Reposted by Knepherbird
Every day we pull three Verge stories out of the paywall for 24 hours, and today we're starting with a banger from @lopatto.bsky.social:
X’s deepfake porn feature clearly violates app store guidelines. Why won’t Apple and Google pull it?
www.theverge.com/policy/85990...
X’s deepfake porn feature clearly violates app store guidelines. Why won’t Apple and Google pull it?
www.theverge.com/policy/85990...
January 13, 2026 at 5:34 PM
Every day we pull three Verge stories out of the paywall for 24 hours, and today we're starting with a banger from @lopatto.bsky.social:
X’s deepfake porn feature clearly violates app store guidelines. Why won’t Apple and Google pull it?
www.theverge.com/policy/85990...
X’s deepfake porn feature clearly violates app store guidelines. Why won’t Apple and Google pull it?
www.theverge.com/policy/85990...
Reposted by Knepherbird
I have spent years of my life studying People Magazine and if this happened last year I would be floored — the magazine felt much more like an SEO farm than even a celebrity publication — but this is very much in line with *very* recent messaging
January 13, 2026 at 5:25 PM
I have spent years of my life studying People Magazine and if this happened last year I would be floored — the magazine felt much more like an SEO farm than even a celebrity publication — but this is very much in line with *very* recent messaging
Reposted by Knepherbird
There is a dynamic of “working towards the Führer” going on at the moment (you work out what the leader wants and give it to him). This has certain advantages for a tyrannical leader: it limits how directly you’re implicated, and you can drop the subordinate in it if it turns out to be inexpedient.
Wild reporting from Bloomberg. Jeanine Pirro apparently freelanced the subpoenas and criminal investigation of Jerome Powell.
January 13, 2026 at 6:37 AM
There is a dynamic of “working towards the Führer” going on at the moment (you work out what the leader wants and give it to him). This has certain advantages for a tyrannical leader: it limits how directly you’re implicated, and you can drop the subordinate in it if it turns out to be inexpedient.
Reposted by Knepherbird
Hmm: dunno. What's the French for "the weekend"?
January 13, 2026 at 7:07 AM
Hmm: dunno. What's the French for "the weekend"?
Reposted by Knepherbird
This woman is harder than goddamn steel dealing with these goddamn thugs. I want her to be my neighbor.
January 12, 2026 at 6:47 PM
This woman is harder than goddamn steel dealing with these goddamn thugs. I want her to be my neighbor.
Reposted by Knepherbird
The increasingly common habit of screenshotting the AI summary of a Google search and presenting it as evidence must be nipped in the bud immediately. That is nothing. That is not anything, it is not a thing.
January 13, 2026 at 3:13 AM
The increasingly common habit of screenshotting the AI summary of a Google search and presenting it as evidence must be nipped in the bud immediately. That is nothing. That is not anything, it is not a thing.
All those guys still in the bureau who remember investigating Catholic and mainline churches back in the 80s for their Central American activism are itching to get back in the field.
F.B.I. Inquiry Into ICE Shooting Is Examining Victim’s Possible Ties to Activist Groups www.nytimes.com/2026/01/12/u...
F.B.I. Inquiry Into ICE Shooting Is Examining Victim’s Possible Ties to Activist Groups
www.nytimes.com
January 13, 2026 at 1:19 AM
All those guys still in the bureau who remember investigating Catholic and mainline churches back in the 80s for their Central American activism are itching to get back in the field.
No law but our will.
Breaking NYT:
The Pentagon used a secret aircraft painted to look like a civilian plane in its first boat attack, according to officials briefed on the matter.
The laws of armed conflict forbid combatants from feigning civilian status.
That is a war crime called "perfidy."
The Pentagon used a secret aircraft painted to look like a civilian plane in its first boat attack, according to officials briefed on the matter.
The laws of armed conflict forbid combatants from feigning civilian status.
That is a war crime called "perfidy."
U.S. Attacked Boat With Aircraft That Looked Like a Civilian Plane
www.nytimes.com
January 13, 2026 at 12:50 AM
No law but our will.
Reposted by Knepherbird
[BBC Sport] Sam Heathcote, Macclesfield FC player, is greeted at the school where he is PE teacher after the FA Cup giant-killing v Crystal Palace
January 12, 2026 at 10:43 PM
[BBC Sport] Sam Heathcote, Macclesfield FC player, is greeted at the school where he is PE teacher after the FA Cup giant-killing v Crystal Palace
I was only a youth referee, so my experience is bounded, but it seems to me that in terms of match management, if a primary goal as a center referee is to try to have 11v11 until the end of the game you're more likely to lose control of a match.
January 12, 2026 at 11:36 PM
I was only a youth referee, so my experience is bounded, but it seems to me that in terms of match management, if a primary goal as a center referee is to try to have 11v11 until the end of the game you're more likely to lose control of a match.
Some people don't appear to understand the frisson of excitement involved in possessing some scandalous bit of knowledge that you will take to your grave.
A reader asked the Ethicist: I recently learned that my deceased father had a secret family. I don't know whether my mother knows. The revelation would devastate my sister and kids. What responsibility do I have to share or conceal the truth? nyti.ms/3LbGd1p
January 12, 2026 at 9:50 PM
Some people don't appear to understand the frisson of excitement involved in possessing some scandalous bit of knowledge that you will take to your grave.
Reposted by Knepherbird
"Bitter tears come to their eyes, and they say to you, 'You sound as if you think white people don't have any decency.' Well, this is much too simple. That is not the question. The question here is how long can Americans believe the rest of the world...will take the will for the deed."
January 12, 2026 at 8:54 PM
"Bitter tears come to their eyes, and they say to you, 'You sound as if you think white people don't have any decency.' Well, this is much too simple. That is not the question. The question here is how long can Americans believe the rest of the world...will take the will for the deed."
"I guess the anti-Iraq war crowd turned out to be right, but they made the fatal mistake of saying so too soon."
January 12, 2026 at 7:21 PM
"I guess the anti-Iraq war crowd turned out to be right, but they made the fatal mistake of saying so too soon."
let the reader understand
I don’t believe that there is one literal Antichrist, but if you’re looking for the Spirit of Antichrist I know where I would start at the moment.
January 12, 2026 at 5:59 PM
let the reader understand
If there ever was a war on protein, protein won it long ago, if my trips to the grocery store are any indication.
“No, I won’t be eating my vegetables” [scariest face I can muster]
January 12, 2026 at 2:30 PM
If there ever was a war on protein, protein won it long ago, if my trips to the grocery store are any indication.
Reposted by Knepherbird
If there’s one thing the 21st century has convinced me of, it’s that the 18th-century anti-gambling activists were 100% correct and we should have listened to them.
Oh god having live Polymarket predictions for Best Podcast on the Golden Globes is unspeakably gross
January 12, 2026 at 5:22 AM
If there’s one thing the 21st century has convinced me of, it’s that the 18th-century anti-gambling activists were 100% correct and we should have listened to them.
I'd forgotten how much good stuff there is in Unfinished Tales and how much of it is in service to the meta-narrative of the origin of the tales. This is from a *note* explaining how the scene of Isildur's death in "The Disaster of the Gladden Fields" was surmised, though there were no witnesses.
![But King Elessar, when he was crowned in Gondor, began the re-ordering of his realm, and one of his first tasks was the restoration of Orthanc, where he proposed to set up again the palantír recovered from Saruman. Then all the secrets of the tower were searched. Many things of worth were found, jewels and heirlooms of Eorl, filched from Edoras by the agency of Wormtongue during King Théoden’s decline, and other such things, more ancient and beautiful, from mounds and tombs far and wide. [Highlighted:] Saruman in his degradation had become not a dragon but a jackdaw.[End highlight] At last behind a hidden door that they could not have found or opened had not Elessar had the aid of Gimli the Dwarf a steel closet was revealed. Maybe it had been intended to receive the Ring; but it was almost bare. In a casket on a high shelf two things were laid. One was a small case of gold, attached to a fine chain; it was empty, and bore no letter or token, but beyond all doubt it had once borne the Ring about Isildur’s neck. Next to it...](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:btz2odnqydzpguphhnffxhiw/bafkreiac3vtz7s5jvdm2pdxfcrzh7le7klumbtlbe37i4xfhh4grc5g734@jpeg)
January 12, 2026 at 5:08 AM
I'd forgotten how much good stuff there is in Unfinished Tales and how much of it is in service to the meta-narrative of the origin of the tales. This is from a *note* explaining how the scene of Isildur's death in "The Disaster of the Gladden Fields" was surmised, though there were no witnesses.
Seriously? The whole "this is a distraction from the Epstein files" is sometimes a funny joke, but the idea that Trump is doing all this other stuff for any reason other than he really wants to and thinks he has the power to Is kind of stupid, imo.
Let's be clear. Donald Trump will indict the Fed Chair, kidnap foreign leaders and kill American citizens in MN if it distracts you from asking WTF is in the Epstein files because HIS BASE doesn't like pedophiles. None of this is normal. But everything he does is from weakness right now.
January 12, 2026 at 4:12 AM
Seriously? The whole "this is a distraction from the Epstein files" is sometimes a funny joke, but the idea that Trump is doing all this other stuff for any reason other than he really wants to and thinks he has the power to Is kind of stupid, imo.
Reposted by Knepherbird
I have very few hopes for anyone who thought Trump sounded smart up to this point.
You know the thing where Musk seems smart until he starts talking about things you know about? Finance dudes are about to go through that with Trump.
January 12, 2026 at 2:19 AM
I have very few hopes for anyone who thought Trump sounded smart up to this point.
Reposted by Knepherbird
Psychotic YouTube TV multiview preset
January 12, 2026 at 1:05 AM
Psychotic YouTube TV multiview preset
Reposted by Knepherbird
Do Wine Mom Crimes™
January 12, 2026 at 1:19 AM
Do Wine Mom Crimes™
Feeling like a lot of people are going to pick this up and then be scratching their heads and saying, "wtf?", but I'm a few pages in and it is absolutely my jam.
January 12, 2026 at 1:17 AM
Feeling like a lot of people are going to pick this up and then be scratching their heads and saying, "wtf?", but I'm a few pages in and it is absolutely my jam.
"If so, which license are they under?"
Are the fae open source.
Turning into my father one "the problem is no one reads enough books these days" grumble at a time
January 12, 2026 at 1:08 AM
"If so, which license are they under?"
TIL the Federal Reserve is on Bluesky
January 12, 2026 at 1:00 AM
TIL the Federal Reserve is on Bluesky