Lynn Cherny
@arnicas.bsky.social
Into creative ML/AI, NLP, data science and digital humanities, narrative, infovis, games, sf & f. Consultant, ds in Residence at Google Arts & Culture. (Lyon, FR) Newsletter arnicas.substack.com.
Fair. But I do think the AI games phenomenon -- why are so many being made, what does it mean that everyone wants to vibe code a game? is an interesting thing in itself. If I were still in research, I'd be looking into that (ethnographically).
February 14, 2026 at 10:02 AM
Fair. But I do think the AI games phenomenon -- why are so many being made, what does it mean that everyone wants to vibe code a game? is an interesting thing in itself. If I were still in research, I'd be looking into that (ethnographically).
This will not be a popular observation, but I think people are currently making zillions of games with tools like three.js + ai. I can’t move for them on the other site. Just like any period, quality is a different question.
February 14, 2026 at 8:04 AM
This will not be a popular observation, but I think people are currently making zillions of games with tools like three.js + ai. I can’t move for them on the other site. Just like any period, quality is a different question.
for me it was the cheeky scarf and hat. but yeah, it's astounding.
February 13, 2026 at 2:58 PM
for me it was the cheeky scarf and hat. but yeah, it's astounding.
Not using Claude to write my newsletter, but made a skill to turn my db of links into html in groups for me to easily cut and paste before writing. It has opinions 😜 "The LLM/AI section is pretty heavy — you might want to split some of those out or move a few to Misc. Let me know what you think!"
February 13, 2026 at 2:56 PM
Not using Claude to write my newsletter, but made a skill to turn my db of links into html in groups for me to easily cut and paste before writing. It has opinions 😜 "The LLM/AI section is pretty heavy — you might want to split some of those out or move a few to Misc. Let me know what you think!"
those are pretty old models by now though
February 12, 2026 at 8:18 PM
those are pretty old models by now though
Reposted by Lynn Cherny
Vector search using only Parquet and DataFusion – Xiangpeng’s blog
Just tune your existing stack
blog.xiangpeng.systems
February 11, 2026 at 11:57 PM
Reposted by Lynn Cherny
We (in DDH at KCL) are pleased to announce that registration is now open for The Digital Conference 2026, which will take place from 23 to 26 June 2026 at Bush House, King’s College London.
Registration: estore.kcl.ac.uk/conferences-...
Registration: estore.kcl.ac.uk/conferences-...
The Digital Conference 2026 | King's College London eStore
From the 23rd to 26th June 2026, the Department of Digital Humanities at King’s College London will host an international conference exploring the ev
estore.kcl.ac.uk
February 10, 2026 at 12:22 PM
We (in DDH at KCL) are pleased to announce that registration is now open for The Digital Conference 2026, which will take place from 23 to 26 June 2026 at Bush House, King’s College London.
Registration: estore.kcl.ac.uk/conferences-...
Registration: estore.kcl.ac.uk/conferences-...
yeah i went away for a weekend and left my Claude box at home to give my over achieving a break 😅
February 9, 2026 at 8:26 PM
yeah i went away for a weekend and left my Claude box at home to give my over achieving a break 😅
Reposted by Lynn Cherny
For Some Reason, Someone Who Generates AI Slop Books Has Unmasked Herself gizmodo.com/for-some-rea...
For Some Reason, Someone Who Generates AI Slop Books Has Unmasked Herself
Someone who calls herself
gizmodo.com
February 9, 2026 at 11:58 AM
For Some Reason, Someone Who Generates AI Slop Books Has Unmasked Herself gizmodo.com/for-some-rea...
Reposted by Lynn Cherny
I made a map of 3.4 million Bluesky users - see if you can find yourself!
bluesky-map.theo.io
I've seen some similar projects, but IMO this seems to better capture some of the fine-grained detail
bluesky-map.theo.io
I've seen some similar projects, but IMO this seems to better capture some of the fine-grained detail
Bluesky Map
Interactive map of 3.4 million Bluesky users, visualised by their follower pattern.
bluesky-map.theo.io
February 8, 2026 at 10:59 PM
I made a map of 3.4 million Bluesky users - see if you can find yourself!
bluesky-map.theo.io
I've seen some similar projects, but IMO this seems to better capture some of the fine-grained detail
bluesky-map.theo.io
I've seen some similar projects, but IMO this seems to better capture some of the fine-grained detail
Open Data Practices of Art Museum on Wikidata (via wikipedia research newsletter) #glam #museums openhumanitiesdata.metajnl.com/articles/10....
Open Data Practices of Art Museums in Wikidata: A Compliance Assessment | Journal of Open Humanities Data
openhumanitiesdata.metajnl.com
February 6, 2026 at 8:31 AM
Open Data Practices of Art Museum on Wikidata (via wikipedia research newsletter) #glam #museums openhumanitiesdata.metajnl.com/articles/10....
it seems like openai might be petty about it
February 5, 2026 at 2:03 PM
it seems like openai might be petty about it
what happens if you ask codex to update your claude.md 🤔
Claude Code overview - Claude Code Docs
Learn about Claude Code, Anthropic's agentic coding tool that works in your terminal, IDE, desktop app, and browser to help you turn ideas into code faster than ever before.
claude.md
February 5, 2026 at 1:31 PM
what happens if you ask codex to update your claude.md 🤔
heh - i was worried my slam would be seen as rude — it does “go somewhere” but i didn’t like the destination or the way it was described as science fictional by some; and am solidly bored by marital woes
February 5, 2026 at 8:35 AM
heh - i was worried my slam would be seen as rude — it does “go somewhere” but i didn’t like the destination or the way it was described as science fictional by some; and am solidly bored by marital woes
A new creative writing style bench and leaderboard for LLMs surgehq.ai/blog/hemingw...
Hemingway-bench AI Writing Leaderboard
Stop rewarding slop. Hemingway-bench is an AI writing leaderboard that takes real-world writing tasks and puts them in front of master wordsmiths. Our goal: to push AI writing from two-second vibes to...
surgehq.ai
February 5, 2026 at 7:38 AM
A new creative writing style bench and leaderboard for LLMs surgehq.ai/blog/hemingw...
Ok, i might quibble about the results (it wasn't Deep Research) but this Gemini app report with a MAP (I LIVE FOR MAPS) on places for a getaway was above and beyond.
February 4, 2026 at 10:23 AM
Ok, i might quibble about the results (it wasn't Deep Research) but this Gemini app report with a MAP (I LIVE FOR MAPS) on places for a getaway was above and beyond.
yeah, i have saved a skill for that but haven't turned it on yet
February 4, 2026 at 10:14 AM
yeah, i have saved a skill for that but haven't turned it on yet
i passed them into Nano Banana to make them non-ascii system diagrams, so good
February 4, 2026 at 8:58 AM
i passed them into Nano Banana to make them non-ascii system diagrams, so good
does not change the fact that its diagrams are ace 😜
February 3, 2026 at 10:19 AM
does not change the fact that its diagrams are ace 😜
God, Claude's ascii diagrams are insanely good.
February 3, 2026 at 9:30 AM
God, Claude's ascii diagrams are insanely good.
plenty of game recs in my media recs edition! Outer Wilds for sure, beautiful and strange. Death Stranding. Fallout 4 is very pretty. I’ll check my list…
February 2, 2026 at 8:17 PM
plenty of game recs in my media recs edition! Outer Wilds for sure, beautiful and strange. Death Stranding. Fallout 4 is very pretty. I’ll check my list…
First rec (I could see it coming) was Slow Gods, which I also rec'd as one of my fav recent sf reads... really, really good. (I added the others he lists to my todo list.)
I've noticed a microgenre shift in SF over the last year - or possibly just in the books I've come across. Specifically, a bit of a boom in big concept space opera books working in the Banks/Hamilton ideaspace. Meaning SF that simultaneously delivers a strong action storyline against a backdrop
February 2, 2026 at 3:39 PM
First rec (I could see it coming) was Slow Gods, which I also rec'd as one of my fav recent sf reads... really, really good. (I added the others he lists to my todo list.)
Reposted by Lynn Cherny
Don't spend the day thinking about how seemingly everyone who runs the world is implicated in an increasingly-horrifying paedophile murder island conspiracy! Instead, enjoy the fact that someone's made Quake playable in-browser - this is ACE: mrdoob.github.io/three-quake/ (via @arnicas.bsky.social)
February 2, 2026 at 9:32 AM
Don't spend the day thinking about how seemingly everyone who runs the world is implicated in an increasingly-horrifying paedophile murder island conspiracy! Instead, enjoy the fact that someone's made Quake playable in-browser - this is ACE: mrdoob.github.io/three-quake/ (via @arnicas.bsky.social)