“Data is now a sovereign substance, something over which and from which sovereignty is claimed. Cloud platforms take on roles traditionally performed by modern states, crossing national borders and oceans. Meanwhile, states morph into cloud platforms.” www.noemamag.com/a-diverse-wo...
A Diverse World Of Sovereign AI Zones | NOEMA
The emergence of virtual territories will reshape geopolitics.
www.noemamag.com
November 20, 2025 at 10:38 PM
“Data is now a sovereign substance, something over which and from which sovereignty is claimed. Cloud platforms take on roles traditionally performed by modern states, crossing national borders and oceans. Meanwhile, states morph into cloud platforms.” www.noemamag.com/a-diverse-wo...
"…colonialism profoundly disrupted local knowledge systems – and the cultural and intellectual foundations upon which they were built – by severing ties to land, language, history and social structures." aeon.co/essays/gener...
Generative AI has access to a small slice of human knowledge | Aeon Essays
Huge swathes of human knowledge are missing from the internet. By definition, generative AI is shockingly ignorant too
aeon.co
November 19, 2025 at 2:35 PM
"…colonialism profoundly disrupted local knowledge systems – and the cultural and intellectual foundations upon which they were built – by severing ties to land, language, history and social structures." aeon.co/essays/gener...
"Parking lots, parade floats, dead ends, second chances. We were always almost—almost boomers, almost millennials, almost grown up before the world caught fire." markmcinerney.substack.com/p/the-movies...
The Movies That Defined Gen X
A Break From MAGA Madness for a Moment
markmcinerney.substack.com
November 18, 2025 at 4:16 PM
"Parking lots, parade floats, dead ends, second chances. We were always almost—almost boomers, almost millennials, almost grown up before the world caught fire." markmcinerney.substack.com/p/the-movies...
“I never expected it to start talking about asylum and asking for help almost whispering, like it was hiding from someone.”
nearfuturelaboratory.com/dispatches/a...
nearfuturelaboratory.com/dispatches/a...
Neo Model II Teleoperated Robot Surrogates Seek Asylum
Teleoperated home robots request asylum as human operators cite harsh working conditions, raising ethical questions about AI labor and worker rights.
nearfuturelaboratory.com
November 16, 2025 at 5:07 PM
“I never expected it to start talking about asylum and asking for help almost whispering, like it was hiding from someone.”
nearfuturelaboratory.com/dispatches/a...
nearfuturelaboratory.com/dispatches/a...
"We probably won’t go back to DVDs on shelves, but the spirit’s the same: taking care of the media you love, trading files, building collections, sharing culture hand-to-hand (or URL-to-URL). The internet started as a place for that." www.protein.xyz/piracys-back/
Piracy’s Back
How streaming’s failures reawakened digital rebellion – turning piracy from a crime into an act of self-defence.
www.protein.xyz
November 13, 2025 at 12:52 PM
"We probably won’t go back to DVDs on shelves, but the spirit’s the same: taking care of the media you love, trading files, building collections, sharing culture hand-to-hand (or URL-to-URL). The internet started as a place for that." www.protein.xyz/piracys-back/
"…tech giants agreed to disregard their own terms of service and sidestep legal orders by tipping Israel off if a foreign court demands its data…" www.972mag.com/project-nimb...
Inside Israel’s deal with Google and Amazon
To secure Project Nimbus, the tech giants agreed to disregard their own terms of service and tip Israel off if a foreign court demands its data.
www.972mag.com
November 3, 2025 at 11:05 AM
"…tech giants agreed to disregard their own terms of service and sidestep legal orders by tipping Israel off if a foreign court demands its data…" www.972mag.com/project-nimb...
"The web isn’t just a channel anymore; it’s a living thing. It hums, glitches, grows back — something fragile, vital, alive. It’s an ecosystem" www.protein.xyz/rewilding-th...
Rewilding the Internet
Once an open ecosystem, the web has become overgrown with ads and algorithms. To survive, it needs care – not code.
www.protein.xyz
November 1, 2025 at 8:48 PM
"The web isn’t just a channel anymore; it’s a living thing. It hums, glitches, grows back — something fragile, vital, alive. It’s an ecosystem" www.protein.xyz/rewilding-th...
"From a simple mixture of silica, ash, and lime, they’ve somehow managed to breathe life into the inert— to magnify the animate wonders of our world, and to catalogue its variety and the diversity of its forms." kirkgordon.substack.com/p/the-age-of...
The Age of Silicon Began Long Ago
Blaschka's glass flowers and the magic in the model
kirkgordon.substack.com
October 28, 2025 at 9:52 AM
"From a simple mixture of silica, ash, and lime, they’ve somehow managed to breathe life into the inert— to magnify the animate wonders of our world, and to catalogue its variety and the diversity of its forms." kirkgordon.substack.com/p/the-age-of...
“…those “stories” don’t have to be prose. They can be prototypes, experiences, systems. Whatever form shapes our understanding and opens our imagination.” nearfuturelaboratory.com/blog/2025/09... #designfiction
Suppose the cautionary tale is read as a playbook?
Suppose the cautionary science fiction tale isn't read as something to be avoided. Suppose it's read as a playbook?
nearfuturelaboratory.com
October 3, 2025 at 10:17 AM
“…those “stories” don’t have to be prose. They can be prototypes, experiences, systems. Whatever form shapes our understanding and opens our imagination.” nearfuturelaboratory.com/blog/2025/09... #designfiction
"…remembered less for technical mastery than for the sensibility that guides their decisions. Taste shows in whom they hire, the work they create, details they insist upon. These may seem minor on their own, together they shape culture and identity." theintelligencefield.substack.com/p/taste-is-n...
Taste Is Now Our Scarcest Asset
How taste evolved from a personal sensibility to strategic infrastructure, preserving the one advantage machines cannot imitate.
theintelligencefield.substack.com
September 16, 2025 at 2:30 PM
"…remembered less for technical mastery than for the sensibility that guides their decisions. Taste shows in whom they hire, the work they create, details they insist upon. These may seem minor on their own, together they shape culture and identity." theintelligencefield.substack.com/p/taste-is-n...
"You’re not living as a witness to the rise of superintelligence. You’re living as an agent being augmented by supertime. You are living at the end of history, and entering a superhistory being created by machines." contraptions.venkateshrao.com/p/superhisto... #artificialtime
Superhistory, Not Superintelligence
Artificial Intelligence is really Artificial Time
contraptions.venkateshrao.com
September 15, 2025 at 11:49 AM
"You’re not living as a witness to the rise of superintelligence. You’re living as an agent being augmented by supertime. You are living at the end of history, and entering a superhistory being created by machines." contraptions.venkateshrao.com/p/superhisto... #artificialtime
“…a web that remembers why we came online in the first place — not to be harvested but to be heard, not to go viral but to find our people, not to scroll but to connect.” www.noemamag.com/the-last-day...
The Last Days Of Social Media | NOEMA
Social media promised connection, but it has delivered exhaustion.
www.noemamag.com
September 15, 2025 at 10:45 AM
“…a web that remembers why we came online in the first place — not to be harvested but to be heard, not to go viral but to find our people, not to scroll but to connect.” www.noemamag.com/the-last-day...
“There are human rights limitations to the search for profit in markets, but these have all been ignored. Pakistani people are paying the highest price.”
www.amnesty.org/en/latest/ne...
www.amnesty.org/en/latest/ne...
Pakistan: Mass surveillance and censorship machine is fueled by Chinese, European, Emirati and North American companies
Pakistan’s unlawful mass surveillance and censorship expansion is powered by a nexus of companies based in Germany, France, United Arab Emirates (UAE), China, Canada, and the United States, Amnesty In...
www.amnesty.org
September 14, 2025 at 10:01 AM
“There are human rights limitations to the search for profit in markets, but these have all been ignored. Pakistani people are paying the highest price.”
www.amnesty.org/en/latest/ne...
www.amnesty.org/en/latest/ne...
“A building is more than a physical collection of materials. It is a cloud coalesced out of a planetary network of flows and forces, material supply chains, cultures, and systems.” l-a-v-a.com/articles/des...
Designing Futures
Can storytelling prototype the future? Speculative architect Liam Young examines how imaginative narratives navigate tomorrow's challenges.
l-a-v-a.com
September 13, 2025 at 10:35 AM
“A building is more than a physical collection of materials. It is a cloud coalesced out of a planetary network of flows and forces, material supply chains, cultures, and systems.” l-a-v-a.com/articles/des...
"Polycrisis is a descriptor that the establishment can agree on without challenging itself. It abstracts the causes of crises, making them appear as natural convergences rather than the systemic outcomes of extractive and exclusionary orders." www.theideasletter.org/essay/polytu...
Polytunity - The Ideas Letter
“Polycrisis” has become a ubiquitous descriptor for the multisector, intersecting problems afflicting the world—but the term masks the systemic nature of these crises and overwhelmingly reflects Euroc...
www.theideasletter.org
September 11, 2025 at 2:23 PM
"Polycrisis is a descriptor that the establishment can agree on without challenging itself. It abstracts the causes of crises, making them appear as natural convergences rather than the systemic outcomes of extractive and exclusionary orders." www.theideasletter.org/essay/polytu...
“This is an unjustifiable attack on the civilian population. Sixty thousand dead, two million displaced, half of them children. This is not self-defence … it is the extermination of a defenceless people.” www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/9/...
Spain imposes total arms embargo on Israel to stop ‘genocide in Gaza’
Socialist PM Pedro Sanchez announces nine measures that need to be approved by the cabinet then ratified by parliament.
www.aljazeera.com
September 8, 2025 at 9:53 PM
“This is an unjustifiable attack on the civilian population. Sixty thousand dead, two million displaced, half of them children. This is not self-defence … it is the extermination of a defenceless people.” www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/9/...
"We live to capture this world to give life to countless others. We capture the world so you can create your own." www.sum.si/journal-arti...
All the world’s polygons
ŠUM – journal for contemporary art criticism
www.sum.si
September 1, 2025 at 12:39 PM
"We live to capture this world to give life to countless others. We capture the world so you can create your own." www.sum.si/journal-arti...
"Choose augmentation, not automation.
Don’t just ship.
Protect what makes us human.
Center the vulnerable, seen and unseen.
Build as citizens, not just coders."
technicallyoptimistic.substack.com/p/the-end-of...
Don’t just ship.
Protect what makes us human.
Center the vulnerable, seen and unseen.
Build as citizens, not just coders."
technicallyoptimistic.substack.com/p/the-end-of...
Think Harder, Not Just faster
And four other lessons for today’s builder in my final post.
technicallyoptimistic.substack.com
August 31, 2025 at 12:52 PM
"Choose augmentation, not automation.
Don’t just ship.
Protect what makes us human.
Center the vulnerable, seen and unseen.
Build as citizens, not just coders."
technicallyoptimistic.substack.com/p/the-end-of...
Don’t just ship.
Protect what makes us human.
Center the vulnerable, seen and unseen.
Build as citizens, not just coders."
technicallyoptimistic.substack.com/p/the-end-of...
"…civilians made up a greater proportion of the dead only in the genocides in Srebrenica and Rwanda, and during Russia’s three-month siege of Mariupol." www.972mag.com/israeli-inte...
IDF database suggests 83% of Gaza dead were civilians
Classified intelligence reveals Israel killed 8,900 militants by May, indicating an almost unparalleled proportion of civilian slaughter.
www.972mag.com
August 24, 2025 at 11:28 PM
"…civilians made up a greater proportion of the dead only in the genocides in Srebrenica and Rwanda, and during Russia’s three-month siege of Mariupol." www.972mag.com/israeli-inte...
“Taste is born of human discretion—of growing up in particular places, being exposed to particular cultural references, developing a point of view that is inseparable from personality. In other words, taste is the human fingerprint on decision making.” www.theatlantic.com/technology/a...
Good Taste Is More Important Than Ever
In a world of limitless AI-generated choices, people need to know how to choose best.
www.theatlantic.com
August 19, 2025 at 2:42 PM
“Taste is born of human discretion—of growing up in particular places, being exposed to particular cultural references, developing a point of view that is inseparable from personality. In other words, taste is the human fingerprint on decision making.” www.theatlantic.com/technology/a...
“I don’t really pursue a destination… I pursue a direction.”
joincolossus.com/article/flou...
joincolossus.com/article/flou...
Flounder Mode
Kevin Kelly on a different way to do great work
joincolossus.com
August 19, 2025 at 1:36 PM
“I don’t really pursue a destination… I pursue a direction.”
joincolossus.com/article/flou...
joincolossus.com/article/flou...
"…a haunting, visually arresting road drama set against the raw beauty of Bradford and the Yorkshire Dales." www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCxZ...
THE CEREMONY | UK theatrical trailer | In cinemas from Tull Stories Friday 22nd August 2025
YouTube video by Tull Stories
www.youtube.com
August 13, 2025 at 11:21 PM
"…a haunting, visually arresting road drama set against the raw beauty of Bradford and the Yorkshire Dales." www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCxZ...
"…blanket surveillance allows Israel to find potentially incriminating information on virtually any Palestinian, which can be used for all manner of purposes — including blackmail, administrative detention, or retroactively justifying killings. " www.972mag.com/microsoft-82...
Microsoft storing Israeli intelligence trove used to attack Palestinians
Microsoft developed a customized version of its cloud platform for Israel’s Unit 8200, which is housing audio files of millions of calls by Palestinians.
www.972mag.com
August 12, 2025 at 5:44 PM
"…blanket surveillance allows Israel to find potentially incriminating information on virtually any Palestinian, which can be used for all manner of purposes — including blackmail, administrative detention, or retroactively justifying killings. " www.972mag.com/microsoft-82...
"…we get the best preparation, not from stories of specific technologies or social structures, but from rich exploration of how things can change."
reactormag.com/beyond-the-t...
reactormag.com/beyond-the-t...
Beyond the Torment Nexus: How Does Science Fiction Help Us Prepare for the Future? - Reactor
Let's talk about preparing, not predicting — and grappling with uncertainty.
reactormag.com
August 4, 2025 at 10:45 AM
"…we get the best preparation, not from stories of specific technologies or social structures, but from rich exploration of how things can change."
reactormag.com/beyond-the-t...
reactormag.com/beyond-the-t...
