Simmer
@simmer.ooo
St Paul. Words won’t fix this (but they’ll help)
simmer.ooo
simmer.ooo
Reposted by Simmer
Big Tech’s PR work around AI has been a masterclass in how not to communicate with the public about technology
December 10, 2025 at 6:33 PM
Big Tech’s PR work around AI has been a masterclass in how not to communicate with the public about technology
Reposted by Simmer
none of these people (inclusive of UK labour) seem to understand that voters want their leaders to *lead* them, not reflect their own ill thought preferences back at them
December 10, 2025 at 2:34 PM
none of these people (inclusive of UK labour) seem to understand that voters want their leaders to *lead* them, not reflect their own ill thought preferences back at them
Reposted by Simmer
“Why are folks getting dumber?” Because they don’t read. “Why aren’t men as romantic & poetic as they used to be?” Because they don’t read. “Why are people so vulnerable to propaganda?” “Why is everyone a conspiracy theorist?” Because they don’t read. Because they don’t read.
December 8, 2025 at 11:49 PM
“Why are folks getting dumber?” Because they don’t read. “Why aren’t men as romantic & poetic as they used to be?” Because they don’t read. “Why are people so vulnerable to propaganda?” “Why is everyone a conspiracy theorist?” Because they don’t read. Because they don’t read.
Reposted by Simmer
What, exactly, does this string of words mean? Why does everyone who stands to profit from selling "AI" love to repeat it? And what's the value of slogans that masquerade as history?
sonjadrimmer.com/blog-1/2025/...
sonjadrimmer.com/blog-1/2025/...
"The Printing Press Democratized Knowledge": When Slogans Masquerade as History — Sonja Drimmer
The phrase is said so frequently it seems, like the mechanism it celebrates, to mechanically replicate itself. It's become a favorite catchphrase among tech boosters of any sort (see my post on...
sonjadrimmer.com
September 10, 2025 at 7:51 PM
What, exactly, does this string of words mean? Why does everyone who stands to profit from selling "AI" love to repeat it? And what's the value of slogans that masquerade as history?
sonjadrimmer.com/blog-1/2025/...
sonjadrimmer.com/blog-1/2025/...
Reposted by Simmer
I wanted dinner recommendations so I scraped 13,000+ London restaurants and accidentally discovered Google Maps is running a shadow economy. Anyway here's a dashboard and a political economy thesis: open.substack.com/pub/laurenle...
How Google Maps quietly allocates survival across London’s restaurants - and how I built a dashboard to see through it
I wanted a dinner recommendation and got a research agenda instead. Using 13000+ restaurants, I rebuild its ratings with machine learning and map how algorithmic visibility actually distributes power.
open.substack.com
December 9, 2025 at 7:53 AM
I wanted dinner recommendations so I scraped 13,000+ London restaurants and accidentally discovered Google Maps is running a shadow economy. Anyway here's a dashboard and a political economy thesis: open.substack.com/pub/laurenle...
Reposted by Simmer
"what could possibly go wrong by algorithmically amplifying absolute lunacy" -someone at Facebook or YouTube, somewhere, probably
December 8, 2025 at 8:08 PM
"what could possibly go wrong by algorithmically amplifying absolute lunacy" -someone at Facebook or YouTube, somewhere, probably
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imagine investing in public media and ensuring that media literacy (and spotting unreliable narrators) was integral in primary school education
Finland has emerged as a global leader in countering “fake news”. Here's how they've done it
Teaching when to trust
As fake news accelerates, we need to teach our children how to think critically. Finnish schools are leading the charge
newhumanist.org.uk
December 7, 2025 at 2:32 PM
imagine investing in public media and ensuring that media literacy (and spotting unreliable narrators) was integral in primary school education
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An incredible piece of writing, a gift of a sort I had not known it was possible to receive
sorry I'm late! I have at last broken my silence on Pantone's Color of the Year johnpaulbrammer.substack.com/p/cloud-danc...
'Cloud Dancer': A Measured Response
Regarding Pantone's decision, and so on, and so forth
johnpaulbrammer.substack.com
December 7, 2025 at 1:01 PM
An incredible piece of writing, a gift of a sort I had not known it was possible to receive
Reposted by Simmer
imagine US political culture if Ford hadn't pardoned Nixon, and instead he went to jail
December 4, 2025 at 8:12 PM
imagine US political culture if Ford hadn't pardoned Nixon, and instead he went to jail
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hey so that sounds like total shit. really fucking awful. bleak. soul and society destroying. world eating levels of bad.
The co-founder of Kalshi says: " The long-term vision is to financialize everything and create a tradable asset out of any difference in opinion."
December 4, 2025 at 12:30 AM
hey so that sounds like total shit. really fucking awful. bleak. soul and society destroying. world eating levels of bad.
Reposted by Simmer
And that's what makes the anti-trans sports stuff so clearly bullshit. Everyone on the "actually, there are some valid concerns!" side of things is cheering on this 61-year-old lady no longer getting to hag out with her friends and play tennis.
December 4, 2025 at 12:54 AM
And that's what makes the anti-trans sports stuff so clearly bullshit. Everyone on the "actually, there are some valid concerns!" side of things is cheering on this 61-year-old lady no longer getting to hag out with her friends and play tennis.
Reposted by Simmer
Every mortgage issued is 30 years of rent control, effectively. Tenants should have the same economic predictability.
“We are ready for change, for real change, for real affordability and to end displacement of our communities.”
www.wbur.org/news/2025/12...
www.wbur.org/news/2025/12...
Rent control supporters say ballot question pits struggling residents against corporate landlords
Housing advocates are advancing a ballot question for next year's election that would overturn Massachusetts’ decades-long ban on rent control. Boston Mayor Michelle Wu said the measure would be bette...
www.wbur.org
December 3, 2025 at 4:19 PM
Every mortgage issued is 30 years of rent control, effectively. Tenants should have the same economic predictability.
"Ethics Panel Slides Back to Reveal Hot Tub"
What is the quintessential Onion headline? The strong contender that just randomly popped in my mind is "Hank Williams Jr. Honored by Institute For Football Preparedness"
December 3, 2025 at 4:10 PM
"Ethics Panel Slides Back to Reveal Hot Tub"
Reposted by Simmer
Every Democrat should be an ICE abolitionist.
None of this “we all agree you need to come here legally” or “we all agree the immigration system needs reform.” Fuck focus groups and polls.
Inform the public of these atrocities and shift the Overton window to a presumption of equality for everyone.
None of this “we all agree you need to come here legally” or “we all agree the immigration system needs reform.” Fuck focus groups and polls.
Inform the public of these atrocities and shift the Overton window to a presumption of equality for everyone.
A 6-year-old boy is missing after ICE arrested him and his dad in NYC last week and shipped them off to separate facilities. www.thecity.nyc/2025/12/02/i... @thecity.nyc @gwynnefitz.bsky.social
ICE Arrested and Separated Chinese Father From 6-Year-Old Son, Advocates Say
The father and son were detained at an ICE check-in on Nov. 26, advocates say. The son’s location is currently unknown, while the father is being held at an upstate ICE facility.
www.thecity.nyc
December 3, 2025 at 12:45 PM
Every Democrat should be an ICE abolitionist.
None of this “we all agree you need to come here legally” or “we all agree the immigration system needs reform.” Fuck focus groups and polls.
Inform the public of these atrocities and shift the Overton window to a presumption of equality for everyone.
None of this “we all agree you need to come here legally” or “we all agree the immigration system needs reform.” Fuck focus groups and polls.
Inform the public of these atrocities and shift the Overton window to a presumption of equality for everyone.
Reposted by Simmer
Just imagining how much better it would be if ALL news stories about vaccine-preventable illnesses were illustrated with pictures of people with the disease, not pictures of needle injections. If you must show something that people will find scary & unpleasant, make it the disease, not the cure.
I'm so tired of measles.
I'm also tired of people using needle shots on stories like this.
Show what measles looks like.
I'm also tired of people using needle shots on stories like this.
Show what measles looks like.
Gallatin Co. reports 2nd measles case, warns of exposure sites nbcmontana.com/news/local/g...
December 2, 2025 at 4:40 AM
Just imagining how much better it would be if ALL news stories about vaccine-preventable illnesses were illustrated with pictures of people with the disease, not pictures of needle injections. If you must show something that people will find scary & unpleasant, make it the disease, not the cure.
Reposted by Simmer
"Never spread the lie in the headline" should be a hard rule of 21st century journalism.
Research shows that repeating lies helps to spread them, and people read headlines more than they read stories.
Research shows that repeating lies helps to spread them, and people read headlines more than they read stories.
News media has to do better with headlines that present false and unverified public health claims.
November 30, 2025 at 1:10 AM
"Never spread the lie in the headline" should be a hard rule of 21st century journalism.
Research shows that repeating lies helps to spread them, and people read headlines more than they read stories.
Research shows that repeating lies helps to spread them, and people read headlines more than they read stories.
Reposted by Simmer
People think to make good music, you just need to have a good idea and then execute that idea effectively, but this is a false path. A better approach to making good music is to have a bad idea that you fail to effectively realize.
November 30, 2025 at 2:03 PM
People think to make good music, you just need to have a good idea and then execute that idea effectively, but this is a false path. A better approach to making good music is to have a bad idea that you fail to effectively realize.
Reposted by Simmer
I have written this thread up into a blog post, it has more extensive links to sources & previous conversations about fake content & users on the internet. It's easier to share, if you want to make sure your friends don't get caught in that honeypot of a corporate blogpost aramzs.xyz/microblogs/d...
Don't trust the human slop telling you how much of the web is AI slop
Is a lot of the web algorithmically created content? Possibly! But don't share the argument that's trying to sell you on creating more fake content.
aramzs.xyz
November 28, 2025 at 3:48 PM
I have written this thread up into a blog post, it has more extensive links to sources & previous conversations about fake content & users on the internet. It's easier to share, if you want to make sure your friends don't get caught in that honeypot of a corporate blogpost aramzs.xyz/microblogs/d...
Reposted by Simmer
I don’t know if anyone else notices or cares, but when I see a presentation in which the speaker uses obviously generated-AI images to illustrate their slides, it makes me immediately less confident in whatever other content they’re presenting.
November 28, 2025 at 3:07 PM
I don’t know if anyone else notices or cares, but when I see a presentation in which the speaker uses obviously generated-AI images to illustrate their slides, it makes me immediately less confident in whatever other content they’re presenting.
Reposted by Simmer
Pointing out that something is incorrect definitely isn't sufficient - the *culture* of "it is bad to make incorrect statements, good to promptly and clearly retract and apologize for them, and disqualifying to keep making them deliberately" is the framework needed for fact-checking to plug into.
November 28, 2025 at 3:34 PM
Pointing out that something is incorrect definitely isn't sufficient - the *culture* of "it is bad to make incorrect statements, good to promptly and clearly retract and apologize for them, and disqualifying to keep making them deliberately" is the framework needed for fact-checking to plug into.
Reposted by Simmer
Christmas is coming, and the Black Friday sales signal we’re in peak gift-buying season.
When you’re picking out gifts for friends and family this year, there’s a whole slew of tech products that are better to avoid. I put together a guide to help you through it.
When you’re picking out gifts for friends and family this year, there’s a whole slew of tech products that are better to avoid. I put together a guide to help you through it.
A tech critic’s guide to holiday gift-giving
Maybe your grandma doesn’t need that Alexa smart speaker
disconnect.blog
November 25, 2025 at 5:22 PM
Christmas is coming, and the Black Friday sales signal we’re in peak gift-buying season.
When you’re picking out gifts for friends and family this year, there’s a whole slew of tech products that are better to avoid. I put together a guide to help you through it.
When you’re picking out gifts for friends and family this year, there’s a whole slew of tech products that are better to avoid. I put together a guide to help you through it.
"So _Simulacra and Simulation_ is..."
"Baby food?"
"Wha... oh, nice. But I was going to say that the Wachowskis took some ideas..."
"Oh, the guy from Monsters Inc?"
"Alright."
"Baby food?"
"Wha... oh, nice. But I was going to say that the Wachowskis took some ideas..."
"Oh, the guy from Monsters Inc?"
"Alright."
November 26, 2025 at 3:13 AM
"So _Simulacra and Simulation_ is..."
"Baby food?"
"Wha... oh, nice. But I was going to say that the Wachowskis took some ideas..."
"Oh, the guy from Monsters Inc?"
"Alright."
"Baby food?"
"Wha... oh, nice. But I was going to say that the Wachowskis took some ideas..."
"Oh, the guy from Monsters Inc?"
"Alright."
Reposted by Simmer
Statement from President VanDassor on the actions of HSI in St Paul this morning
November 25, 2025 at 11:52 PM
Statement from President VanDassor on the actions of HSI in St Paul this morning
Reposted by Simmer
Seeing how much of the right-wing on Twitter is just bot farms, kinda lays bare how much hate and hatred is a project that needs to be constantly maintained, a fire that needs to be fed all the time lest it go out for a moment, so much time, effort, and resources to keep people angry and hateful.
November 24, 2025 at 1:54 PM
Seeing how much of the right-wing on Twitter is just bot farms, kinda lays bare how much hate and hatred is a project that needs to be constantly maintained, a fire that needs to be fed all the time lest it go out for a moment, so much time, effort, and resources to keep people angry and hateful.
Reposted by Simmer
somebody on here suggested awhile back that a pretty compelling 2028 Democrat campaign promise would be "on day one I will deploy a WPA-scale army of forensic accountants across every square inch of the federal government" and I think about that every day
It’s crazy to think about the crimes we’re going to learn about after this regime ends.
We’re already hearing about Watergate level crimes every week. Imagine what will come out after it’s over.
We’re going to need a full accounting of all that’s been done in violation of the constitution.
We’re already hearing about Watergate level crimes every week. Imagine what will come out after it’s over.
We’re going to need a full accounting of all that’s been done in violation of the constitution.
November 23, 2025 at 12:25 AM
somebody on here suggested awhile back that a pretty compelling 2028 Democrat campaign promise would be "on day one I will deploy a WPA-scale army of forensic accountants across every square inch of the federal government" and I think about that every day