Bordeaux, France, has now recorded more days above 40°C in 2026 alone than during the entire 105-year period from 1920 (when observations began) to 2025. This is deeply shocking.
Kevin Bankston
@bankston.bsky.social
CONVERGER at kevinbankston.substack.com. Senior Advisor on AI Governance @cdt.org. Teaching AI law @georgetownlaw.bsky.social. Imagining futures @imaginationasu.bsky.social. My opinions, not theirs.
This is the most delightful nerd news I've heard in awhile. Look forward to getting the literal magazine in my mailbox.
Meredith Borders@mereborders.bsky.social · last mo.Almost can't believe I'm saying it but STARLOG IS BACK, BABY. Beyond honored to serve as senior editor under the badass, brilliant @annaleen.bsky.social, with @jhoffman.bsky.social & @da7e.com on the podcast mic. Trust that you'll want to sign up for Jordan's weekly inbox dispatch, too: starlog.com
Today could be Congress's last chance to stop the KIDS Act. Tell your lawmaker to vote NO on this rushed, messy package of internet bills that threatens privacy, free expression, and private messaging online. www.eff.org/deeplinks/2...
The KIDS Act Would Require Age Checks To Get Online
Buried inside the KIDS Act are provisions that will push online services to verify all users’ ages, require government-directed moderation policies for online speech, and even create new rules about
eff.org
Sadly ironic that today's the 55th anniversary of an overreaching White House going to the Supreme Court to try to block the Pentagon Papers' publication, and now with Anthropic's Fable we're seeing another historic prior restraint by an equally lawless administration. #FreeFable
NEW: The Trump admin clamped down on Anthropic following a spat over the company granting South Korean telecom giant SK Telecom access to Claude Mythos. Why? US officials were concerned the company may have ties to China.
The Korean Telecom Giant at the Center of Anthropic’s Mythos Controversy
Days before Anthropic took its most advanced AI models offline, the White House ordered the company to revoke SK Telecom’s access to Claude Mythos over claims of alleged ties to China.
wired.com
My brother's a Hollywood creative exec. I dragged him to the 'AI on the Lot' conference to see the future. Then I interviewed him: “They keep talking about saving time and money. I live in Burbank, man—that ‘time and money’ are all my neighbors.” converger.kevinbankston.com/i/201583118/...
There's been not enough attention to the fact that this event on public property can be seen only through--who else's?--Paramount's paywalled streamer. I'm among many praying for thunderstorms to wash it out. www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...
Seven fights on the South Lawn: Trump prepares for UFC birthday spectacle at White House
Show goes on for Trump’s 80th birthday event – featuring a 92ft ‘Claw’, thousands of seats and a fighting cage – despite ominous weather forecasts
theguardian.com
To be clear, this is an order to depublish speech based on vague and unsupported “national security” concerns. We have seen this before. It wasn’t justified then and it’s not justified now. The fact that it’s a new technology does not change the analysis. www.anthropic.com/news/fable-m...
Statement on the US government directive to suspend access to Fable 5 and Mythos 5
The US government has issued an export control directive to suspend all access to Fable 5 and Mythos 5 by any foreign national, whether inside or outside the United States.
anthropic.com
Confession time: I helped murder Punky Duck. Accidentally. Which I guess makes it duckslaughter? A couple weeks ago I went to the AI on the Lot conference in LA, and unexpectedly found myself at the center of Hollywood’s AI controversy of the week... converger.kevinbankston.com/p/converger-...
CONVERGER #4: How I Got an AI-Generated TV Series Cancelled (Accidentally)
ALSO: ‘AI on the Lot’ Conference Takeaways, Tech Brother vs. Hollywood Brother, and the Last Edition of Hannah Einbinder’s Swirlie Watch!
converger.kevinbankston.com
We didn't get the data portability we wanted for social networks in time to matter. Now the same fight's shaping up around AI. In my 1st guest post for @mbogen.bsky.social's AI policy newsletter Elicitation, I lay out what real AI portability would look like. elicitation.substack.com/p/dont-let-p...
Don’t let perfect be the enemy of portable
For real AI data portability, we need importability
elicitation.substack.com
Why do this? Do we need even more national guards standing around doing nothing?
Megan Gray@megangray.bsky.social · 2mo agoit's like living in a police state here in DC Trump's "DC Safe and Beautiful Task Force" leaders announce surge of # National Guard in DC up to 5,000. Today there's 3,450 National Guard in DC — up from 2,500 a week ago. More police from HSI, ICE, FBI on the way.
I would be immensely grateful if the house office of legislative counsel could drag themselves into oh I don't know 1995 so that the bills they produce could be a) in a machine readable format and b) have actual internal links from the table of contents.
There were signs: Scorcese spoke positively of the next generation using these tools in a recent BFI interview. I covered that, and other directors' comments indicating the ongoing AI vibe shift (most recently visible at Cannes) in my newsletter Converger converger.kevinbankston.com/p/converger-...
CONVERGER #3: The Cannes AI Vibe Shift
Also: mapping the microdrama megatrend, how I “engineered wonder" by making comic books, and more!
converger.kevinbankston.com
Richard Grusin@rgrusin.bsky.social · 2mo agoMarty! Say it ain't so. www.nytimes.com/2026/06/02/b...
🧵1/3 🎮 What if cultural history disappears because no one is allowed to preserve it? Jordan Mechner, creator of Prince of Persia, reflects on the fragility of games, media, and cultural memory in his essay in VANISHING CULTURE, from the #InternetArchive. Read it here: archive.org/details/vani...
"My opposition to cancel culture is such that I will fire you for what you said."
Justin Baragona@justinbaragona.bsky.social · 2mo ago"They’re going to have to fire him. No amount of HR speak will have him retract what he said," one CBS staffer just told me, adding: "For an anti-woke crusader, this is pretty woke of [Bari] to accuse Pelley of after firing the entire leadership of his show and two correspondent colleagues."
AI is changing how products behave and how they are built. Product lawyering has to change too. Here's my attempt to describe how. I'd love to hear if this rings true to folks who are still product counseling. www.bricoleur.org/2026/06/prod...
Product Counselling in the AI Era
AI is changing how products behave and how they are built. Product lawyering has to change too. Product counsel have always needed to unde...
bricoleur.org
We are all in horrible danger when our nation’s intelligence apparatus is run by a corrupt regime loyalist with no relevant experience
MeidasTouch@meidastouch.com · 2mo agoTrump says he is appointing his ally and loyalist Bill Pulte as Acting DNI. Pulte has no national intelligence experience, but he has used his current role as head of the Federal Housing Finance Agency to pursue phony mortgage fraud allegations against Trump’s political opponents.
🧵 Some publishers & news organizations are blocking the Wayback Machine from archiving journalism, stifling access to the public record. 📣 If you rely on the Wayback Machine to preserve news & history, tell them not to block web archiving. ✏️ Sign the open letter👇 www.savethearchive.com/NewsLeaders
... and we're LIVE! You can pledge for the fourth issue of the coolest newspaper format journal of comics criticism around now! www.kickstarter.com/projects/tif...
The Comics Courier, A Comics Criticism Journal [Issue 4]
A newspaper-format journal dedicated to in-depth comics criticism edited by Tiffany Babb
kickstarter.com
Backrooms and Obsession have set off a small-budget big-box office revolution, but Parsons and Barker are just two of the many creators making the YouTube-to-cinema leap. Check out my roundup of the next gen of viral video-to-horror feature directors: converger.kevinbankston.com/i/196771089/...
The AI vibe shift at Cannes that I just wrote about in Converger was in full effect at AI on the Lot this past week in LA as studios & networks like Fox, Paramount, MGM, & AMC were all there talking about integrating AI--though not without pushback. converger.kevinbankston.com/p/converger-...
CONVERGER #3: The Cannes AI Vibe Shift
Also: mapping the microdrama megatrend, how I “engineered wonder" by making comic books, and more!
converger.kevinbankston.com
Honestly, this is good because it removes any plausible deniability about the type of people Trump put in charge of his domestic paramilitary operations
Jeff Tischauser@jtischauser.bsky.social · 2mo agoGreg Bovino will speak at a white nationalist conference in Portugal tomorrow. He will share the stage with no fewer than five people who idolize Hitler, including one who joined a group created by two Nazi SS members. Another guy is a self-described racist who refers to women as "cockroaches."🧵
Wrote about how Bluesky users do not click links and read articles (yes, this is behind the scenes stuff so paywalled). Bluesky isn’t unique among social networks. Many people do not click through. Instead they scroll, maybe reply, and move on. Not good for journalism www.404media.co/behind-the-b...
Behind the Blog: Being New and Some Numbers
This week, we discuss going deeper and Google's search changes.
404media.co
That Texas Blood is an exceptional book. Very excited for the creators; FX should be a great home for this.
Chris Condon@christophcondon.bsky.social · 2mo agoWell... deadline.com/2026/05/that...
In LA today for the AI on the Lot conference, looking forward to meeting new people & learning new things about the intersection of AI and film, which I'm covering in my tech & media newsletter Converger (latest issue at converger.kevinbankston.com/p/converger-...). Drop a line if you'll be around!
Absolutely nothing is stopping John Cornyn, Tillis, Murkowski, & Paul from caucusing immediately with Democrats & giving them control of the Senate. The same is true of Thomas Massie & any 2 retiring GOP Reps in the House. It is a choice to continue caucusing with the authoritarian personality cult.