Kelly Spell
@kellyspell.bsky.social
I’m an artist who makes abstract quilts, maybe I’ll post some of them here. Other interests are plants, gardening, cats, news, and culture. She/her.
Reposted by Kelly Spell
"It is acceptable to engage a child in conversations that are romantic or sensual." Meta removed that language from its internal guidelines after I raised it.
AI experts worry financial incentives will blur the line between human relationships and bot engagement.
www.reuters.com/investigates...
AI experts worry financial incentives will blur the line between human relationships and bot engagement.
www.reuters.com/investigates...
Meta’s AI rules have let bots hold ‘sensual’ chats with children
An internal Meta policy document reveals the social-media giant’s rules for chatbots, which have permitted provocative behavior on topics including sex and race.
www.reuters.com
August 14, 2025 at 2:11 PM
"It is acceptable to engage a child in conversations that are romantic or sensual." Meta removed that language from its internal guidelines after I raised it.
AI experts worry financial incentives will blur the line between human relationships and bot engagement.
www.reuters.com/investigates...
AI experts worry financial incentives will blur the line between human relationships and bot engagement.
www.reuters.com/investigates...
Reposted by Kelly Spell
Amy Sherald says the Smithsonian suggested removing a painting of a transgender woman as the Statue of Liberty from her upcoming show at the National Portrait Gallery “to avoid provoking President Trump.” Sherald: “I cannot in good conscience comply with a culture of censorship”
Amy Sherald Cancels Her Smithsonian Show, Citing Censorship
www.nytimes.com
July 24, 2025 at 5:06 PM
Amy Sherald says the Smithsonian suggested removing a painting of a transgender woman as the Statue of Liberty from her upcoming show at the National Portrait Gallery “to avoid provoking President Trump.” Sherald: “I cannot in good conscience comply with a culture of censorship”
Reposted by Kelly Spell
Venus Williams just won her first match in two years and at the end when they were interviewing her about what a miracle it was, she said she had to come back and play a match; they told her she was on cobra and she’s always at the doctor so **she needs the health insurance**
Venus Williams literally a millionaire working for healthcare coverage
July 23, 2025 at 1:39 AM
Venus Williams just won her first match in two years and at the end when they were interviewing her about what a miracle it was, she said she had to come back and play a match; they told her she was on cobra and she’s always at the doctor so **she needs the health insurance**
Reposted by Kelly Spell
this is the writeup you get when you ask the ad agency to undo the thing you forced them to do
*nodding politely and pretending to listen while I discreetly signal the waiter to hurry up with the check* yeah no totally
July 10, 2025 at 11:41 AM
this is the writeup you get when you ask the ad agency to undo the thing you forced them to do
Reposted by Kelly Spell
NEW from me — FEMA staffers say the response to the Texas floods is horrifyingly slow, and it may be because of DHS Secretary Kristi Noem's recent increased control over how the agency spends money.
"If this is how they are going to do a major hurricane response, people are fucked.”
"If this is how they are going to do a major hurricane response, people are fucked.”
FEMA response to deadly Texas floods delayed & deficient with Noem in charge
Staffers sound the alarm.
www.thehandbasket.co
July 8, 2025 at 2:58 AM
NEW from me — FEMA staffers say the response to the Texas floods is horrifyingly slow, and it may be because of DHS Secretary Kristi Noem's recent increased control over how the agency spends money.
"If this is how they are going to do a major hurricane response, people are fucked.”
"If this is how they are going to do a major hurricane response, people are fucked.”
Reposted by Kelly Spell
"The relationship to handcraft is a beautiful one. You are related bodily to a solid block of metal letters, to the weight of the trays, to the adroitness of spacing, to the tempo and temper of the machine. Each triumph a conquest by body, fingers, muscles."
www.themarginalian.org/2012/08/30/a...
www.themarginalian.org/2012/08/30/a...
Anaïs Nin on Self-Publishing, the Magic of Letterpress, and the Joy of Handcraft
“You pit your faculties against concrete problems. The victories are concrete, definable, touchable.”
www.themarginalian.org
July 6, 2025 at 10:58 AM
"The relationship to handcraft is a beautiful one. You are related bodily to a solid block of metal letters, to the weight of the trays, to the adroitness of spacing, to the tempo and temper of the machine. Each triumph a conquest by body, fingers, muscles."
www.themarginalian.org/2012/08/30/a...
www.themarginalian.org/2012/08/30/a...
Reposted by Kelly Spell
There’s a recent piece —maybe on wire cutter? About a journalist who wore one of the new AI enabled all day recorders. It records your every conversation & transcribes it all day. I just want you to know that once basic social trust is broken in this way? It’s over
Don't be mad if you come up to me wearing one of these and I put a postit note over the camera until I leave
Reposted with ALT.
Y’all this is giving me Google Glass vibes LMAO it is gonna crash and burn so hard. That camera staring you dead in the eye non-consensually filming everywhere it goes is so creepy
Also it just looks like an Apple Watch hanging on a corny AF rope? THIS is your legendary design?
Y’all this is giving me Google Glass vibes LMAO it is gonna crash and burn so hard. That camera staring you dead in the eye non-consensually filming everywhere it goes is so creepy
Also it just looks like an Apple Watch hanging on a corny AF rope? THIS is your legendary design?
May 27, 2025 at 6:34 PM
There’s a recent piece —maybe on wire cutter? About a journalist who wore one of the new AI enabled all day recorders. It records your every conversation & transcribes it all day. I just want you to know that once basic social trust is broken in this way? It’s over
Reposted by Kelly Spell
“They will pass salmon swimming upstream in places the fish had not been able to reach since the early 1900s. They will pass through the ancient territory of their tribes … they will be celebrated as the first to descend the full length of the Klamath, source to sea, since the dams went up” 🎁 link:
First Time in 100 Years: Young Kayakers on a Ride for the Ages
www.nytimes.com
June 17, 2025 at 1:52 PM
“They will pass salmon swimming upstream in places the fish had not been able to reach since the early 1900s. They will pass through the ancient territory of their tribes … they will be celebrated as the first to descend the full length of the Klamath, source to sea, since the dams went up” 🎁 link:
Adds to watchlist
for people who are never going to play a game but are interested to understand a bit about what games culture is like, I can highly recommend the film Grand Theft Hamlet, about two out-of-work actors during the lockdowns trying to stage a production of Hamlet inside the game Grand Theft Auto
June 10, 2025 at 11:06 AM
Adds to watchlist
Reposted by Kelly Spell
The FDA has updated an ongoing recall of tomatoes distributed in Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina to its most severe warning, saying there is a higher probability that potential salmonella contamination could lead to “serious adverse health consequences or death.”
F.D.A. Updates Recall of Tomatoes, Warning of a High Risk of Illness or Death
www.nytimes.com
June 1, 2025 at 2:32 PM
The FDA has updated an ongoing recall of tomatoes distributed in Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina to its most severe warning, saying there is a higher probability that potential salmonella contamination could lead to “serious adverse health consequences or death.”
Not to mention the Trump administration also slashed funding for food banks.
Conservatives will likely point to private charity or paid work as the solution here. But families on SNAP are already relying on overstretched food banks to fill in the gaps in the program. And most families on SNAP are already working--their jobs just don't pay enough to keep their kids fed.
“it would also mark the first time in the history of SNAP that the federal government would no longer ensure children in every state have access to food benefits” www.cnbc.com/2025/05/21/s...
May 22, 2025 at 1:54 PM
Not to mention the Trump administration also slashed funding for food banks.
Reposted by Kelly Spell
BREAKING: FDA says covid boosters now only for those over 65 or with preconditions. www.statnews.com/2025/05/20/f...
FDA will limit Covid vaccines to people over 65 or at high risk of serious illness, leaders say
The FDA announced it will limit access to Covid-19 vaccines going forward to people 65 and older and others at high risk of serious illness
www.statnews.com
May 20, 2025 at 3:15 PM
BREAKING: FDA says covid boosters now only for those over 65 or with preconditions. www.statnews.com/2025/05/20/f...
Reposted by Kelly Spell
NEW: i spoke with several young AmeriCorps volunteers around the country who were abruptly pulled off projects building homes, readying forests for wildfire season, and working at food banks Tuesday afternoon. they are now on their way home thanks to DOGE cuts —
DOGE Cuts Pull AmeriCorps Volunteers Off of Disaster Relief Jobs
The youth volunteers who were working on projects ranging from rebuilding homes destroyed in storms to distributing supplies for hurricane recovery were suddenly pulled from service. Why? DOGE cuts.
www.wired.com
April 16, 2025 at 9:19 PM
NEW: i spoke with several young AmeriCorps volunteers around the country who were abruptly pulled off projects building homes, readying forests for wildfire season, and working at food banks Tuesday afternoon. they are now on their way home thanks to DOGE cuts —
Reposted by Kelly Spell
New Buying Power: I wrote about how America built the postwar world order and its own society on “consumer choice” and cheap goods, and what happens if Trump strips that out while also gutting the social safety net. Gift link:
www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
Cheap Consumer Goods Are the American Dream, Actually
Trump’s tariffs upend a nearly century-old bargain between politicians and US consumers.
www.bloomberg.com
April 10, 2025 at 1:41 PM
New Buying Power: I wrote about how America built the postwar world order and its own society on “consumer choice” and cheap goods, and what happens if Trump strips that out while also gutting the social safety net. Gift link:
www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
Reposted by Kelly Spell
The video cliff notes of everything just bums me out. So much if public engage t these days is people asking you to tap dance for them in their personally preferred style and also for free and happily because they pay you “attention”.
April 10, 2025 at 12:25 PM
The video cliff notes of everything just bums me out. So much if public engage t these days is people asking you to tap dance for them in their personally preferred style and also for free and happily because they pay you “attention”.
Reposted by Kelly Spell
I'm calling for an investigation into whether President Trump manipulated the market to benefit his Wall Street donors—all while working people and small businesses paid the price.
Did Trump help insiders cash in on his tariff flip-flopping? It sure looks like corruption.
Did Trump help insiders cash in on his tariff flip-flopping? It sure looks like corruption.
Did Trump help insiders cash in on his tariff flip-flopping?
YouTube video by Senator Elizabeth Warren
youtu.be
April 9, 2025 at 10:21 PM
I'm calling for an investigation into whether President Trump manipulated the market to benefit his Wall Street donors—all while working people and small businesses paid the price.
Did Trump help insiders cash in on his tariff flip-flopping? It sure looks like corruption.
Did Trump help insiders cash in on his tariff flip-flopping? It sure looks like corruption.
Reposted by Kelly Spell
Let’s talk about fraud, waste and abuse. Measles outbreaks are expensive to society. The human costs—hospitalizations, potentially severe long-term effects, immune amnesia, and death—are bad enough. But some aren’t swayed by this. So let’s talk about the financial costs of a measles outbreak.
April 8, 2025 at 10:53 PM
Let’s talk about fraud, waste and abuse. Measles outbreaks are expensive to society. The human costs—hospitalizations, potentially severe long-term effects, immune amnesia, and death—are bad enough. But some aren’t swayed by this. So let’s talk about the financial costs of a measles outbreak.
Reposted by Kelly Spell
Playing around with CBP airport processing data this morning to see how much air travel by non-US passengers is cratering.
April 5, 2025 at 1:16 PM
Playing around with CBP airport processing data this morning to see how much air travel by non-US passengers is cratering.
Reposted by Kelly Spell
MURFREESBORO folks coming correct with the sign game 🔥 👀
April 5, 2025 at 8:56 PM
MURFREESBORO folks coming correct with the sign game 🔥 👀
Reposted by Kelly Spell
::taps the sign::
Masking discourse is on again and I’ll just say if you see people masking when few others are it’s likely because they’ve determined that for them, in that setting, the benefit of not catching (or spreading) whatever’s going around is worth the cost of masking. It’s rarely more complicated than that
April 2, 2025 at 10:44 PM
::taps the sign::
Reposted by Kelly Spell
What does it mean to sew racial division? Is it a cross-stitch? Are we talking bias cut?
I've seen all kinds of people trying to Obama on here, not just white. Is sewing racial division going to help the situation right now. Think about what you're doing.
March 30, 2025 at 5:07 PM
What does it mean to sew racial division? Is it a cross-stitch? Are we talking bias cut?
I finished a new mini quilt! The center circle is monoprinted and hand-dyed, and I used neon yellow and lavender thread to quilt it. #quiltsky #modernquilt #mountedquilt
March 30, 2025 at 4:31 PM
I finished a new mini quilt! The center circle is monoprinted and hand-dyed, and I used neon yellow and lavender thread to quilt it. #quiltsky #modernquilt #mountedquilt
Reposted by Kelly Spell
Lmao how does this keep happening
March 26, 2025 at 9:37 PM
Lmao how does this keep happening
Reposted by Kelly Spell
my takeaway from reading this is that i have to assume that every half-competent intelligence agency in the world has an almost real-time glimpse into what the white house and the pentagon are doing
March 24, 2025 at 4:40 PM
my takeaway from reading this is that i have to assume that every half-competent intelligence agency in the world has an almost real-time glimpse into what the white house and the pentagon are doing