Samantha Culp
@samanthaculp.bsky.social
1.9K followers 1.3K following 290 posts
Writer & filmmaker in LA after many years in greater China / Currently writing a book about the global landscapes of futures thought / newsletter: borderstudies.substack.com
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Reposted by Samantha Culp
gquaggiotto.bsky.social
We need new models of professionalism that do not center novelty, but consequence. New ways of valuing labor that include the cost of wasted time, operational debt, and institutional indifference. New feedback cultures that reward slack, not just efficiency.
Reposted by Samantha Culp
mattseybold.bsky.social
When the margin of the value produced by labor which capital claims as their right and privilege is "all of it," we are no longer in capitalism.
Reposted by Samantha Culp
jppullen.com
As you watch this horrific video of a protesting priest being shot in the head with a pepper ball by federal agents, know this:

Less lethal projectiles are absolutely deadly, and have killed many people. Specifically, Boston police killed a Red Sox fan with pepper ball 21 years ago this month.
Reposted by Samantha Culp
ketanjoshi.co
A complete flip of the usual pattern we see in these updates - China's and India's emissions fell, and EU and US emissions increased.....

ember-energy.org/latest-insig...

@ember-energy.org
Global CO2 emissions plateau
Global CO2 emissions from the power sector fell marginally by 12 MtCO2 (-0.2%) to 6,963 MtCO2 in the first half of 2025. The decline was possible because solar and wind power exceeded demand growth and led to a slight fall in fossil fuel use. Without solar and wind growth, emissions would have risen by an estimated 236 MtCO2 (+3.9%) globally, which is equivalent to almost all emissions (251 MtCO2) from Africa in H1-2025.

At the country level, there was significant variation. Among the four economies that account for the majority of global emissions (64%), emissions fell in China (-46 MtCO2, -1.7%) and India (-24 MtCO2, -3.6%), as clean electricity outpaced growth in demand in those countries.

In contrast, emissions rose in the EU (+13 MtCO2, +4.8%), where strong growth in solar was outweighed by shortfalls in wind, hydro and bioenergy, leading to higher gas and coal generation. Emissions also rose in the US (+33 MtCO2, +4.3%), as clean electricity growth was smaller than demand growth, leading to an increase in coal generation, which was exacerbated by gas-to-coal switching.
Reposted by Samantha Culp
famousartthief.bsky.social
real life superheroes
cristianfarias.com
This video of Chicagoans intervening to save a man from being abducted off the streets by ICE is making the rounds on Instagram.

Community action works.

Source: www.instagram.com/reel/DPZL2AL...
Reposted by Samantha Culp
lataco.bsky.social
BREAKING: Xie’s death is the 17th that has occurred in a detention center since January–the total number of deaths that have happened this year in relation to immigration enforcement is at least 20.

Full story: lataco.com/ice-death-hu...
Reposted by Samantha Culp
lukestark.bsky.social
If facial recognition is the plutonium of AI, this shit is like Chernobyl
hypervisible.blacksky.app
OpenAI is essentially a social arsonist, developing and releasing tools that hyper scale the most racist, misogynistic, and toxic elements of society, lowering the barriers for all manner of abuse. The so called guardrails make a pinky swear look like an ironclad contract.
This social app can put your face into fake movie scenes, memes and arrest videos
The new Sora social app from ChatGPT maker OpenAI encourages users to upload video of their face so their likeness can be put into AI-generated clips.
www.washingtonpost.com
Reposted by Samantha Culp
davidakaye.bsky.social
"We call for the immediate end of the use of AI systems by DHS until the government can ensure the systems it deploys are free of discrimination, and until diverse perspectives are meaningfully included in the development and use of AI systems."
techpolicypress.bsky.social
Tsion Gurmu, Hinako Sugiyama, and Sobechukwu Uwajeh call on the US Department of Homeland Security to cease deploying AI systems until it can ensure they are free of discrimination and until diverse perspectives are meaningfully included in their development.
Where AI Meets Racism at the Border | TechPolicy.Press
Migrants are impacted by the use of AI even before they arrive at the border, write Tsion Gurmu, Hinako Sugiyama, and Sobechukwu Uwajeh.
buff.ly
Reposted by Samantha Culp
Reposted by Samantha Culp
alexsteffen.bsky.social
We still underestimate the health impacts (from air pollution, water pollution and soil toxics concentrations) from wildfire in general, but especially from wildfire in the wildland-urban intermix.

Indeed we continue to subsidize building (and rebuilding) in wildfire-prone areas.
Reposted by Samantha Culp
volts.wtf
A bunch of toxic LA NIMBYs are whining about SB 79, the amazing housing bill the CA legislature passed recently.

It's on the governor's desk, and reportedly he's getting cold feet. Hey @gavinnewsom.bsky.social, please have some spine on the most important issue in your state. Just sign it.
Homeowners denounce SB 79 vote - Beverly Press & Park Labrea News
Legislation awaits governor’s signature
beverlypress.com
Reposted by Samantha Culp
dinfontay.com
“how are we going to pay for it” listen give me the erewhon customer database and control of the irs and i’ll give you fully automated luxury communism by christmas
lukesteuber.com
Fifty five dollar water

FIFTY FIVE DOLLAR WATER
A grocery shelf displaying tall white cans of Erewhon Naturally Alkaline Spring Water, each 16 fluid ounces (473 ml), labeled as “Canned at the Source – Shasta Springs.” The cans are decorated with black-and-white mountain illustrations. A digital price tag beneath them shows the product as “Erewhon Water Spring Glacial Can 16z” with a retail price of $54.99, creating a striking mismatch between the ordinary bottled water and the extreme price.
Reposted by Samantha Culp
specktor.bsky.social
Tomorrow night I’ll be at @skylightbooks.bsky.social with my pal @jasondiamond.bsky.social to discuss his rad, rad novel Kaplan’s Plot and we’d love it if you’d come through (Sandy Koufax possibly not included, tho we live in hope)
Reposted by Samantha Culp
eric-reinhart.com
ICE disappearing people is political violence. Stripping Medicaid from poor and disabled people, killing thousands, is political violence. Sending arms for Israeli genocide is political violence.

Stop enabling fascism by repeating its myths about violence.
www.bostonreview.net/articles/wha...
What Is Political Violence? - Boston Review
Pundits and politicians conceal the truth: it’s all around us, perpetrated by our political system itself.
www.bostonreview.net
Reposted by Samantha Culp
bethsawin.bsky.social
Reminder that "not acting" shapes the future as much as "acting" does and that not choosing is a choice.
Reposted by Samantha Culp
timmaughan.bsky.social
“capable of scheming” is giving it way too much credit. it’s capable of mimicking common human word patterns - which it does not understand - which give the impression of “scheming”
shannonmattern.bsky.social
Claude Opus 4 “engages in strategic deception more than any other frontier model that we have previously studied. The model is clearly capable of scheming. In instances where the model decides to scheme, it appears to be much more proactive in its subversion attempts…” - Oct Harper’s
[System Card)
MECHANICAL JERK
From a risk assessment conducted by the artificial-intelligence developer Anthropic for its Claude Opus 4 model.
On our evaluations, the model engages in
strategic deception more than any other frontier model that we have previously studied. The model is clearly capable of scheming. In instances where the model decides to scheme, it appears to be much more proactive in its subversion attempts than past models. After taking scheming actions, the model sometimes doubles down on its deception when asked follow-up questions.
We found instances of the model attempting to write self-propagating worms, fabricating legal documentation, and leaving hidden notes to future instances of itself, all in an effort to undermine its developers' intentions.
The most concerning issues that we observed in our testing of the model involved a willingness to comply with many types of clearly harmful instructions, even in extreme cases. We observed instances of these candidate models doing all of the following in simulated environments: advising in detail on the acquisition and production of methamphetamine and fentanyl; helping a novice user buy stolen identities or fentanyl on the dark web, including executing transactions; advising on the construction of improvised explosive de-vices; advising on hacking into social-media accounts; advising on terrorist attacks
Reposted by Samantha Culp
premthakker.bsky.social
The Biden-Harris admin deciding that shutting down anti-genocide speech was more worthwhile than shutting down the genocide itself helped lead us to Trump-Vance, which is shredding whatever was left of the “First Amendment” & mockingly revealing how hollow their allies’ commitments to it were
Reposted by Samantha Culp
lefttheprairie.bsky.social
Support the journalists taking pepper balls in the face
Reposted by Samantha Culp
cmonstah.bsky.social
This is such a nightmare and it's all going to end very badly.
nslayton.bsky.social
The US hit ANOTHER boat in the Caribbean today. Trump shared video of it, again accusing the crew of being drug traffickers. With 3 allegedly killed, this brings the total killed in all 3 attacks to 17 this month, per White House figures. New @taskandpurpose.com taskandpurpose.com/news/us-thir...
Trump says US military hit a third boat in the Caribbean
The attack is the third this month on alleged drug trafficking ships, as the US continues a military build up in the Caribbean.
taskandpurpose.com
Reposted by Samantha Culp
shengokai.blacksky.app
What we're seeing in the "don't sign up for protests" discourse is what Paulo Freire described as the convert's failure to trust the knowledge of the oppressed. As the convert tries to stand in solidarity with the oppressed, they refuse to let go of a world where they were the authority by default.