Links, notes, & sundries — Ethan Marcotte’s website

In this essay, Hamilton suggests that if airline and airport workers weren’t so constrained by federal labor laws, the current airport crises would have already been resolved.

A project from the University of Toronto’s Creative Labour & Critical Futures research lab: Around the world, cultural workers are striking, protesting, running campaigns and mobilizing in relation to the use of AI in the workplace, such as Hollywood writ…

I haven’t played the new Marathon — I think I’ve aged out of shooters, and definitely out of multiplayer ones — but I’m just smitten by the way it looks.

404 Media on the data labelers and trainers staging a workers’ rebellion against “artificial intelligence”: “You can’t understand where you’re positioned if you don’t understand your history,” Angela, one of the day’s speakers, told the workers who had as…

David Sizemore’s “curated collection of digital archives”.

The power loom, as we know, is inevitable, preordained by God, who works His miracles through the hands of rich and wise inventors.

Every time you visit this link, you’ll get a random Web 1.0 website: https://wiby.me/surprise A glimpse into a different — better?

Danny Fenster’s account of his imprisonment in Myanmar, told with simple, delicate comic sketches.

Goodness me.

An adult life, told through five car purchases.

Here’s Aria with a scorcher of an essay on LLMs.

Whatever the lofty output gains promised by LLMs, their initial productivity surge is erased over time, and replaced by heavier workloads — and that leads to workers experiencing “cognitive fatigue, burnout, and weakened decision-making.”

Brian uses two of my very favorite topics — industrial history and infrastructure — to argue that it’s high time we prioritize maintenance and the public good in how we ship technological products.

I think Kim’s right to make a distinction between the citizen-led shutdowns we’ve been seeing here in the US, and a real general strike.

The US is at the forefront of a global push for gas that is set to escalate over the next five years, after tripling its planned gas-fired capacity in 2025.

My pal Jason just launched his new design practice, and wow does it have the perfect name: Loud Room.

I learned a lot from Eric Blanc’s interview with Aru Shiney-Ajay, executive director of the Sunrise Movement, discussing the organizing principles behind the resistance in the Twin Cities.

I know you’re worried I’m getting religious but trust me I am a stone atheist.

Bhaskar Mitra, writing for Disjunctions: …the grand fictitious narratives about AI, both the hype and the fearmongering, will continue to bolster claims of their “foundational” advancements, creating the conditions to commodify labor, renegotiate down wor…

Yale Environment 360: Since the beginning last year, at least 15 coal plants have had their planned retirements delayed, some indefinitely, according to a recent DeSmog analysis of Energy Department data. […] [Secretary of Energy Chris Wright] has said he…

Prompted by remarks from Governor Tim Walz on ICE’s fascist invasion of Minnesota, Ben reflects on what it would take for state governments to properly collect and analyze citizens’ footage of ICE’s countless abuses.

I thought this was an incredibly moving meditation — not just on Star Trek, but on what it means to love something under extractive capitalism.

I loved this post from Fathom, a studio based here in Boston, on how their team uses “generative AI” in their work.

Graphic artist Tai Ericson destroys donated Harry Potter books and transforms them into these beautiful, moving memorials of murdered transgender people, including Ra’Lasia Wright and Sam Nordquist.

I kinda love this: a hand-curated directory of independent blogs, all presented in a lovely feed reader that lets you follow the authors you like.

Did you ever want to know the history of those horns that go “awooga”?

It’s a depressing shift for people who, earlier in their careers, often actually were part of inventing the future.

An absolutely tremendous side project: a simulator for early MTV broadcasts, featuring tens of thousands of videos organized by decade.

This is a stunning, in-depth look at Apple’s new icon system for macOS Tahoe.

Man, do I love it when Rob writes about his website.

I don’t have the words to describe how important this essay of Erin’s feels to me: it’s about knowledge-making as a communal act of care, and how we might rebuild after the ground gives way beneath us.

A tremendous list of games, but wow do I love Tyler’s illustrations for some of his favorites.

A tremendous retrospective on the design process — and the type designer — behind Gotham.

Appreciated this framing from Kagi’s head of machine learning: if you have to interact with LLMs, do so knowing they’re riddled with bias, and best equipped to solve specific, discrete problems.

I love this suggestion that transparency is “the easiest way to gesture at integrity.”

This is a tremendous post from Gregg on the perils of using “artificial intelligence” for user research, and how they impact everyone: the researchers who use the tools; the companies that employ them; and ultimately, the users we design for.

An editor notices some issues with a freelance writer’s pitch, and subsequently finds themselves reckoning with what “artificial intelligence” has done to journalism.

If you’re frustrated by your employers’ “artificial intelligence” policies, here’s a site filled with resources and tools to help you organize against them.

I understood, like, 5% of the post’s more technical bits.

A clear-eyed (if terrifying) look at the rampant financial speculation propping up the “artificial intelligence” industry.

A fiendishly clever generator for animated type.

this website was created in a lab with the express purpose of becoming my new homepage Visit this site.

“The Bay Area has this rich history of people putting themselves on the line for justice.”

Man, if I could have an archive like this to browse through every single day, I’d die happy.

“No change is made in a vacuum, and no step forward in history comes perfectly.”

A close look at Amazon’s plans for rampant automation, and how those plans will impact workers.

The short version: the picture is bleak, and likely will be for a while.

A sobering look at how quickly work has dried up for translators, and how they’re being pushed away from the work they love.

Quoting any part of Jenny’s tremendous piece on “AI” feels like I’m doing it a disservice.

I was legitimately fascinated by the backstage logistics involved in installing not just a swimming pool but also actual rainfall in this theatrical production.