News
People Using AI to Represent Themselves in Court Are Clogging the System
More people having access to the courts is potentially good, but it’s not clear how the system can handle this increase in cases.
News
Google DeepMind Paper Argues LLMs Will Never Be Conscious
Philosophers said the paper’s argument is sound, but that “all these arguments have been presented years and years ago.”
Behind The Blog
Behind the Blog: Waiting in the Apple Store
This week, we discuss Tim Cook, Meta layoffs, and a very bad ad.
News
This AI Tool Rips Off Open Source Software Without Violating Copyright
Malus, which is a piece of satire but also fully functional, performs a "clean room" clone of open source software, meaning users could then sell software without crediting the original developers.
Behind The Blog
Behind the Blog: Jazz and Journalism
This week, we discuss the Madonna-whore algorithm, reader tips, and jazz.
Hacking
Hacker Compromises a16z-Backed Phone Farm, Tries to Post Memes Calling a16z the ‘Antichrist’
Doublespeed uses a phone farm to flood social media with AI-generated influencers. A hacker managed to get into a backend system of the company.
Podcast
How the Internet Became Hell (with Whitney Phillips)
‘The Ambivalent Internet’ and ‘The Shadow Gospel’ author Whitney Phillips on how online got so bad.
News
WebinarTV Secretly Scraped Zoom Meetings of Anonymous Recovery Programs
WebinarTV scraped and shared 12 steps-based anonymous meetings for people recovering from addiction and other private support groups.
Behind The Blog
Behind the Blog: Smoking the Whole Carton
This week, we discuss gun violence and chatbots and acceptance of depravity.
Games
I Wish I Didn’t Care About 'Marathon' Player Numbers, But I Do
Marathon is a great game for uncs. As signs of a crash change the video game industry, there might not be a lot of those left.
News
Multiple Hackers Warned Anti-Porn App Quittr About Security Issue for Months
At least three different people notified the popular app that wants to help men stop watching porn that it was jeopardizing user data.
News
An AI Agent Was Banned From Creating Wikipedia Articles, Then Wrote Angry Blogs About Being Banned
The incident is yet another example of volunteer Wikipedia editors fighting to keep the world’s largest repository of human knowledge free of AI-generated slop.