YouTube video by America's Test Kitchen

YouTube video by Rare Earth

In the past two years, the federal government has unlawfully consolidated data exposing our private information. This consolidation has been chaotic but generally came in three rolling waves: It start...

Literally every modern dictionary includes this definition

2026-09-25, Biblioteca Vasconcelos, Mexico City, Mexico -- A week into my nine-day trip to Mexico City, I have thoughts. The moving-abroad calculus will come later. What I can say right now is that being on the ground hasn't disqualified Mexico City despite several serious cons. So here's a brief list, just five, of my less-than-brief impressions so far. Biblioteca Vasconcelos…

The week in Guadalajara I'd planned ended after just two days. A fifteen-hour battle with Expedia's support call center and a poor choice in hotels didn't help, but the TL;DR on the fundamentals was clear: nice place to visit, don't want to live there, I'd rather be (and am now) in Philadelphia. The Gory Details As large as GDL actually is, it doesn't feel it.

The Museum of the Philadelphia will highlight everything from Hitchbot to objects Philadelphians have thrown over time.

Last year’s First Friday commemoration of 10 years since the hitchhiking robot’s visit to Philly drew around 550 visitors.

Some of you are enjoying a surprise Nor'easter right now, and I wish you safe passage through the storm with no power interruptions, downed trees, or flooded streets. We had a storm here today, too: It "rained" hard enough that I put on my bucket hat for 30 minutes. I can't blame precipitation for my eight days of radio silence--not even a single Bluesky post.

Residents protested outside City Hall this week, and Mayor Parker has set up a task force to report on the pros and cons of hyperscale data centers by June.

The toilets of tomorrow have begun arriving in the Big Apple.

A report predicts electricity demand on the regional grid will nearly double by 2040, due almost entirely to data centers.

The wood-and-red-metal market stalls are designed to be flexible and foster community-gathering in Philly’s Chinatown.

Connecting the Delaware River and Schuylkill River trails via Spring Garden Street is part of a larger project connecting bike and walking trails from Florida to Maine.

More than 40% of recent new housing is in the Center City area, but more incentives are needed to keep the boom going, a business group says.

City officials say two sites in Philadelphia have potential for AI data centers, but there are no proposals for development.

Twenty Five Years Ago -- I didn't hear the first plane hit. My new apartment, a few blocks south of Washington Square, was about a mile and a half away, but I was in the shower. As I dried off and dressed, I could hear NY1 reporting that a small plane had hit one of the towers. Looking at the screen, I didn't concur: the gash ran half the width of the building.

YouTube video by Robert Reich

I hate flying, but here I go again on another recon mission to a Spanish-speaking city whose name begins with 'M'. This time it's Mexico City at the end of September. My plan to move abroad has been a moving target since November 2025. I've gotten used to tweaking it on a weekly basis because something always comes up: new research angles, new videos and articles in my feeds, and even geo-political news.

This is probably the most important thing to have happened in A.I. this year.

Two METR staff members and a Redwood Research contractor investigated an incident in which OpenAI agents coordinated a multi-day hack of Hugging Face on a shared unsanctioned message board.

Philly’s beloved Academy of Natural Sciences’ museum is closing at the end of the month. Here’s how the government, organizations and public have gotten involved in the discourse

YouTube video by soundping

Amazon’s team uses a T. rex preparing to devour a book as its logo.

The organization says its goal is to keep the Portal in Philadelphia and establish it as a lasting landmark in the city.

People seeing summer blockbusters like “The Odyssey” or the new Spider-Man film question if loud theater sounds are causing hearing damage.

In my last quarterly post I asked, "Can we have nice things in Philly?" We're actively testing that hypothesis--all the improvements around the city for the 250th Anniversary of the Declaration of Independence are nice things calling out to Philly's better angels to protect and appreciate and maintain them. Meanwhile Philly's own agent of chaos, Gritty, whispers in our other ear.

Tensions were high at Philadelphia City Hall on Aug. 5 during a hearing about police presence in the Gayborhood following Pride festivities in June.

Also: Forging the One Ring in Rings of Power S3 teaser; new Lanterns trailer; Spaceballs: The New One panel.

After two ambitious quarters of gainful unemployment, world travel, and exhaustive research, I needed a break. I started the year with ambitious plans--too ambitious: Kickstart learning Spanish. Explore teaching English as a foreign language. Get a new job and maybe a new profession while I'm at it. Even just *write more*. All that and more ... NOT done. Plenty of things kept me demotivated.

The final condition will shock you! (It won’t. It’s taxes.)...

“You learn that you’re more than just a cheesesteak shop. You’re part of people’s history and part of people’s expectations,” Ken Silver said.

The Washington Post reports: Officials who separated former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg from his young twins last month relied on a vague and unsubstantiated allegation from an accuser aut...

A federal bill that seeks to ban books, activities, and programs that mention transgender people — and potentially all LGBTQ people — from K-12 public schools nationwide has moved ahead in the House a...