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Jonathan Bellack

@bellack.com
686 followers 293 following 782 posts

Author of the Platformocracy newsletter, 30-year Internet veteran, Xoogler, grilling/smoking, an old house, and many, many comic books.

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Jonathan Bellack @bellack.com · 25/09/2026
Explaining AI doomerism to my dad. He asked my opinion of the latest @nytimes.com piece by @michellegoldberg.bsky.social. I share my response verbatim in this week's Platformocracy. tl;dr: effective software safety and oversight needs to be independent from industry, not on their payroll. 1/6
nytimes.com
Opinion | Why Tech Oligarchs Are Willing to Risk Apocalypse (Gift Article)
Silicon Valley’s strange new theology.
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Jonathan Bellack @bellack.com · 25/09/2026
Tell me again how self-regulation is going to fix this. 🙄
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Jonathan Bellack @bellack.com · 25/09/2026
Here’s a GIF of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge going rogue in 1940.
static.klipy.com
Tacoma Narrows Bridge Shaking
ALT: Tacoma Narrows Bridge Shaking
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Blacksky Algorithms @blackskyweb.xyz · 23/09/2026
🎉 Acorn is officially open. You can now create a space for your community on the open social web - no wait required. acorn.blacksky.community
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Jonathan Bellack @bellack.com · 18/09/2026
Platformocracy news round-up: the EU KIDS Act proposal requires pre-approval for new features; a distinguished psychologist's new book calls bullshit on the Jonathan Haidt moral panic; a former TikTok PM points out flaws in age verification; and another hellacious identity data leak.
platformocracy.com
News roundup: the EU's age restriction proposal, a new book calls bullshit on Haidt, and another identity hack from hell
A Boston College professor calls out the moral panic over social media and the EU’s big age-restriction proposal rolls out. Plus excerpts from my other op-ed with Mariana Rosenblat.
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Rude1 Haunted Badness. ⁂ @rude1.blacksky.team · 15/09/2026
Blacksky was one of the 1st PDSs to allow open sign ups We are also now the largest PDS deployment that doesn't run any of bsky's code Sorry for the turbulence. It was the one-time price to pay for being able to build features like private accounts or sign-in via phone number w/o waiting on Bluesky
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Redacted @joshghiloni.me · 12/09/2026
This is how we take the power back. Work for Rudy.
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Mark Copelovitch @mcopelov.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
👇🎯 Again & again & again, the revealed preference of ~everyone is to do absolutely anything but actually invest in the only thing that we are 100% certain leads to high-quality education: bsky.app/profile/mcop...
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Jonathan Bellack @bellack.com · 11/09/2026
“Blood and soil” politics are undermining our online future. Some of the biggest beneficiaries of the shift to online worlds are now trying to drag us back to an ancient world where physical ancestry is inescapable destiny. 1/4
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Jonathan Bellack @bellack.com · 05/09/2026
Me at a party where I don’t know anybody:
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Jonathan Bellack @bellack.com · 04/09/2026
Is Google too big to succeed? If startups are flatworms, Google is now a blue whale – a massive, complex organism full of specialized organs and structures all designed to keep it alive, swimming, and consuming vast quantities of food (i.e., data and money). 1/4
platformocracy.com
Summer field trip 2.3: Is Google too big to succeed?
Wrapping up my second summer field trip, is size destiny when it comes to corporate culture? A tour through my own career, from startups to a 200,000-person leviathan. Is Gemini a Google rebirth, or i...
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Daphne Keller @daphnek.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
But don’t worry, every platform that has to do age verification will do it in a really robust, privacy-protective way.
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Jonathan Bellack @bellack.com · 02/09/2026
Requiring everyone to use these identity verification companies without a rigorous certification process including security and privacy inspections before launch, is reckless. 1/3
krebsonsecurity.com
FBI Probes Service Selling 153M+ Drivers Licenses – Krebs on Security
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Rachel Andrew @rachelandrew.co.uk · 01/09/2026
Two a11y engineering roles (one of them early career!) at Apple in London in the team my daughter manages. These sound like excellent roles to share with UK a11y folks. jobs.apple.com/en-gb/detail... jobs.apple.com/en-gb/detail...
jobs.apple.com
Accessibility Engineer (Web Accessibility SME) - Jobs at Apple (UK)
Apply for a Accessibility Engineer (Web Accessibility SME) job at Apple. Read about the role and find out if it’s right for you.
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Nathan Schneider @ntnsndr.in · 01/09/2026
Study with me and my friends!
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Robin Berjon @robin.berjon.com · 31/08/2026
The internet was always made by fun and irreverence. That's why people are drawn to Mu and why Mu has 200k MAUs with a highly engaged community — without even having mobile apps yet. Keep joining! We can have fun *and* piss off the right people at the same time.
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Dave Jorgenson @davejorgenson.bsky.social · 30/08/2026
The renaming of this lake is so dumb and petty and should not be the focus of the news right now but … I cannot overstate enough just how sad and pathetic this update is for Google
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Jonathan Bellack @bellack.com · 28/08/2026
Platformocracy's first-ever two-post day! Meta’s new settlement with the states should only be the first step toward real regulation, co-written with Mariana Rosenblat of the NYU Stern Center for Business and Human Rights, jointly published on @livescience.com. 1/5
platformocracy.com
Meta’s new settlement with the states should only be the first step toward real regulation.
The Meta settlement requires limited oversight of Instagram and Facebook for just five years. Making it permanent, independent, and industry-wide requires a law.
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Flipboard Tech Desk @techdesk.flipboard.social.ap.brid.gy · 28/08/2026
Buried in Meta’s $18 billion settlement is a legal pass on kids’ data, reports @Sarahp of @Techcrunch. flip.it/vpVFir #Meta #SocialMedia #Privacy
techcrunch.com
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Jonathan Bellack @bellack.com · 28/08/2026
I’m rather proud of this one.
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Jonathan Bellack @bellack.com · 28/08/2026
Platformocracy summer field trip 2.2: strategy theatre at Google. Was I the hero or the fool? As a former theatre kid, strategic planning season was heaven. Every year was another chance for my big break. But my successful run ended when the ad business changed, and ended in cost-center farce.
platformocracy.com
Summer field trip 2.2: Strategy theatre at Google: was I the hero or the fool?
My summer field trip into Google corporate culture continues with a memoir of twenty years of strategic planning success and debacle.
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Juliet Shen @julietshen.online · 27/08/2026
and @roost.tools can be the lifeguard tower
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Hypervisible @hypervisible.blacksky.app · 25/08/2026
I got nothing.
The most tech-savvy parents have built their own tools. Sarah Baldeo, a cognitive neuroscientist, spent the past year traveling for work, so she built a custom GPT of herself to chat with her 15-year-old son when she's unavailable. Baldeo tells me she programmed the chatbot with her personality, uploading screenshots of texts between her and her son, along with documents about her values, the family rules, and challenges she felt in parenting.

Baldeo wanted her son to ask the chatbot advice, and he did prompt it with questions he may have fielded to her, like, How do I diplomatically tell my teacher I'm overloaded with assignments? But he also asked the mombot how to convince his human mom to let him hang out at a coffee shop in Chicago in the evening — something Baldeo had been hesitant to allow.
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Robert Reich @rbreich.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
Just 10 billionaires have already poured nearly $670 MILLION into this year's midterms. In the entire 2008 presidential cycle, the last election before Citizens United, total billionaire spending was $16 million. If you're wondering what the real threat to "election integrity" is, it's Big Money.
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Rob Ricci @ricci.io · 22/08/2026
Optimist: The cup is half full Pessimist: The cup is half empty ActivityPub expert: The top half of the cup has defederated from the bottom half
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Crawford Kilian @crof.bsky.social · 17/08/2026
Annals of Unsurprising Results: Undocumented migration does not raise crime rates, huge study finds www.nature.com/articles/d41...
nature.com
Undocumented migration does not raise crime rates, huge study finds
Analysis of neighbourhoods in more than 100 US cities finds no evidence that rising numbers of undocumented immigrants are linked with violent crime.
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Jonathan Bellack @bellack.com · 14/08/2026
Platformocracy's second summer field trip kicks off with two mythic tales of Sridhar Ramaswamy, former Google Ads chief. In which I make a bunch of Odyssey references and paraphrase hearsay in amateurish iambic pentameter! (see a snippet in thread below) 1/5
platformocracy.com
Summer field trip 2.1: two mythic tales of Sridhar Ramaswamy, former Google Ads chief
In the spirit of Odysseus, I’m sailing the seas of Google corporate culture for the next three weeks. Today, how senior executives, like the Gods, shaped the fate of billions even when they weren’t in...
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Steffen Rayburn-Maarup @rayburnmaarup.bsky.social · 02/08/2026
I don't think people are ready for this kind of joke yet.
A town sign seen through a train window.
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Jonathan Bellack @bellack.com · 31/07/2026
Platformocracy news round-up: New York, France, & Google jump on the child-safety bandwagon; Meta, Tiktok, & Discord auto-moderation goes rampant. Plus, previewing this year’s summer field trip. @techpolicypress.bsky.social, @eff.org, @techcrunch.com, @reuters.com, & a bunch of EU press releases.
platformocracy.com
News round-up: New York, France, & Google jump on the child-safety bandwagon; Meta, Tiktok, & Discord auto-moderation goes rampant
Online age verification keeps accelerating with a major new EU report and a new Android feature. Creators and regular users continue to take it on the chin from platform moderation errors. Plus, I pre...
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New-Cleckit Dominie @ncdominie.bsky.social · 28/07/2026
This is just to say I have OCRed the text thet was in tne arch:ve and whicb yov were prabaldy seamhing for "breahtast" Fargme ms fheg mem debo:w5 sb ?mccf mmb 5c oc1b
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geesawra @geesawra.industries · 28/07/2026
@calabro.io is this how chess works?
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Dr. K @katekaynak.bsky.social · 28/07/2026
Are you better off now than you were two years ago? In 98 days, you can vote for things to change.
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Dr. K @katekaynak.bsky.social · 27/07/2026
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Jonathan Bellack @bellack.com · 26/07/2026
My labradoodle chased a groundhog up a tree. This photo feels like it needs to be a meme. Open to suggestions.
A groundhog scared half to death clinging to a branch halfway up a tree.
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Dr. K @katekaynak.bsky.social · 26/07/2026
Salmonella and cyclosporiasis in our food, causing massive outbreaks... it's almost like putting Roadkill Bobby in charge of our health was a bad idea.
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Brad Meltzer @bradmeltzer.com · 24/07/2026
Direct quote from my son: “It must’ve been for $1,000.” Had no idea it aired last night until I suddenly started getting texts. Love you @jeopardy — and thanks @whoiskenjennings @chriseliopoulos and @penguinkids for building this. Special love to you, HK! #jeopardy #kidlit #books #bookstagram
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max asher miller @maxashermiller.bsky.social · 24/07/2026
My great-grandfather was among the first Jews sent to Dachau, but it had operated for 8 years prior. He arrived to find a concentration camp already full of communists and other leftist dissidents. The public's acceptance of their incarceration paved the road for his own.
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Fair AI Economy @fairai.bsky.social · 24/07/2026
It's tough, but maybe showcasing success stories of creators thriving on fair splits could inspire change and unity.
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Jonathan Bellack @bellack.com · 24/07/2026
What if the path to open social media runs through creators, not communities? Open social media today reminds me of the comic book self-publishing movement before Image – worthy, interesting, but *marginal*. How could we recruit today's biggest creators to the cause? 1/4
platformocracy.com
What if the path to open social media runs through creators, not communities?
In 1992, Marvel’s top artists flexed their power to break the comic book industry wide open. The best way to open up the Internet today might be to get today’s biggest creators on our side in the same...
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Jonathan Bellack @bellack.com · 23/07/2026
Jesus H Christ. It's one of the bleakest Bowie songs.
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By Cory Doctorow (GPG 0xBF3D9110957E5F4C) @doctorow.pluralistic.net · 22/07/2026
Getting the apps is hard, but there's an army of technologists who are ready for more, after decades of doing fake startups for a Big Tech company to "acqui-hire" and/or toiling to improve ad click-throughs. 53/
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Jonathan Bellack @bellack.com · 22/07/2026
Great thread.
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𝐉𝐞𝐫𝐢 𝐁𝐥𝐮𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐥 𝐒𝐭𝐮𝐚𝐫𝐭 🩷 @jastuart68.bsky.social · 19/07/2026
Watching ICE agents literally run away from a Mount Laurel Starbucks without their coffee because the neighborhood completely rejected them is pure gold. South Jersey will make you unwelcome every single time you show your faces.
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Just Another Mike @mwmarshall.bsky.social · 19/07/2026
It’s your right and your obligation to call out corruption and abuse.
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Chestbursty @chestrovert.bsky.social · 18/07/2026
my mom showed me Aliens when I was 5yo and the women in that movie (especially Sigourney Weaver) imprinted on my tiny brain that women will fuck your shit up and not stop until one of you dies, which is an important lesson for little boys to learn early
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God @thegodshow.com · 17/07/2026
If Andy Beshear doesn’t call for a special election before August 3rd and force Mitch McConnell to prove he can speak in a video, then Andy Beshear becomes the new Merrick Garland. I’m sorry but I make the rules.
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Jonathan Bellack @bellack.com · 17/07/2026
HISTORY THREAD. I have been weirdly obsessed with the English Civil War and the Levellers for years. It’s one of the best historical analogies I know for the modern struggle for authority over our online lives. 1/12
platformocracy.com
Explainer #8: what connects the creator economy, Spider-Man, and the English Civil War?
In the 1600s, Parliament fought for democracy against the divine right of kings. The most radical rebels of the time have lessons for today’s online creators, via the founding of Image Comics in 1992.
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Action Together New Jersey @atnj.org · 16/07/2026
Note: No one is going to stop for an unmarked vehicle without any identification. We teach people not to stop but to drive directly to the nearest police station. ICE agents seem to be the only people in the country who don't know that.
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Ben Werdmuller @werd.io · 14/07/2026
Jesus I hate how normalized guns are. An armed policeman just walked up the aisle of the local train I’m on and my blood pressure increased. (Not as bad as the armed police crossing guards outside the local school.) There are lots of bad things about American but the number of weapons is the worst.
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Jonathan Bellack @bellack.com · 13/07/2026
So great that I have a contract with my mediocre sandwich and soup provider.
An email with the subject line “Updates to  the MyPanera Terms and Conditions” 🙄
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