Ryan Schnurr
ryanschnurr.bsky.social
Ryan Schnurr
@ryanschnurr.bsky.social
Prof, laborer, public humanist. American Studies + film/TV + built environment.
ryanschnurr.com
Reposted by Ryan Schnurr
The entanglement of private equity and tech in our institutional operations is a massive threat to how free we get to be going forward. www.chronicle.com/article/the-...
The ‘Crisis of the Humanities’ Is Over. That’s Not a Good Thing.
All of higher ed now suffers the attacks of politics and technology.
www.chronicle.com
December 29, 2025 at 2:55 PM
Reposted by Ryan Schnurr
NEW: By a 6-3 vote, the Supreme Court blocks Trump’s deployment of the National Guard to Chicago to assist immigration agents. A majority holds that he likely lacks authority to do so. Thomas, Alito, and Gorsuch dissent. www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/25p...
December 23, 2025 at 8:16 PM
Reposted by Ryan Schnurr
via The New Yorker, Ellis Rosen cartoon
December 23, 2025 at 5:31 AM
Reposted by Ryan Schnurr
"This promise of an AI future, is really just a collective anxiety that wealthy people have about how well they're gonna be able to control us in the future."

- @tressiemcphd.bsky.social with an absolute mic drop moment about AI bullshit.

Incredible words.
Listen to all of it!
December 19, 2025 at 12:24 PM
Reposted by Ryan Schnurr
It's fitting that the cover on AI mindlessly apes an earlier creation and also displaces workers while elevating Silicon Valley plutocrats.
December 12, 2025 at 3:40 AM
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Indiana Republicans rejected a proposal to redraw the state's congressional maps despite a furious pressure campaign by Trump
Trump's Bid To Rig Indiana Congressional Map Goes Down In Flames
After two months of pressure and violent threats, Republican state senators voted against Trump's effort to eliminate two House seats held by Democrats.
www.huffpost.com
December 11, 2025 at 9:46 PM
Reposted by Ryan Schnurr
“If you believe, as Ellison does, that Americans will be better off when they are subjected to ‘supervision at all times,’ then buying microvideo platforms, enterprise software, streaming services, cable networks, gaming developers, & internet publishers is just buying supervision capacity.”
The Ellisons Are Beta-Testing Big Brother.
If your feeds, subs, streams, games, and sports don't ensure you are on your "best behavior," your school and its EdTech partners will.
theamericanvandal.substack.com
December 5, 2025 at 12:50 PM
Reposted by Ryan Schnurr
In addition to all of the other benefits already reported about NYC congestion pricing, "In the first six months of the program, air pollution – in the form of particulate matter 2.5 micrometers and smaller – dropped by 22% in the Congestion Relief Zone (CRZ)"

news.cornell.edu/stories/2025...
Congestion pricing improved air quality in NYC and suburbs | Cornell Chronicle
Cornell researchers tallied the environmental benefits of New York City’s congestion pricing program and found air pollution dropped by 22% in Manhattan, with additional declines across the city’s fiv...
news.cornell.edu
December 9, 2025 at 2:19 AM
Reposted by Ryan Schnurr
Brian’s been so good on this, I probably should’ve linked to him.

His book & newsletter are fantastic. Here’s one short example:
Learning from the Luddites - Boston Review
The key to an alternative is building a movement.
www.bostonreview.net
December 7, 2025 at 5:12 PM
Reposted by Ryan Schnurr
Oh really
Three years into the generative-AI wave, demand for the technology seems surprisingly flimsy
Investors expect AI use to soar. That’s not happening
Recent surveys point to flatlining business adoption
econ.st
December 1, 2025 at 2:01 PM
Reposted by Ryan Schnurr
every neoliberal policy analyst wants to "trim the fat" of society until the lean times come. community level resilience, redundancies, etc are good actually
When power went out across all of Puerto Rico on 16 April, a lot of the lights in the town of Adjuntas stayed on. A combination of experimental microgrids, solar panels, and storage kept power on for many businesses and residents.

spectrum.ieee.org/puerto-rico-...
Could Microgrids Be Puerto Rico's Answer to Endless Blackouts?
Meanwhile, feds redirect $365 million away from solar toward grid fixes
spectrum.ieee.org
November 30, 2025 at 2:27 PM
Reposted by Ryan Schnurr
I wrote an essay for @bostonreview.bsky.social about what I learned about close reading when I taught at West Virginia University

www.bostonreview.net/articles/the...
The Claims of Close Reading - Boston Review
Literary studies have been starved by austerity, but their core methodology remains radical.
www.bostonreview.net
November 26, 2025 at 3:14 PM
Reposted by Ryan Schnurr
Going to war as "a favor to our oil companies" used to be something Republicans vigorously denied.
Rep. Salazar: "We're gonna be doing a favor to us, to our children, to our economy, to our oil companies to be able to liberate. And to Venezuelans who wants to be free."
November 24, 2025 at 10:57 PM
Reposted by Ryan Schnurr
I don't understand how anyone can watch how blatantly Grok is manipulated to answer the way ownership desires it to and then act like the other LLM chatbots couldn't possibly be similarly but less obviously compromised to produce responses in whatever way corporate interests and priorities dictate.
November 23, 2025 at 7:13 PM
Reposted by Ryan Schnurr
Ralph Lauren released a USPS commemorative capsule collection.
Ralph Lauren Creates Commemorative Capsule for USPS
The U.S. PostalSservice was established in 1775 and celebrated its 250th anniversary this year.
wwd.com
November 23, 2025 at 3:06 PM
Reposted by Ryan Schnurr
You probably saw videos of a nighttime raid in Chicago. Agents rappelling from a helicopter, bursting down doors, questioning brown-skinned immigrants.

We investigated -- and found little evidence to support the government’s claims about Tren de Aragua.

www.propublica.org/article/chic...
“I Lost Everything”: Venezuelans Were Rounded Up in a Dramatic Midnight Raid but Never Charged With a Crime
Authorities said Tren de Aragua “terrorists” had taken over the building. A ProPublica investigation found little evidence to back up the government’s claims. For the first time, the Venezuelans arres...
www.propublica.org
November 13, 2025 at 1:28 PM
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How about we shut down the government for this very popular and specific goal and then, hear me out, we hold out for like a month and a half and then, ok this part is important, after a watershed election where we ran the table, ONLY THEN, fold and don't get the one thing we said we wanted.
November 10, 2025 at 2:31 AM
Reposted by Ryan Schnurr
A family friend was telling us about what her husband shared about his experience in Broadview before he was deported back to Mexico. She's been sharing to friends and family because she's just in disbelief & horror what her husband told her. She wasn't able to talk to him until he was in Mexico.
November 7, 2025 at 3:08 AM
Reposted by Ryan Schnurr
honestly the only piece worth reading on the platner situation. @tressiemcphd.bsky.social is absolutely cooking here. (gift link)
Opinion | A Nazi Tattoo Exposes Democrats’ Greatest Weakness
www.nytimes.com
October 29, 2025 at 1:36 PM
Reposted by Ryan Schnurr
A sitting president opening a betting market on his own website taking bets on things he influences.
Wild times.
"Truth Social users will be able to trade prediction contracts related to major events and milestones, such as political elections, interest and inflation rate changes, commodity prices on gold and crude oil, events across all major sports leagues"

What the bloody hell?

crypto.com/us/company-n...
Truth Social to Become World’s First Social Media Platform Offering Prediction Markets via Exclusive Partnership with Crypto.com
Trump Media Expansion Now Includes Strategic Push into Prediction Markets
crypto.com
October 29, 2025 at 2:33 AM
Reposted by Ryan Schnurr
Chatbots — LLMs — do not know facts and are not designed to be able to accurately answer factual questions. They are designed to find and mimic patterns of words, probabilistically. When they’re “right” it’s because correct things are often written down, so those patterns are frequent. That’s all.
June 19, 2025 at 11:21 AM
Reposted by Ryan Schnurr
this is something that individual members of Congress could do tomorrow. The government is shut down so they could use their district offices. I suggested in January that they turn those offices into full on community centers where people could find each other re: mutual aid etc...
If I were running the DNC, there would be Democratic Party sponsored food relief banks across the country right now that specifically welcomed anyone regardless of party affiliation.

Along with the food, there could be voter registration and links to runforsomething.net
October 27, 2025 at 12:01 AM
Reposted by Ryan Schnurr
More from the scene
October 25, 2025 at 4:21 PM