steve k
@stevekovacs.com
Your boy in government (former). Tech policy, gov systems, public lands, public everything. Distorted bass, mild pro wrestling experience.
“Timely and persuasive, this revelatory account is difficult to ignore.” My new book HYPERSCALE received a fantastic review from @publisherswkly.bsky.social. Less than three months until it hits bookstore shelves! Get more info and preorder your copy: hyperscalebook.com
Read it here if you haven't yet. Today is the very best day of all days to read it for the first time. short-stories.co/@raybradbury...
There Will Come Soft Rains by Ray Bradbury
The voice-clock sang, breakfast was ejected, but no doors slammed. The garage chimed and lifted its door to reveal the waiting car. The house sat alone in a city of rubble and…
short-stories.co
Adam Rawnsley@arawnsley.bsky.social · yesterdayToday, August 4, 2026, is the setting of Ray Bradbury’s short story “There Will Come Soft Rains” about a fully automated house continuing on after the family who lived there and the world around it died in a nuclear blast.
Moving to Austin in an attempt to make the worst podcast ever. (So bad it summons the cenobites)
Updated our 'Do Moderates Do Better?' paper When you analyze the question rigorously (and don't assume correlation is causation), you find that moderates & non-moderates perform ~equally well in the Trump era Love working with @adambonica.bsky.social
"A quintessential quality of modern American life is the inescapable feeling that once-good things are subtly but surely being degraded. Things that once seemed to be abundant and free transform into consumer experiences." www.hamiltonnolan.com/p/enshittifi...
Enshittification Relies on Broken Economic Math
Pay no attention to the externalities behind the curtain.
hamiltonnolan.com
I'm not sure folks have realized just how crazy the second half of 2026 and 2027 will be for global temperatures – on the back of a record-smashing El Niño event. Here is my latest estimate of where both years will end up compared to global temperatures since 1850.
The real solution to the Male Loneliness Epidemic is to launch dozens upon hundreds of Savanna Bananas type leagues for every single sport, so dudes all over the country can be just funny lil guys outdoors, goofin and mugging for the cameras, instead of getting parboiled online 24/7.
Based on an informal decade-long study of "compliments paid to band t-shirts after a gig" I'm starting to believe that Neurosis should run for president.
Lemme tell you about the angel of history being blown backwards into the future: The shackles these people have been put in are Hiatt brand, same company founded in 1780 to mass produce shackles for slaver ships.
Joel S.@joelhs.bsky.social · 2w agoThe use of extremely online memetic aesthetics to support far-right political goals is like something out of Walter Benjamin’s nightmares.
New, by me: The Justice Department is prosecuting an American for allegedly providing U.S. border agents with a "duress" passcode that wiped the contents of his phone when they entered it. We've confirmed the phone was running GrapheneOS. Bypass for ad-blockers: web.archive.org/web/20260724...
US accuses American of allegedly wiping his phone using a 'duress' password during border search | TechCrunch
A U.S. citizen has asked a court to throw out the government's claim that he gave over a passcode to border authorities that wiped his phone's data, opening up fresh questions about a person's constit...
techcrunch.com
Groundbreaking new research — funded by California legislation — has finally allowed scientists to predict deadly cliff collapses along the Pacific coast with amazing accuracy: www.latimes.com/environment/... via @rosannaxia.bsky.social
Scientists crack the code on predicting California's deadly cliff collapses
Scientists at UC San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography found that it is possible to predict a coastal landslide hours, sometimes days, before it happens.
latimes.com
🚨 BREAKING: President Trump announced and signed two proclamations to dramatically shrink the boundaries of Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monuments by nearly three million acres. https://bit.ly/3Ti1cTE
President Trump Signs Order to Slash Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monuments in Utah
"President Trump’s order to slash protections for Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante is both a betrayal to the American people and illegal. No president has the authority to erase or shrink a na...
npca.org
Hey, New Yorkers: Mayor Mamdani is recreating the city's digital service, after Mayor Adams destroyed it. They're hiring devs, designers, and product folks to work on-site in Brooklyn, starting now. You don't even have to be a city resident. Get on it!
NYC PIT Crew
nyc.gov
🚨 HEADS UP: If you haven't submitted a comment on the OMB proposal yet, there's still time - but it's running out! There are only 1 days left to push back against Russell Vought's attempt to give political appointees unprecedented control over federal research funding. Take Action: zurl.co/eoQwY
“Cornell researchers found that at the current rate of AI growth, the burgeoning industry could represent 24 to 44 million metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions by 2030, the equivalent of adding five to ten million cars to US roadways.”
The Pollution Being Churned Out by AI Data Centers Is So Severe That It's Almost Incomprehensible
The extent of the pollution being put out by thousands of data centers is shocking. Some developers are exploiting regulatory loopholes.
futurism.com
Did you write your comment yet on the OMB rules on federally funded science yet? No? Don’t worry, you can do it this weekend. Here are some resources that can help you get started.
Are you a former (or current) fed looking for meaning work in the civic tech space that's NOT directly under this admin, but still working with important public services? Here's a great resource with open roles across a ton of great companies like mine! dscovery.fly.dev
DSCovery
dscovery.fly.dev
After 16 years of Viktor Orbán's rule, Hungary's state television has suspended its news broadcasts for restructuring. The main state TV channel, M1, displayed a black screen with the following message: "Public media must not lie. We apologize for doing so for many years."
"The city of Utrecht beat Copenhagen on the Copenhagenization Index– a competition to be the best at biking and urban mobility. We visit the city to steal the cheat codes to the top (so other cities can get back in the race). " With input from @dutchcycling.nl
Inside the world's best cycling city
YouTube video by DW Planet A
youtu.be
Since George H. Bush became president we have gained 2 million jobs (in 18 years) under Republicans and 50 million (in 20 years) under Democrats.
There are 8 Black Hawks on GSA Auctions right now. Thinking about getting one for the ferals in the back yard. gsaauctions.gov/auctions/auc...
Personal Property Management System
gsaauctions.gov
Low-Earth orbit has gotten so crowded that new NASA mission proposals need to include (and pay for, out of a limited cost cap!) three collision avoidance maneuvers, and are told to expect 1-5 potential collisions that need to be avoided.
I know the list is endless but I genuinely think trashing the legitimate congressionally chartered org for celebrating the 250th to instead hijack our national assets and taxpayer funds for his personality cult grifter crap should, in and of itself, be fully sufficient to merit removal from office.
107 years ago a similarly baby-brained line of reasoning gave us the thought-terminating cliche "falsely shout fire in a theater": en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schenck... The court has always been the custodian of a bottomless well of contempt for left-coded speech activities.
Schenck v. United States - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Robin Bougie@robinbougie.bsky.social · last mo.They gave US zinester Elizabeth Soto *50 fucking years* in prison for publishing a zine that supports an anti-fascism stance. Prosecutors also used her feminism themed zine, and an anti-AI zine as evidence against her. This is unprecedented.
KBJ's dissent: "The court reduces some of Congress’s greatest legislative achievements—federal laws that secure civil rights, environmental stability, healthcare, and more—to nothing more than the wheelings-and-dealings of an especially wealthy private party." www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/25p...
Re-upping: If you had not followed Mark Singer's work, please take sad news of his demise as prompt to read at least these outstanding examples: -1997 Profile of Trump that told us everything we would later learn. -1993 Ricky Jay Profile that every writer envies. www.newyorker.com/magazine/199...
Ricky Jay’s Magical Secrets
From 1993: The magician’s deft illusions flout reality, and he rejects the notion that magic is a suitable entertainment for children.
newyorker.com
James Fallows@jfallows.bsky.social · 2mo agoOh no! Mark Singer has been one of the most gifted magazine writers ever. And among the most decent, admirable people. In addition to his unforgettable profile of Ricky Jay, Mark wrote *the* piece about Trump that foresaw everything. Nearly 30 years ago: www.newyorker.com/magazine/199...
