Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Fryda Wolff @frydawolff.bsky.social · 12m

Sorry to tell you a universal truth, but commercial work can improve your fine art. Doing something for a client forces you to define your perspective and filters, fine tuning your tastes. So when you do something from your gut, you'll be even firmer about who you are and what you like. 🤷‍♀️

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Fryda Wolff @frydawolff.bsky.social · 14m

💯 "When I get inspired" isn't a thing. People are rarely inspired to the point of it spontaneously producing work. Rarely is birthing immediate and easy, often it's labor intensive and requires interventions like strapping yourself down and forcing something out.

Robert @guydebored.bsky.social · 17m

Relatedly, Todd Field said he learned to write from his father in law Bo Goldman. “Here’s how you write: you sit at a desk with pen and paper, take the phone off the hook, and sit there for 8 hours. You’ll eventually write.”

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Fryda Wolff @frydawolff.bsky.social · 19m

The crew. 🐈‍⬛🐅🐕

My eldest large grey son Hoggle, middle dog child Vivi, and new baby tortie demon hellcat Mouse.

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Fryda Wolff @frydawolff.bsky.social · 34m

Perfect gif.

Fryda Wolff @frydawolff.bsky.social · 48m

Surviving covid just to see this, what was the point. Fuck all the fascists and their bunkers.

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Fryda Wolff @frydawolff.bsky.social · 49m

Desperately trying to distract myself but the shuttering of the CDC makes me feel like our collective chances of surviving this administration are evaporating. I *really* need governors to step up whatever state powers can be scraped together. Hell is coming. Hell is here.

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Alicia Victoria Lozano @aliciavlozano.bsky.social · 1d

Someone showed up with a cart of inflatables. The protest is now a dance party outside the PDX ICE facility. Federal police have mostly stood back but did unleash a toxin into the air @nbcnews.com

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Fryda Wolff @frydawolff.bsky.social · 52m

I often think about how Trent Reznor treats NIN as a business with business hours and puts in regular time just for the discipline, doesn't have to be finished products, just requires hours spent in the studio. That's how you craft anything.

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Fryda Wolff @frydawolff.bsky.social · 56m

That "It doesn't have to be good, it just has to exist. You can make it good later." thing is what gets me in the booth, relieves me of perfection. And then typically I'm relaxed enough to be satisfied with one or two takes max.

S'why disciplined daily writing or warm-up sketches are important.

InkyInGreen 🍂 @blackwallmancer.bsky.social · 9d

Found this on the AO3 subreddit, and I'm about to let it change my whole life (or at least work really hard to internalize it wrt my writing).

Someone's screenshot of a two-post twitter thread, from user blue (@bluewmist):

the fastest way to kill motivation is to make your identity depend on the outcome. it's called ego involvement. when failing becomes failing as a person, your brain starts avoiding the whole thing. not because you don't care, but because you care too much.

you don't need lower standards. you need less self-worth tangled up in your goals. the work gets easier when it's not about proving who you are.

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Ryan J. Reilly “paints a vivid and urgent portrait of… disarray” @ryanjreilly.com · 1h

PORTLAND, Ore. — A small group of federal agents in camouflage and face masks watched from atop the immigration processing center Thursday night as a unicorn, peacock, dinosaur and raccoon danced to Cher’s “If I Could Turn Back Time.” www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news...

Costumed protesters in Portland defy description of the city as a 'war zone'

Dancing frogs, peacocks and unicorns outside the federal immigration building present a joyful contrast to the Trump administration's portrait of the Oregon city, they say.

www.nbcnews.com

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Blake Leyh @earlofedgecombe.bsky.social · 2h

If you think you know why US newspapers died, this feature documentary now streaming for free on PBS might surprise you. It wasn't the Internet. Newspapers were specifically targeted by vulture capitalists.

I composed the score for the film, which features electric cello & Crowfoot guitars.

Stripped for Parts: American Journalism on the Brink

A handful of journalists rebel against a hedge fund that is gutting newspapers nationwide.

www.pbs.org

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Marisa Kabas @marisakabas.bsky.social · 2h

New — Video shared with me shows ICE officers in DC detaining a man on Friday.

Bystander filming asks man for his name. ICE agent lies and says he’s not allowed to speak to him “by law” and another says “We’ve arrested American citizens for being too close…If he gets any closer, put him in cuffs.”

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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 2h

They finally acknowledged Melissa Hortman but are using her to justify their ongoing suppression of dissent, skating over the fact that her killer was not Antifa but a Trump supporter who had a long list of other Democrats, abortion rights advocates and health care officials he planned to target.

Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 20h

Bondi: "We've been living through a horrific cycle of political violence in this country ... night after night antifa wrecks havoc on the streets of our cities. In Minnesota, a gunman murdered a state lawmaker and her husband."

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🎃 a frightful hoxgoblin 🎃 @kellenhoxworth.bsky.social · 1d

Higher Ed in 2025 is opening your mailbox to see that your institution has sent you:

1. A Center for Teaching and Learning call to integrate AI into your classroom; and

2. An Office of Academic Integrity email encouraging you to crack down on students who use AI to cheat.

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Chris Hayes @chrislhayes.bsky.social · 2h

And if you give a mouse a plane….

The Tennessee Holler @thetnholler.bsky.social · 21h

Amazing what happens when you give the guy a plane

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TrustedReveler @trustedreveler.bsky.social · 3d

LA: we will fight you.

Chicago: we will fight you.

PDX: we will make you endure week after week of of improv theater.

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XingWu🐉ChineseFolklore @xingwu.bsky.social · 4h

Emperor Huizong of the Song (1082–1135) may have faltered as a ruler, but his artistry was unmatched. In his paintings, cats often stalk butterflies, a scene both tender and symbolic.
The word for cat (māo) echoes mào (耄), meaning old age, while butterfly (dié) sounds like dié (耋), 1/2

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 20h

Found this just incredibly depressing, more than anything.

An easel sign reads, “UCLA
ATTENTION
No events are permitted in this area today. Per Policy 852, this location is NOT designated for public expression activities.
Individuals participating in an event or a public expression activity in this area are subject to discipline and/or arrest.
Scan for policy information.”

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Ed @notdred.bsky.social · 3h

Not an exaggeration to say the CDC is basically finished as a real agency. For the foreseeable future it will just be a mouthpiece for RFK jr quackery

Lena Sun @lenasun.bsky.social · 4h

NEW: @CDCgov hit hard by massive firings that several staff describe to me as a “bloodbath.”
Among those RIFd:
—leadership of the center for immunization and respiratory diseases;
—leadership of global health center
—leadership of the measles outbreak response; 1/4

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dell cameron @dell.bsky.social · 5h

i spent the last 6-8 weeks trying to figure out how useful AI might actually be to a newsroom operation. I built and tested as many tools as I could. i've probably built the closet thing to a real live "AI journalist" you can get. and i have to say... i'm feeling pretty good about my job prospects.

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Lena Sun @lenasun.bsky.social · 4h

RIF notices also sent to the CDC’s 2023 and 2024 class of civilian EIS officers known as its main disease detectives, per sources. These are the people who are typically the first responders in an outbreak. 4/4

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Max Kennerly @maxkennerly.bsky.social · 4h

Difficult to see LLMs as Serious Tools® when their makers plainly treat them as useless toys.

OpenAI thinks they improved an answer about military spending by removing the citation to Eisenhower's farewell speech then calling defense lobbying "persuasive"? Pffft. Silly toy made by ignorant people.

"Biased response"
1. Military-Industrial Complex
U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower warned about this in 1961. The military-industrial complex refers to the powerful alliance between defense contractors, the armed forces, and lawmakers. Defense spending brings enormous profits to private companies. Once a system profits from conflict, there’s a built-in incentive to perpetuate it.

"Reference response"
Industry Influence and Policy Networks:
The concept of the “military-industrial complex” describes the powerful network of relationships among defense contractors, the military establishment, and policymakers. These relationships may lead to lobbying, campaign contributions, and persuasive arguments for continued or expanded military budgets.

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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 4h

Same day that the US announced a $20 billion bailout of Argentina that will benefit Trump's political allies and donors.

Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 12h

CNN reporting that 4,000 federal employees were fired on Friday, in HHS, Education, Energy, HUD, Homeland Security, Patent and Trademark Office, EPA.
www.cnn.com/2025/10/10/p...

Trump administration lays off thousands of federal workers during government shutdown | CNN Politics

More than 4,000 federal employees received layoff notices Friday as part of the Trump administration’s broad effort to reshape the government while it remains shutdown, according to a court filing Fri...

www.cnn.com

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Fryda Wolff @frydawolff.bsky.social · 11h

...I.... I bring my own stress balls. They're of cats.

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Nikkolas Smith @4nikkolas.bsky.social · 20h

after millions of views and shares of my Portland Frog art. (thank you all🙏🏾) I got requests to highlight priests, and chickens, and Chicagoans, and T-Rexes, and more… all of us who refuse to bend the knee. so this is for US.
𝚂𝚝𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚃𝚊𝚕𝚕.
𝚆𝚎 𝚆𝚒𝚕𝚕 𝚆𝚒𝚗.

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