Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

S. H. Marr @shmarr.bsky.social · 3h

I just want to read something in which friends make each other laugh. Smothered giggles. Helpless guffaws. Inside jokes. Knowing looks. You see the vision.

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Reposted by S. H. Marr

Rebecca @bluebec.bsky.social · 1d

For newer users of BlueSky, please alt-text your images. It helps people who use screen-readers or who have slow internet connections understand the image you've uploaded. Make the web accessible.

I rarely reshare images without alt-text & I know others do the same. Alt-text your images for reach

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S. H. Marr @shmarr.bsky.social · 20h

People need to openly and sincerely compliment their friends more.

Teasing is fun and all, but showing people you genuinely appreciate and respect them is so important.

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S. H. Marr @shmarr.bsky.social · 20h

I have absolutely nothing to work with my friend

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S. H. Marr @shmarr.bsky.social · 1d

October always gets me bad for story vibes and I never have time for them.

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S. H. Marr @shmarr.bsky.social · 1d

It is Halloween season and this I am possessed by the wild desire to write a story that is basically “hold hands with me while we step into the darkness and brave through it together” vibes.

No I don’t have characters or a plot. I have yearning.

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Reposted by S. H. Marr

Prasad Jallepalli, MD, PhD @prasad.bsky.social · 2d

it is so important for the public to know about this terrible waste of talent, curiosity, wonder, and progress

too much of science -- how it's made, who makes it, and how and why -- is hidden from public view

these stories need to be told

Carl Zimmer @carlzimmer.com · 2d

Today my @nytimes.com colleagues and I are launching a new series called Lost Science. We interview US scientists who can no longer discover something new about our world, thanks to this year‘s cuts. Here is my first interview with a scientist who studied bees and fires. Gift link: nyti.ms/3IWXbiE

nyti.ms

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S. H. Marr @shmarr.bsky.social · 1d

I am increasingly of the opinion that if a plot twist doesn't twist you to look at the entire previous part of the story from a new lens, it is both not a plot twist, and not that interesting.

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Reposted by S. H. Marr

Sandstone @quartzen.bsky.social · 1d

Yeah! The question I wish authors ask themselves about plot twists is "wait, does this twist actually make this more typical and less interesting" because unfortunately more often than not the answer is "yes"

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S. H. Marr @shmarr.bsky.social · 1d

It’s kind of sad that I’m lucky my parents never make noises about grandkids even though none of their children have kids, or, at this point, are going to have kids.

Although maybe it’s easier for them not to think about that when both of my brothers are helpless disasters still.

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S. H. Marr @shmarr.bsky.social · 2d

Decided to check FB for like my once a year check, and found this from 13 years ago.

Remember when the web wasn't all algorithms?

Jesus this was depressing.

A shoddily-censored screenshot from FB. It reads, from 13 years ago today, "Today, Facebook decided to show me a post from Barack Obama even though I don't like him on Facebook.

None of my friends shared the post. Facebook simply decided to tell me what I should like."

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Reposted by S. H. Marr

The Octopus Gallery @octopusgallery.bsky.social · 3d

Good news for sewists: the paper pattern company feared lost to bankruptcy has been saved as an independent company.

craftindustryalliance.org/sewing-patte...

Sewing Patterns Rise from DGA Bankruptcy Ashes - Craft Industry Alliance

The “Big 4” sewing patterns are saved. Simplicity, McCall’s, Vogue & Butterick get new life under Rubelmann Capital.

craftindustryalliance.org

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S. H. Marr @shmarr.bsky.social · 2d

Specificity, even specificity we don’t necessarily share, is deeply compelling. We need politicians willing to have personalities and cultures.

Reposted by S. H. Marr

Ghostly Bree @mostlybree.kitrocha.com · 2d

this feels like the corollary to we need Mamdani in NYC and an oyster fisherman in Maine and a midwestern dad in Minnesota.

we're supposed to be the party that embraces the fact that we're a diverse and chaotic nation, stop test-polling yourself to generic national oatmeal!!!

Constant Scream @ajaxsinger.bsky.social · 2d

It's interesting seeing the different ways resistance has formed in different cities. Los Angeles Organized, Chicago Radicalized, and Portland Got Weird as Fuck. All 3 have had success unifying their respective cities.

I guess my point is there are multiple paths to ungovernability.

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S. H. Marr @shmarr.bsky.social · 3d

Was just about to google whether or not the rate at which your fingernails grow as you age changes because I swear I did not have to trim them this much as a kid.

Then I remembered I used to chew my nails.

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Reposted by S. H. Marr

Kevin M. Kruse @kevinmkruse.bsky.social · 3d

"Look, the President clearly has some kind of dementia" should be how Democrats begin every single comment to reporters these days.

Eric Michael Garcia @ericmgarcia.bsky.social · 4d

Ruben Gallego on whether Trump is talking to Democrats:

“Look, the President clearly has some kind of dementia, so I think there's a he's probably talking to himself, or think he's talking to a Democrat, but I sincerely doubt that that's actually he's actually physically talking to a Democrat.“

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Reposted by S. H. Marr

C Baker @ccbeta.bsky.social · 3d

I love this paragraph:

“One of the chants that has become ubiquitous at these protests at Broadview is, ‘Love your neighbor, love your God, save your soul and quit your job,’” said Black, who pastors at the First Presbyterian Church of Chicago. “Everybody chants that.”

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S. H. Marr @shmarr.bsky.social · 4d

I just think any company “too big to fail”, aka their destruction would destroy the economy, should be bailed out and the promptly cut to shreds by the FTC because they are clearly violating some antitrust statutes. It should be illegal to be too big to fail.

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S. H. Marr @shmarr.bsky.social · 4d

GenAI is regurgitated gobbledygook that says nothing at all no matter how many words it uses, there is never any point or progression to the words.

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S. H. Marr @shmarr.bsky.social · 4d

*whispers* Listen to me. You’re a better writer than any GenAI. No matter how hard you find it to put things into words, no matter how artless the words are, how stiff it feels and how confusingly it is written.

You are still better than AI. Because you are actually trying to communicate something.

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Reposted by S. H. Marr

Nome @nome.bsky.social · 4d

For me, there was this, but at base it was even simpler:

Whatever my attitude about it was, the people I wanted to follow didn't feel safe or welcome there.

I'm not joining a site to be somewhere alone, but to be where people are that I want to be in community with.

Mastodon turned them away.

Sarah ⚧ ✡︎ @sarahkorse.bsky.social · 4d

"Go to Mastodon". I tried that. But it came off as a honey pot for people who get sexually aroused by the thought of watching normies try to install Linux.

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S. H. Marr @shmarr.bsky.social · 4d

IDK what else you call "People boarded up their windows and doors with plywood with 'There are children upstairs' painted on it and a civilian is killing other civilians and also you can't go outside after 7pm."

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S. H. Marr @shmarr.bsky.social · 4d

As someone from Kenosha…IDK, I feel like the first shots in this have been fired.

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S. H. Marr @shmarr.bsky.social · 4d

People are red-state, blue-state thinking about this when everywhere is purple which makes everywhere a potential war zone.

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S. H. Marr @shmarr.bsky.social · 5d

Same reason the UK cops have been annoyed at protestors going "floppy"--it's hard to hold them and they look ridiculous needing five people to carry one skinny teenager.

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