Code of America's Measles Outbreaks

Environment / Climate / Green Propaganda

• To end animal suffering, the most ethical choice is to kill wild predators

• Atlantic 'cold blob' likely caused by weakening AMOC near a tipping point

• How to Spot Greenwashing Claims When You Travel

• Centuries-old logbooks reveal how bowhead whales are recovering from near-extinction

• Bumblebees have tiny brains but can solve problems like chimps and elephants

• Chinese court cases reveal most trafficked rhino horns come from Southern Africa

• Toxic Ground: Inside Oklahoma's Oil Field Wastewater Crisis

• Landscape experts ask Colorado to "embrace the beige" for drought adaptation

• Whales are showing up in San Francisco Bay. New ship alerts help protect them

• Stress on oceans as rate of sea level rise doubles in 10 years, UN warns

• 'Unbelievably Stupid' Tourist Charges Yellowstone Bison Herd