Adrienne Massanari
@adriennemassanari.bsky.social
Prof@AmerU (views mine). New book: Gaming Democracy (MIT Press). Researches digital cultures, platform politics, games, etc. Wrote that one thing about Reddit that one time (okay several things). I will always want to see your pets. She/her/hers.
The richest person in the world, an avowed white supremacist, today again posted "the next step is getting rid of 'source code' entirely and just making an efficient binary directly with AI" because he has no idea how anything works, not even the basics of industries he is in.
Fascists and authoritarian regimes try to control universities and turn them into purveyors of state propaganda through extortion…... www.politico.com/news/2026/08...
Trump administration asks colleges to commit to education overhaul
Education Secretary Linda McMahon’s letter contains some similarities to a compact offered to and rejected by a small group of schools last year.
politico.com
airbnb I’m staying at unintentionally created the toughest punk album cover of 2027
Latest Foreign Desk for Monocle Radio. Contemplating the rightward lurch of Silicon Valley, with @gilduran.com, @politicsprof.bsky.social, @adriennemassanari.bsky.social and Claire Stapleton. monocle.com/radio/shows/...
CTRL + ALT + RIGHT: Has technofascism taken over Silicon Valley?
Thirty years ago, it was assumed that the internet would be an engine of liberal democracy. Now, Silicon Valley’s massive...
monocle.com
Pope Leo received singer and songwriter Patti Smith in private audience this morning. The Pope and Smith are both Chicago natives. She was accompanied by @antoniospadaro.bsky.social, undersecretary for the Vatican's Dicastery for Culture and Education.
a bunch of popular ASMR artists lost their channels forever this week, after YouTube cited them for violating terms against "sexually gratifying" content: www.404media.co/youtube-asmr...
YouTube Bans Popular ASMR Artists, Accusing Them of Making 'Sexually Gratifying' Content
YouTube told ASMR artists including Bunnii, Slight Sounds, Rose, and others that their content broke the platform's sex and nudity policy. Creators say these bans are unfair and potentially life-alter...
404media.co
There are a lot of important things going on. Maybe this isn’t a top twenty concern. But, this is actually workplace harassment, the kind that can get people killed.
@carmenlynn.bsky.social · 5d agoThe Koch Nazis are back “A shadowy network of conservative activist groups, backed by Koch-linked dark money, is deploying hidden cameras and mass public-records requests to hunt down and destroy the careers of college professors and administrators — and it's working.”
The wealthiest university on the planet, Harvard claims it needs to close a huge range of student services, including support for writing tutors and community service, to close a budget deficit while simultaneously planning to spend $10 million on hiring conservative professors. Give me a break.
Faculty Express Cautious Concern About Harvard’s Plan To Endow Viewpoint Diversity Professorships | News | The Harvard Crimson
Harvard’s plan to bankroll a new cohort of professors in the name of “viewpoint diversity” is drawing a wary response from faculty, who said the proposal could expand donor influence and reshape facul...
thecrimson.com
Last week I presented a keynote at #SIGIR2026 titled "Emancipatory Information Retrieval: Towards Critical IR Theories and Practices". Slides: bhaskar-mitra.github.io/files/emanci... I went in nervously excited but several people appreciated talking openly about this topic. A quick thread. 🧵 1/
“Historically, men never provided for women”
Do white people ever think, "I wonder what it would be like if every book I read or TV or film only had Black people in them?" Just constantly inundated with images of Black people, in our vastness. Probably not, but, I dare say, it would change how they view everything. Representation matters.
At least in movies and TV, Science Fiction has become an almost exclusively nostalgic genre. It's now primarily interested in retro aesthetics and past visions of the future
If the media were serious about covering higher education in 2026, the actual National Conversation™️ would be “How have universities managed to retain such a high level of trust, relative to almost all the other institutions in 🇺🇸, amidst decades of assault from the far right authoritarian party?” 🧐🤔
Chris Warren@chriswarren.info · last wk.
Please take a moment out of your day to marvel at the balletic poise, calm elegance and graceful athleticism of the panda.
The use of extremely online memetic aesthetics to support far-right political goals is like something out of Walter Benjamin’s nightmares.
6yo's last day of camp is tomorrow, so I'm having this feeling a little early this year.
This entire story is repulsive but this part is also vile but easily missed: "A 'Dollar Tree gooner' crypto coin launched in January 2025, followed by an unofficial Pokémon card and a song released on SoundCloud by an underground noise band from Tennessee named Mukus." WTAF
The disturbing rise of ‘gooner’ assaults at Dollar Tree stores: ‘They find it funny to degrade women’
In dark corners of the internet, men are goading each other to masturbate in public – and on female shoppers – and post the footage
theguardian.com
This entire story is repulsive but this part is also vile but easily missed: "A 'Dollar Tree gooner' crypto coin launched in January 2025, followed by an unofficial Pokémon card and a song released on SoundCloud by an underground noise band from Tennessee named Mukus." WTAF
The disturbing rise of ‘gooner’ assaults at Dollar Tree stores: ‘They find it funny to degrade women’
In dark corners of the internet, men are goading each other to masturbate in public – and on female shoppers – and post the footage
theguardian.com
Two people tried to enter a screening of The Odyssey without buying tickets after hiding inside a miniature model of the Trojan Horse. 😂😂😂
We literally learned nothing from gamergate. This kind of bad faith arguing is now the raison d'être of the right (and algorithmic social media generally I guess).
Robert Balkovich@robertbalkovich.bsky.social · 3w agoOne thing I fundamentally don't understand about how we live now: Why are we spending any amount of time debating the arguments and intentions of obvious bad actors? Any argument that begins with comparing humanities professors to drug addicts losing their children can just be disregarded.
As with so many things, it is critical to realize this is not bumbling or ineptitude or not thinking through policy implications. On the contrary: making it impossible for foreign students to do the doctorate here is THE WHOLE POINT. It’s about starving higher ed under the guise of America first.
Ben Allen@evodynamics.bsky.social · 3w agoCongrats we just made it impossible to come here for a PhD www.bostonglobe.com/2026/07/16/m...
Would we take air quality alerts more seriously if they were associated with a mascot of some sort? "It's Code Grimace in DC, y'all."
ass out flower ate this is how i like pollinate
✨🎀 NEW CFP: The Queer and Feminist Perspectives on Japanese Popular Cultures symposium (supported by the University of Tokyo, Media, Gender, and Sexualities Study Group) is coming back for its third edition!!!✨🎀 📩 Send us your abstract by August 15 at popculturesjapan@gmail.com✨ Share widely!
Call for Papers: Queer and Feminist Perspectives on Japanese Popular Cultures Symposium 2026
A platform for critical discussions about gender and Japanese animation, fashion, video games, literature and digital cultures
events.humanitix.com
This is why Dems are reluctant to run on retribution, despite its popularity. They want the power he accrued and the surveillance infrastructure he formalized. Period.
