Wrote about capitalist realism, academia, and the radical monopolies inherent in innovation tied to capital.

Flaming Hydra@flaminghydra.com · last mo.

TODAY: @littlewow.online on the many different paths AI could take. “If the inevitability and the dangers inherent in the development of AI are both so obvious, why are they so difficult to understand?” flaminghydra.com/radical-hege...

Library advocates in multiple states and major advocacy organizations wouldn’t be fighting back if corporate greed didn’t dictate their collections over their community’s needs. Supporting a library’s right to fair terms in digital is what brave, forward-thinking, and informed authors do.

Library Futures@libraryfutures.bsky.social · 2mo ago

Oh James Patterson. A library loan does not "[undermine]" how authors are compensated for their creative contributions." And ebook legislation means libraries can buy MORE books. (Including yours.) /1 www.wordsandmoney.com/the-queue-li...

I’ve been taking pictures of good bumper stickers for more than 3 years (400 photos!) and the thing I love the most is that you rarely see the same deranged one twice. This was the only sticker on a new looking white Kia Forte parked at the North Carolina State Farmers Market on a Sunday morning.

Flaming Hydra@flaminghydra.com · 2mo ago

TODAY: A tour of the bumper stickers @milesklee.bsky.social has been cruelly FORBIDDEN from putting on his shared automobile. "Do not want to explain the joke to parents when they see the car. Maybe just too sexually suggestive for everyday driving anyway." flaminghydra.com/r/8eb670ef?m...

I’m exhibiting @amlibraryassoc.bsky.social conference this year and was surprised to see that an org that says they care about privacy selling participant data to vendors, particularly at a time when a lot of people are taking a risk in attending the conference at all.

“Moreover, campus surveys suggest that many students feel compelled to self-censor. Out of fear for their grades, they often respond to exam questions by drawing on what their professors have taught them, thereby reproducing expert opinion.” www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/wer...

We’re Diversifying the University by Hiring More Crackpots

“For too long, the university has ignored the wisdom of the donor class and hired based on academic excellence. Regrettably, this has led to the underreprese...

mcsweeneys.net

“No one goes to Pilates thinking ‘I’m going to be a fascist today’”

Flaming Hydra@flaminghydra.com · 3mo ago

TODAY: @littlewow.online on the Pilates tsunami. “Over the past few years there has been a noticeable and depressing homogenization of workout culture with an increased emphasis on thinness over strength.” flaminghydra.com/r/511eea61?m...

How Things Work is three years old this week. It's not the most important thing in the world but it is nice to know that it is possible to build sustainable independent media in 2026. If you're a subscriber, thank you for keeping hope alive. www.hamiltonnolan.com/p/three-year...

Three Years of How Things Work

A brief annual update on this nice place.

hamiltonnolan.com

Wtf I share a birthday with Bari Weiss this sucks

I have never used another browser unless I was forced to, so I was surprised to see that Firefox has less than 5% market share! It’s not even that ideological, I just like it.

Anil Dash@anildash.com · 3mo ago

"[T]hey want to be both the best browser for people who hate AI and the safest browser for people who love AI" Alongside the bold plan to win users by... building a better browser. I'm here for it. www.pcmag.com/news/firefox...

Wrote about why we need a strong consumer protection movement to fight digital contract abuses over @techdirt.com. Thanks for the opportunity @masnick.com ! www.techdirt.com/2026/04/21/y...

You Can’t Vote Out Amazon Web Services: Fighting Internet Contracts One Library At A Time

For nearly twenty years, I’ve used Google Docs for most of my writing: class notes, personal notes, a novel in progress, research, activism, and my day job. It’s become an essential piece of infras…

techdirt.com

“We’ve been signing away our rights one click at a time…. If we want to take them back, libraries are the most powerful place we can start.” Our ED @littlewow.online in @techdirt.com.web.brid.gy www.techdirt.com/2026/04/21/y...

You Can’t Vote Out Amazon Web Services: Fighting Internet Contracts One Library At A Time

For nearly twenty years, I’ve used Google Docs for most of my writing: class notes, personal notes, a novel in progress, research, activism, and my day job. It’s become an essential piece of infras…

techdirt.com

Our mutual hatred of this mural was one of the first things my partner and talked about... the dystopian "Chesterfield cigarettes" billboard that rises above it is missing, which makes it look oddly threatening. Kate Bowler might be great, this mural is terrible. www.reddit.com/r/bullcity/c...

From the bullcity community on Reddit: Love this quote by Kate Bowler 🩵

Explore this post and more from the bullcity community

reddit.com

Sometimes I wonder if the chat LLMs are basically Ask Jeeves in its most evolved form.

If you or someone you know is in North Liberty Iowa, @libraryfutures.bsky.social is so proud to be supporting this event and community read of Ink Knows No Borders: Poems of the Immigrant and Refugee Experience! northlibertylibrary.org/programs/eve...

Thanks to @bookriot.bsky.social @heykellyjensen.bsky.social for featuring our new Imagine IF game! Play as a librarian as you CYOA and fend off Intellectual Freedom challenges! bookriot.com/library-futu...

An Interactive Approach Helps Librarians Protect Intellectual Freedom: Book Censorship News, April 3, 2026

Library Futures developed a game to help librarians protect the right to read. Here's what it is, why it was developed, and how to try it out.

bookriot.com

I read through a ton of Seder supplements and made my own Haggadah! you can download it here! 👇

Flaming Hydra@flaminghydra.com · 4mo ago

ALSO TODAY: @littlewow.online on hosting every Seder possible. "I’ve tried to introduce as many people as I can to this liberatory and often moving tradition with hand-picked readings and a commitment to centering community." flaminghydra.com/come-in-and-...

Ugh so considerate and this is the thanks you get!

You: basic, hate the internet because of AI or social media brainrot or whatever. Me: wise, has always hated the internet, for killing off CD-ROMs

This from @masnick.com was thought provoking— as an old school “learn to code” type with humanities background, I am interested in the role of expertise in tech. Agentic code bots transform the gatekeeping of code, and I’m much more here for it than I thought I’d be www.techdirt.com/2026/03/25/a...

AI Might Be Our Best Shot At Taking Back The Open Web

I remember, pretty clearly, my excitement over the early World Wide Web. I had been on the internet for a year or two at that point, mostly using IRC, Usenet, and Gopher (along with email, naturall…

techdirt.com

What’s interesting about this article is that it doesn’t ask whether AI has taste, just assumes it doesn’t, but rather how people can cultivate taste. It’s the same question asked of yuppies in the 1980s — replace “AI” with “money” and it’s the same old. www.nytimes.com/2026/03/22/s...

Is Taste the One Thing A.I. Can’t Replace?

nytimes.com

damn this card for reporters is such a flex

I guess now is as good a time as any to publicly admit that from about 2008-2011 I was adamantly convinced the iPhone wasn't going to take off.

Everyone knows Jolene!

This was excellent

Maria Bustillos@mariabustillos.com · 5mo ago

What happens when the former champions of 'body positivity' grow suddenly and extremely thin? GLP-1s are altering body dysmorphia itself, in ways that aren't yet evident pls read this sensitive, furious, elegant piece at @flaminghydra.com

Only interested in this feature if it’s Harold Bloom telling me he knows my work is unreadable based on the first three words and he’s not even going to bother with it

Ingrid Burrington@lifewinning.com · 5mo ago

A little offended Grammarly didn't make a sloppelganger of me

If I had to describe my gateway political ideology, it would be “know your neighbors!” Being able to rely on people who have little in common beyond proximity is crucial to navigating across difference and building small d democracy. It takes work, but it pays off! thewalrus.ca/cramped-cond...

Bad Housing Is Turning Us into Bad Neighbours | The Walrus

We’re growing lonely, with no ties to the people next door

thewalrus.ca

Feeling paranoid about stochastic violence and weaponized media? Me too. That's why I can't stop thinking about this incredibly helpful essay by @littlewow.online in @flaminghydra.com about the idea of "reparative reading" as a corrective to the "paranoid style." flaminghydra.com/issue-511/

hello Buncombe County, NC (found on Reddit)

Platform based licensing is like printing money for big publishers and intermediaries – why charge once when you can charge again and again?

Stacey Lantagne@staceylantagne.bsky.social · 5mo ago

Congress's copyright policy has consistently sought to subsidize libraries and the publishers have found a loophole through that with the ebook licensing market. -- @guyrub.bsky.social #wipip26

TODAY: @littlewow.online on "paranoid reading" and its remedies. "To practice a worldview more expansive and more open to possibilities than paranoia does not mean you have to deny the reality or gravity of oppression." flaminghydra.com/issue-511/#a...

How to read

Jennie Rose Halperin on transcending paranoia

flaminghydra.com