iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

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Will Stancil @whstancil.bsky.social · 4h

I know people instinctively recoil at monocausal explanations and want important trends to have sufficiently weighty causes, but “We built a novel social environment that rewards anger and lurid pessimism and moved 95% of political discourse into it” is a pretty good explanation for a lot of stuff

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Amanda Litman @amandalitman.bsky.social · 6h

The newly competitive races & places this year are a necessary reminder that “battleground” is a dynamic term and it is rarely a waste of resources to invest in candidate recruitment and/or infrastructure in deep red places because you never fucking know!

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Nothings Monstered @nothingsmonstrd.bsky.social · 7h

"Does the blossom refute the bud?"

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Scifi Art @scifiart.bsky.social · 20h

Chris Moore was a giant of book cover art. Perhaps a bit less well known than the other Chris (Foss), Moore’s covers dominated the sci-fi section of bookshops while I was growing up in the 70s and 80’s

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Natee (they/them) @himmapaan.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Onagadori Rooster. Ink and gouache on Fabriano Medioevalis, 85 × 132 mm, 2022.

Drawing in black ink, primarily in silhouette, of an Onagadori rooster with long flowing tail covert feathers on a plum blossom branch. The rooster's comb and wattle are the only spots of red. The piece is smaller than a postcard and is photographed with the traditional Chinese brush it was drawn with.

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Nothings Monstered @nothingsmonstrd.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

Medusa — Don Blanding

Black and white art of a woman with snake hair from the first half of the 20th century

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でんか @k-hermit.com · 29/09/2026

ヒメ系のかにがに🦀

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John Scalzi @scalzi.com · 28/09/2026

It continues to be interesting to me just how many men, when presented with a clear and obvious answer to a test of morality and empathy, will nevertheless choose to "devil's advocate" themselves into a position of complete assholery

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𝔻𝕖𝕖𝕡 𝕋𝕙𝕠𝕥 @thatsgoodweb.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

David Schleinkofer, cover art for Sim City 2000, 1993

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Rachel Deering @racheldeering.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

A Compendium of Small Birds, Kotori Ruishō, Nantō.

A wren, a crossbill, and I don’t know what the grey and white bird is, all perched on branches, foliage. Woodblock painting.

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Nils Gilman @nilsgilman.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

Agree with Greg‘s general point. But let me ask the hard question about moral hazard: if the likes of Zuck or Jensen (or Dartmouth or Paul Weiss) pay no price for having kowtowed to Trump, won’t they end up looking smart for having done so? And if we want to curb this moral hazard, what must we do?

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By Cory Doctorow (GPG 0xBF3D9110957E5F4C) @doctorow.pluralistic.net · 25/09/2026

Prepping for a voyage to Mars, painted by Robert McCall for Life magazine, October 1964. humanoidhistory.tumblr.com/post/8287662...

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Michael Whelan @michaelwhelan.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

PURSUIT (1982) Acrylic - 30” x 20” Occasionally it is fun to do an action-filled scene. This exciting book by Alan Dean Foster afforded the perfect opportunity. #art #booksky 🪐📚

In a frantic flight through the woods, a fierce ostrich-like bird bends its sinuous neck as it corners around a massive tree. With a powerful talon, it grips rock and seeks footing with its other leg raised. Mounted on its back gripping reins is a redheaded man in a vibrant blue coat. A serpent coils around his shoulder and down his extended arm. The serpent spreads kaleidoscopic wings and hisses in displeasure. A badger-like creature springs out of their path.

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Adam Serwer @adamserwer.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

that 18 percent seems really well represented in the news and on social media bsky.app/profile/atru...

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Barry Butler Photography @barrybutler9.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Fire on Friday. Today's sunrise over the Chicago skyline.

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Max Berger @maxberger.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

One of my most galaxy-brained takes is that politicians and political groups should talk more about workers’ share of national income. It's one of the clearest, simplest ways to describe how billionaires and corporate elites captured so much of the economy--and something policy can change.

axios.com

U.S. workers' share of national income falls to a new low

Labor's bargaining position has worsened markedly in the last half-decade.

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Saganism @sagan.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

Carl Sagan 🧵 "The Fermi paradox essentially says that if there's extraterrestrial high technology intelligence anywhere they should have been here because if they travel at the speed of light, the galaxy is 100,000 light-years across, it takes you 100,000 years to cross the galaxy.

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The Economist @economist.com · 24/09/2026

Deaths now outnumber births in reliably Republican counties for the first time since at least 1982. We explain how this may already be affecting voting patterns in America bit.ly/471apDL

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Carl Quintanilla @carlquintanilla.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

WSJ: The AI build-out is on track to become the biggest economic bet in US history, dwarfing the investments made to fund other huge US infrastructure projects — such as the railroads, the highway system and the plumbing for the internet.” (via Jefferies)

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Ashmolean Museum, Oxford @ashmoleanmuseum.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

The autumn equinox is here in the northern hemisphere, meaning that the new season has officially begun. This woodblock print by Hiroshige captures the colours and feeling of autumn beautifully.

A woodblock print by Utagawa Hiroshige I detecting autumn leaves on a maple tree

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Barry Butler Photography @barrybutler9.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

Today's Chicagohenge. This morning's start on the day of the Autumnal Equinox in Chicago.

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Nicolas Hénin @nicolashenin.net · 17/09/2026

Nice campaign by the Norwegian Consumer Council about the declining lifespan of products. Enjoy!

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Joe Walsh @walshfreedom.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

“ICE FISHING”: White U.S. citizens display Mexican flags on their cars to expose ICE’s racial profiling, waste agents’ time and divert them from preying on immigrants. 1/2

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Brent Toderian @brenttoderian.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

Remember this one? “Humans aren’t very efficient movers—until you put us on a bicycle, when we become some of the most energy-efficient land travelers in the animal kingdom.” The most efficient travellers are us on bikes. Proven science via Scientific American @sciam.bsky.social #CityMakingMath

scientificamerican.com

The Most Efficient Traveler Isn’t a Bird or a Fish—It’s You on a Bike

A famous graphic, now updated, compares locomotion in the animal kingdom

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Nils Gilman @nilsgilman.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

In my latest piece, with @brankomilan.bsky.social, we contemplate how exactly AI is likely to affect the class structure. BLUF: absent policy intervention, it's going to end social mobility, because the sorts of jobs that once enabled mobility are the ones going away www.noemamag.com/the-end-of-u...

noemamag.com

The End Of Upward Mobility | NOEMA

Artificial intelligence is coming for the meritocracy.

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Our World in Data @ourworldindata.org · 18/09/2026

Since the rise of humans, wild land mammal biomass has declined by 85%. Around 100,000 years ago, all of the wild land mammals on Earth summed up to around 20 million tonnes of carbon. By around 10,000 years ago, there had been a huge decline, likely in the range of 25% to 50%.

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Dare Obasanjo @carnage4life.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

The most significant trend of the next decade is going to be that computers are getting smarter while people are getting dumber.

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Nothings Monstered @nothingsmonstrd.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

Countries that do not have an Indo-European language as an official language. www.tumblr.com/mapsontheweb...

A world map with all of the all of the Western Hemisphere in Gray as well as Australia sub-Saharan Africa new Zealand and most of Oceania marked in red are Indonesia southeast Asia China Japan Mongolia a few smaller places in there such as Taiwan Singapore afghanistan and then a belt stretching across north Africa to Saudi Arabia the Western Sahara disputed territory is in Gray I believe Spanish is an official language there to the extent anything is official the Horn of Africa is in red other sedan I think includes English as an official language in Europe Hungary and Estonia are the two countries in red Finland counts Swedish as one of its official languages
India Pakistan Sri Lanka Iraq and Iran all have an indo European language among their official languages

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SE Gyges @segyges.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

This idea seems to be the most infectious because it activates the same neurosis that every apocalyptic or millenarian cult does. The world is going to end, and only I and my special group of people in the know can maybe stop it. (Also, you should give me money and have sex with me.)

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The New York Times @nytimes.com · 16/09/2026

Japan’s health ministry released data on Tuesday showing that there are now 107,677 people who are at least 100 years old, an increase of nearly 8,000 since last year. Women make up the vast majority of the group, at 88%. nyti.ms/4cP7jWJ

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Nothings Monstered @nothingsmonstrd.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

Chappell Roan, 2024

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Eamon Javers @eamonjavers.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

This is a subhed for the ages in the WSJ this morning: “Talk of heading off artificial intelligence’s potential role in destroying humanity hurt some stocks and helped others”

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Nothings Monstered @nothingsmonstrd.bsky.social · 31/08/2026

Diatom Parade — Betty Busby, 2022 quilt 52 x 68 in www.saqa.com/art/juried-a...

A colorful image of diatoms
Diatom are single-celled marine life who are the only life on earth with cell walls made of silica, as I just learned from Wikipedia

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Will Stancil @whstancil.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

I am driven to distraction by how *not angry* so many of my electeds seem. When they sit around and blab about policy this and policy that and blah blah blah, what I hear is "This is an interesting intellectual exercise for me." You should be barely able to contain yourself in public.

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Nothings Monstered @nothingsmonstrd.bsky.social · 29/08/2026

Untitled (Fridge) — Larry Madrigal, 2020

Painting of the artist in his underwear staring into an open refrigerator. He's standing in a messy kitchen through open door we see what looks like a couple of people sharing a large bed — I think it's the artist's children

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By Cory Doctorow (GPG 0xBF3D9110957E5F4C) @doctorow.pluralistic.net · 12/09/2026

thevaultoftheatomicspaceage.tumblr.com/post/8275759...

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Future Revisitations @futurerevisited.bsky.social · 12/09/2026

After over 60 years, still one of the finest and most thought-provoking ‘first contact’ novels. Celebrating Stanislaw Lem, born OTD 1921. #booksky

Copy of the Faber edition of Stanislaw Lem’s 1961 novel ‘Solaris’, with a quote from the novel:
“How do you expect to communicate with the ocean, when you can’t even understand one another?”

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Rise Up Comus @riseupcomus.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

This line from Shadow of the Torturer by Gene Wolf is such excellent worldbuilding. "The lights of the oubliette are of that ancient kind that is said to burn forever, though some have now gone out." That turn in the second phrase is just...😚👌

The real work of our guild is carried out below all this. Just underground lies
the examination room; beneath it, and thus outside the tower proper (for the
examination room was the propulsion chamber of the original structure) stretches
the labyrinth of the oubliette. There are three usable levels, reached by a
central stairwell. The cells are plain, dry, and clean, equipped with a small
table, a chair, and narrow bed fixed in the center of the floor.
The lights of the oubliette are of that ancient kind that is said to burn
forever, though some have now gone out. In the gloom of those corridors, my
feelings that morning were not gloomy but joyous - here I would labor when I
became a journeyman, here I would practice the ancient art and raise myself to
the rank of master, here I would lay the foundation for the restoration of our
guild to its former glory. The very air of the place seemed to wrap me like a
blanket that had been warmed before some clean-scented fire.

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Michael Whelan @michaelwhelan.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

DAWN JOURNEY (2010) Acrylic - 14” x 11” Every day offers the possibility of a new beginning. The journey the title refers to is the freedom of mind. 1/3 #art

Two women inhabit the ruins of an ancient abbey offering a contrast in contemplation. Atop a high pillar, one kneels with palms resting on her thighs and eyes closed in meditation while the other sits below leaning back at the base of a massive arched window bay now open to the sky. One knee is raised and her gaze is turned up and out of the ruins. The colors framed there are vivid traces of morning light, pink and purple traces lit warm but sunrise. A fat crescent moon lingers high left as seen past the broken wall of the ruins. Birds swoop and glide past light cloud cover.

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Gabino Iglesias @gabino.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

Here’s some Vladimir Chebakov art to make your Wednesday a little better.

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Aaron Meyers @aaronmeyers.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

This movie occupies more time in my brain than it should. I think about it a lot.

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Nothings Monstered @nothingsmonstrd.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

Arnaldo Barbosa, 1928

Artwork for Para Todos magazine
I thought it was Jose Carlos at first but it's the house style i believe
Jose Carlos was the art director for Para todos and this artist followed the look of the magazine. a green skinned mermaid floating on multicolored waves with long tendrils coming out from behind her head

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derek guy @dieworkwear.bsky.social · 06/09/2026

this is the kind of design costume designers make to tell you who are the bad guys in a space movie

Donald Trump posts an image on his Truth Social account. It shows a new uniform for US Space Force members, comprising of an all-black outfit with knee-high black leather boots, black cap, and minimalist looking suit.

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Colin Smith @colinsmith.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

Bruce Pennington’s cover art for the turn-of-the-80s paperback edition of Gene Wolfe’s “The Shadow Of The Torturer”.

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BookWormSat @bookwormsat.bsky.social · 05/09/2026

‘It does not do to leave a live dragon out of your calculations, if you live near him.’ ~ Tolkien, The Hobbit. @racheldeering.bsky.social here for #BookWormSat today and #ReadABookDay tomorrow. 🖼️ Tolkien, 1937.

Painting of the dragon Smaug resting on a massive pile of gold inside the Lonely Mountain, facing Bilbo Baggins (visible in the small inset at the bottom right).

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