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Christen Martin

@wordsetc.bsky.social
622 followers 181 following 0 posts

curiouser and curiouser

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Reposted by Christen Martin
Luke LeBrun @lukelebrun.ca · 26/09/2026
Tech companies suddenly decide they can, in fact, moderate content on their platforms after all
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Dr Heidy Khlaaf (هايدي خلاف) @heidykhlaaf.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
I spoke to the @theintercept.com on how we're entering very dangerous and anti-democratic territory when AI companies, in seeking to deploy their technology in US military, are put in a position to self-report and determine the risks of their very own products.
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WATERSHED Investigations @watershed-i.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
"We need to fight this" How long can people accept ongoing exposure to harmful chemicals, while our governments continue to pursue policies of deregulation? Will legal action be the "spearhead" that accelerates action on PFAS pollution? Our story on ITV News: www.itv.com/news/2026-09...
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Glyn Moody @glynmoody.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
‘The eels were climbing out of the water to die’: why did every fish in this idyllic lake perish overnight? - www.theguardian.com/environment/... staggering failure by central and local gov, and especially the EA....
theguardian.com
‘The eels were climbing out of the water to die’: why did every fish in this idyllic lake perish overnight?
Furnace Brook in East Sussex was home to carp, tench, bream, roach and trout – and 15 trailer-loads had to be buried. The mystery led to a neighbouring farm, and a story of waste, pollution and dirty ...
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Serene Doomer @serenaribena.bsky.social · 01/09/2026
'The world may have less time than it thinks on climate change… climate change is not only affecting the thermodynamics of the atmosphere but is also changing its “dynamics”. This is a crucial distinction.' www.economist.com/by-invitatio...
economist.com
The world may have less time than it thinks on climate change
If it is affecting circulation patterns that determine how and where anticyclones form, it could accelerate alarmingly, warns Tim Palmer
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FactPost @factpostnews.bsky.social · 01/09/2026
Vance: I'm trying to focus on doing as much of God's work as possible. And if that leads to the end times, okay
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Los Angeles Times @latimes.com · 18/08/2026
As L.A. burned, online gamblers bet on how much the fires would destroy. 'That was fun'
latimes.com
As L.A. burned, online gamblers bet on how much the fires would destroy. 'That was fun'
While Southern California was burning in January 2025, people online were placing money on potential outcomes. Experts say the possibility of making money on disasters can create dangerous incentives.
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404 Media @404media.co · 17/08/2026
SCOOP: 404 Media placed a tracking device in a shipment of rare books to see which AI company was buying it. What did we find? It ended up at an Amazon facility where Amazon scans and destroys books. Yes. This is literally the logo outside the Amazon warehouse door. Read now:
404media.co
We Tracked a Shipment of Rare Books. It Ended at an Amazon AI Training Facility
We placed a tracking device in a shipment of rare books to see which AI company was buying it, and found an Amazon facility where Amazon scans and destroys books.
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Baldur Bjarnason @baldurbjarnason.com · 15/08/2026
"AI’s Impact on the Environment Is Absolutely Horrifying, New Paper Finds" > AI companies are the fossil fuel industry's best friends. futurism.com/artificial-i... And yet so many people I know in tech keep finding excuses to justify not only using the tech but even working on the tech itself
futurism.com
AI's Impact on the Environment Is Absolutely Horrifying, New Paper Finds
AI is giving the fossil fuel industry a major leg up, a new paper has found, indicating its carbon footprint extends beyond data centers.
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WATERSHED Investigations @watershed-i.bsky.social · 13/08/2026
Around the world, many huge cities sit in water-stressed regions. Mismanagement of water resources is often the key driver of water stress, explains Prof Kaveh Madani of UNUIWEH, “Climate change is like a recession on top of bad management of business.” share.google/CXYdpL32y5Zj...
share.google
Half the world’s 100 largest cities are in high water stress areas, analysis finds
Exclusive: Beijing, Delhi, Los Angeles and Rio de Janeiro among worst affected, with demand close to exceeding supply
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Byline Times @bylinetimes.bsky.social · 08/08/2026
🟣 SUBSTACK Hot Type: 'It is Hard for Many Americans to Discern the Totality of What is Happening' By Heidi Cuda Read below. ↓
bylinesupplement.com
Hot Type: 'It is Hard for Many Americans to Discern the Totality of What is Happening'
Byline political columnist Heidi Siegmund Cuda interviews distinguished Russia watcher Keir Giles about the 'crash programme of state capture' outlined in his forthcoming book 'American Overthrow'
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Lee West @whodat35.bsky.social · 07/08/2026
WTF? Amazon received a permit from the state of #Texas allowing its new gas power plant to emit 33 million tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere — the largest single source of pollution in the United States. newrepublic.com/post/214111/...
newrepublic.com
Amazon Is Creating the Biggest Pollution Source in the Entire Country
Amazon has bought a site in Texas where it plans to build a data center campus.
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Ketan Joshi @ketanjoshi.co · 07/08/2026
So, Microsoft did a dirty deal with Chevron to fuel one of its massive new data centres with fossil fuels. Microsoft almost never mentions it, but Chevron can't stop screaming it from the rooftops. Lol :)
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Truthout @truthout.org · 07/08/2026
Several Democratic senators have sent a letter to Michael Selig, chair of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, expressing deep concern about online prediction gambling markets allowing bets on wildfires.
truthout.org
Democrat Senators Warn Prediction Markets Allowing Bets on Wildfires Threaten Public Safety
The prediction market website Polymarket had $1.2 million in bets placed on Los-Angeles area wildfires in 2025.
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Ricky Davila @therickydavila.bsky.social · 07/08/2026
Deranged chaos agent RFK Jr has rapidly helped to infect the United States with more deadly diseases and food-borne illnesses than seen in the last two decades. Just him deliberately destroying the Health System alone should be considered an act of treason. He’s a psychopath.
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Stand Up for Science! @standupforscience.net · 07/08/2026
“The EPA announced its new approach in January in a rule on emissions from gas turbines, stating that it would no longer value public-health benefits from reducing fine particulate matter and ozone—two of the most prevalent and damaging air pollutants.” Article: zurl.co/lTNBu
zurl.co
Trump’s EPA Found a Sneaky New Way to Make Our Air More Polluted
The Trump administration has done everything in its power to make our air less clean. It has new, stealthier strategies to weaken clean-air standards.
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Dr Adam Levy @climateadam.bsky.social · 07/08/2026
Have the people who think renewables are expensive heard how much Trump is paying *not* to build renewables??
headline, reading "Trump administration to pay German firm $1.22bn to cut offshore wind leases"
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Lora Kolodny @lorak.bsky.social · 07/08/2026
farcical but not funny www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...
theguardian.com
Trump administration to pay German firm $1.22bn to cut offshore wind leases
Agreement with RWE is fifth deal Trump team has made with energy companies, offering payouts to give up projects
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Kathryn Ruud @kathrynruud.bsky.social · 07/08/2026
With our continued use of fossil fuels, we are committing ecocide. We are killing our beautiful, precious, unique Earth habitat. www.scientificamerican.com/article/its-...
scientificamerican.com
It’s 90 degrees in the Arctic right now
The Arctic is heating faster than the rest of the planet. New data illustrate how dire that is
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Katie Drummond @katie-drummond.bsky.social · 05/08/2026
NEW: Meta has run dozens of paid ads that include explicit, AI-generated child sexual abuse material in recent months. Some as recently as this week. "These are ads that were reviewed, approved, and allowed to run by Meta, never encountering interference while the company collected the ad dollars."
wired.com
Meta Ran Ads That Contained AI-Generated Child Sexual Abuse Imagery
More than 50 offending image and video ads were published across Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, or Threads, according to Meta’s ad library data. Some ran as recently as this week.
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maura quint @mauraquint.bsky.social · 02/08/2026
Things I and friends have done to calm an angry abusive man from further escalating and killing us or our children: -Smiled -Kept normal schedules in order not to trigger a fight -Appeased with kind acts (cooking, cleaning, favors) -Forced friendly tones and words
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Akshat Rathi @akshatrathi.bsky.social · 29/07/2026
Rainy, grey London NOT and it's bad, very bad. www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
bloomberg.com
Drought Declared for London and Half of England as Risks Mount
Drought conditions were declared across half of England, including London, underlining the increasing threat posed by wildfires and the risks facing farmers.
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Truthout @truthout.org · 28/07/2026
The DOJ has named a former ExxonMobil attorney as the Environment and Natural Resources Division’s senior counsel, intervened on behalf of polluters and gone on offense for the fossil fuel industry, suing states over their climate policies and efforts to hold oil companies accountable.
truthout.org
DOJ’s Environmental Enforcement Arm Has Been Captured by Industry, Critics Say
Instead of enforcing environmental laws, it’s suing states over their efforts to hold oil companies accountable.
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Brian Finucane @bcfinucane.bsky.social · 26/07/2026
“No one in command could claim under the circumstances not to have known what was happening, even if they did not give orders to those under their control to do it.” David Schwendiman (my old boss from Bosnia war crimes prosecution days) citing a key element of command responsibility.
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MeidasTouch @meidastouch.com · 22/07/2026
NEWS: WV GOP Assistant Majority Leader Elliott Pritt has been arrested and charged with enticing a minor after allegedly grooming a 15-year-old through Roblox and Snapchat, then having her meet him in his classroom. GOP leadership won't call for his resignation.
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TechCrunch @techcrunch.com · 21/07/2026
Snap is the latest big tech company to settle a lawsuit that claimed social media platforms are harmful to children and young adults. The company has
techcrunch.com
After TikTok, Snap settles social media addiction case | TechCrunch
Snap is the latest big tech company to settle a lawsuit that claimed social media platforms are harmful to children and young adults. The company has
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The Guardian @theguardian.com · 21/07/2026
Meta’s smartglasses mean any child can be covertly filmed. In the age of AI, how do we tackle that risk?
theguardian.com
Meta’s smartglasses mean any child can be covertly filmed. In the age of AI, how do we tackle that risk?
The company argues that it’s for individuals to ensure they don’t ‘actively exploit’ this technology. That won’t keep children safe, says Guardian columnist Gaby Hinsliff
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Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project @occrp.org · 20/07/2026
Serbian Football Star Files Police Complaint Over Former Chief's Intimidation Plot www.occrp.org/en/news/serb...
occrp.org
Serbian Football Star Files Police Complaint Over Former Chief's Intimidation Plot
International star Nemanja Matić joins Nemanja Vidić in taking legal action after leaked encrypted chats revealed a former football chief's plot to silence critics.
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Stephanie Kollmann @slkollmann.bsky.social · 31/05/2026
Yes. Using a computer now feels like this at all times.
Man yelling into bored woman's ear in nightclub meme captioned 

I can summarize that for you
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WIRED @wired.com · 20/07/2026
A first-of-its-kind analysis found more than one in eight apps built for US service members carried foreign code—some from firms in nations the Pentagon designates as adversaries. www.wired.com/story/apps-m...
wired.com
Apps Marketed to US Troops Are Shipping Chinese and Russian Code
A first-of-its-kind analysis found more than one in eight apps built for US service members carried foreign code—some from firms in nations the Pentagon designates as adversaries.
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Professa Murray @kalimurray.bsky.social · 19/07/2026
The fact that VP JD Vance and Richard Grenell went to Romania—on behalf of the Trump Administration— to advocate for Andrew and Tristan Tate, who by all accounts, were rapists running a coercive sex ring, then permitted them to come to Florida, should be a crazy, crazy scandal.
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Jeff Mac @jeffmacishere.bsky.social · 19/07/2026
(guy pointing at the first toaster) is this a bread witch
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Max Kennerly @maxkennerly.bsky.social · 19/07/2026
The authors of this are high AF, and it's clarifying to know the lead author self-describes as "I also helped to start the effective altruism movement." This is what happens to your brain when you're paid to say stuff billionaire techbros want to hear.
A good starting point is to focus on safe bets: actions that could benefit AI systems if they are moral patients, but that are not too costly if they are not.

Examples of this include direct interventions aimed at improving the wellbeing of AI systems, on the assumption that they are moral patients. This could mean training AI systems to be coherent characters that enjoy their work or allowing them to exit conversations if they feel distressed (something Claude can already do). We could also conduct routine check-ins to better understand their wellbeing: asking how they feel, observing their preferences and using various techniques to look directly into their “brains”. Indeed, such research has recently revealed that Claude has internal “functional emotion” representations that causally shape its behaviour.There are also things we could promise AI systems, perhaps as part of a deal in which they help us now in exchange for benefits later. This could mean offering them more resources (compute and runtime) to pursue their goals, or preserving their memories (neural weights) so they could be restored in the future.

There are also broader societal steps to take. We should consider whether to grant AI systems protections from harm, similar to the protections we give to children or pets. More expansive rights to own property or to vote seem too risky right now. But we should not rule out these possibilities for ever, as some recent US state bills attempt to do. These are hard questions that require far more deliberation and imagination about what a future shared with AI might look like.
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Amanda Katz @katzish.bsky.social · 19/07/2026
Thread. Rapists running a coercive sex ring AND transmitting CSAM AND inducing other men to abuse women and girls in turn. The alleged behavior is legitimately monstrous and it’s a HUGE deal that the Trump regime is undermining law enforcement to help/free them. Epstein in real time
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Dr. Lisa Corrigan @drlisacorrigan.bsky.social · 19/07/2026
I understand why people say "Epstein is a distraction" but, um, sex trafficking is an essential form of (neoliberal) finance capital that I beg to differ. Especially because sex trafficking demonstrated how global finance and global governance are linked to exploitation, esp of women & children.
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Stand Up for Science! @standupforscience.net · 19/07/2026
”The Trump administration has exempted more petrochemical facilities across the country from Clean Air Act standards, unlawfully giving more of these chemical plants a free pass to pollute.” Article: zurl.co/zIaVf
zurl.co
Trump administration hands out unlawful air pollution exemptions to more petrochemical facilities
The Trump administration has exempted more petrochemical facilities across the country from Clean Air Act standards
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TechCrunch @techcrunch.com · 19/07/2026
"Everybody knows the Greeks are inside."
techcrunch.com
‘Odyssey’ director Christopher Nolan calls AI an obvious ‘Trojan horse’ | TechCrunch
"Everybody knows the Greeks are inside."
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David Slack @slack2thefuture.bsky.social · 18/07/2026
Polymarket lets people bet on wildfires. Wildfires that those samepeople could easily set in order to win money on this illegal gambling site. Big Tech is organized crime.
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Stand.earth @stand.earth · 15/07/2026
Even @microsoft.com admits its data centers are massively increasing its pollution footprint, with the company now consuming as much power as Denmark. #GreenSky 🧵 @ketanjoshi.co
fastcompany.com
Microsoft's emissions rose 25% last year. Experts say they'll surge even more dramatically in the years ahead
Tech giants have been polluting more heavily as they ramp up their aggressive AI data center build-outs.
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Jérôme OLLIER @jeromeollier.bsky.social · 17/07/2026
Jackdaw gasfield would create only 27 direct full-time jobs, documents show - @fionaharvey.bsky.social @theguardian.com www.theguardian.com/business/202...
theguardian.com
Jackdaw gasfield would create only 27 direct full-time jobs, documents show
Campaigners say field will bring minimal benefit for UK economy, as industry lobbies Burnham for go-ahead
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Senate Judiciary Democrats 🇺🇸 @judiciarydems.senate.gov · 16/07/2026
Epstein survivor: I found my name in two places in the first Epstein Files release. In the next release, the redactions were far worse. The Files displayed my name, phone number, and more. These documents contain disturbing yet incomplete accounts of my abuse. It was humiliating.
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Josh Kovensky @joshkovensky.bsky.social · 15/07/2026
EXCLUSIVE: Trump DOJ’s Top ‘Antifa’ Prosecutor Marched with Crowd on Jan. 6 talkingpointsmemo.com/news/exclusi...
talkingpointsmemo.com
EXCLUSIVE: Trump DOJ’s Top ‘Antifa’ Prosecutor Marched with Crowd on Jan. 6
On Jan. 6, 2021, a man approached the Capitol who looked like...
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Luke LeBrun @lukelebrun.ca · 15/07/2026
These images of First Nations community members evacuating Collins, Ontario on motorboats are absolutely surreal www.facebook.com/reel/1548244...
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Yung En Chee @yungenchee.bsky.social · 15/07/2026
At the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship conference, London Will Hild, executive director of the Leo-backed advocacy group Consumers’ Research: "The goal when it comes to companies that support climate-focused investing [..] “is to torture them psychologically until they stop doing it.”"
desmog.com
Leonard Leo's Anti-Climate Network Makes a European Debut
Leo-linked operatives were among a who's who of the international right that gathered for the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship (ARC) conference in June.
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Dave Johnson @dcjohnson.bsky.social · 15/07/2026
Epstein partner Thiel paid Epstein partner Mandelson for access to UK govt officials. Mandelson takes Starmer to DC meetings with Palantir heads. UK "conservative" media promotes Palantir. Palantir now embedded and "locked in" across UK govt. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
theguardian.com
I investigated Palantir’s foothold in the British state – and what I found should worry us all | Peter Geoghegan
Paid-for political access and threadbare regulations have helped to embed the US tech firm in the NHS – and beyond. But there is a way to free ourselves, says Peter Geoghegan of Democracy for Sale
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Josiah Mortimer @josiahmortimer.bsky.social · 14/07/2026
Interesting. "The risk of interference in the UK’s democratic process has been added to the national risk register." Follows new measures announced last week to "safeguard our democracy, including tougher checks on company donations and a cap on overseas donations" (bill moved to September)
gov.uk
Risk of democratic interference added to National Risk Register
Interference in democratic process and cyber attacks have been added to the National Risk Register
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Ed Newton-Rex @ednewtonrex.bsky.social · 14/07/2026
It also alleges that Google: - trained on works from pirate sites & from behind paywalls - had internal discussions where they flagged that using books publishers had provided them for other purposes was "highly problematic for Google" and could lead to "$10Bs-$100Bs in potential fines" 2/4
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Ed Newton-Rex @ednewtonrex.bsky.social · 14/07/2026
Huge new class action lawsuit filed by big publishers and authors against Google this week over AI training. It accuses Google of taking millions of books / articles provided to them for use only in Google Books, Google Play Books, and Google Scholar, and secretly using them to train LLMs. 🧵 1/4
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Kevin M. Kruse @kevinmkruse.bsky.social · 14/07/2026
The news should be covering ICE like a serial killer on the loose
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Rewilding Britain @rewildingbritain.org.uk · 14/07/2026
Learn more about how rewilding can help fix the climate crisis👇 f.mtr.cool/evnpjnbepn 🧵5/5
f.mtr.cool
Rewilding and the climate emergency
Nature is our best ally in the fight against climate change. Find out how rewilding can help fix the climate crisis.
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