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Do Not Obey In Advance
1. Do not obey in advance. Much of the power of authoritarianism is freely given. In times like these, individuals think ahead about what a more repressive government will want, and then start to do it without being asked. You've already done this, haven't you? Stop. Anticipatory obedience teaches authorities what is possible and accelerates unfreedom. - Historian Timothy Snyder from On Tyranny with 20 rules for resisting tyranny
Leonard Peltier granted clemency
Joe Biden has granted clemency to Indigenous activist Leonard Peltier, in one of his last actions as president. Clemency isn't a pardon--the conviction stands--but the 80-year-old Peltier will be released from prison.
My Unsung Hero
My Unsung Hero is an ongoing NPR series where people tell brief stories of the (mostly) strangers they met who changed, and sometimes saved, their lives. [more inside]
"How would you even use this code?"
"Autonomy" is a short scifi/horror story by Meg Elison, published January 2025 in Clarkesworld, that partially takes place in an autonomous vehicle. Elison notes, "Here is my story of bloody revenge, a theme I can't get enough of these days." Content note for sexual assault and gore.
Happy Inauguration Day, DOGE!
A coalition representing veterans, public health professionals, teachers and other groups filed a suit today against DOGE, citing the the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA), and asking a court to block DOGE's activities until it complies with law.
The 1972 Federal Advisory Committee Act says that committees of outside government advisers must be “fairly balanced in terms of the points of view represented,” and that they must make their records available to the public — yet Musk and Ramaswamy's DOGE does neither. [more inside]
"Pop! Pop pop! Pop! Pop into Pop Up Video!"
Between 1996 and 2002, VH1 had a show called Pop Up Video which paired music videos with trivia and jokes that "popped up" on screen, mostly without controversy. Most of it is unavailable today, but the Internet Archive has a number of episodes taped off televion. Here is a list: [more inside]
Fix Your Hearts or Die!
FANFARE THIS WEEK... A special event thread for live commenting on the US inauguration. New movies: apocalypse musical The End; a queer examination of Kevin Smith's 90s romcom in Chasing Chasing Amy; Barry Keoghan and Nykiya Adams in the social realist drama Bird; and a woman becomes romantically entangled with her stepson in French drama Last Summer. In TV, Severance is back, Silo season two is wrapping up, and Stephanie Hsu's ex-lovers are dropping dead, in order in Laid. Also inside: FF's complete David Lynch wrap-up... [more inside]
The "Megalopolis" of Tabletop Role-Playing Games
‘Ultimately, Invisible Sun is an amazing roleplaying game. Its production design is breathtaking, and many aspects of its gameplay are brilliant and revolutionary. ... All roleplaying games are escapism; it is a testament to Invisible Sun’s creative ingenuity that it both foregrounds its own escapist nature and simultaneously provokes meaningful questions about what a better world might look like — because ultimately, we can’t just leave Shadow behind; our world desperately needs a rescue mission, not just an escape hatch." - David M. Higgins, Los Angeles Review of Books [more inside]
EPIC, the musical
EPIC: The Musical is a musical adaptation of Homer's The Odyssey created by Jorge Rivera-Herrans Per Athena Scalzi, I found out about EPIC, an online musical that's beautifully mind-blowing. [more inside]
Keep your mind set on freedom and your eyes on the prize
Crys Matthews calls herself the poster child for intersectionality. Her new album released last week,Reclamation (Youtube, Apple,Spotify, Autographed CD, reviews 1 ,2,3,4,5) "is both sonically and ideologically the fullest representation of who I am as an artist and as a human, she says. A preacher's kid, a Black woman, a Butch lesbian, and a proud Southerner who sings social justice music right alongside 'traditional' Country and Americana music, Matthews is reclaiming not just of the space Black artists have been denied in Country and Americana music, not just of the space LGBTQ people have been denied in communities of faith, not just of the autonomy women have been denied over their own bodies, she is reclaiming the South that raised her." And today, because it s a terrible day for so many, she released her latest song, Sleeves Up, written November 6th, 2024. There is so much [more inside]
Caution: Nerds
Journalist Robert Evans, best known for his sharp, sardonic perspective in everything from Cracked to Bellingcat to Behind the Bastards, live-skeeted his experience of the 2025 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, the annual showcase of the latest tech coming your way (whether you like it or not). Lowlights of the bacchanalia can be found in a series of increasingly pointed episodes of Better Offline (hosted by fellow Silicon Valley curmudgeon Ed Zitron). But it wasn't all bad -- true to the show's mission to be "an oasis within a tech industry gone wrong", Robert and friends made a discovery: after days of grifters and con men at CES we stumbled upon the booth for VLC. they were all dressed as wizards and told us, "we have nothing to sell, we just decided to show up". i told them I'd been using their software to pirate media for 15 years and they said "keep doing that". And reader, there are pictures. [more inside]
The Rolex manufacturing facilities
"By the time I received the invitation from Rolex Geneva to visit its four facilities, I had been to just about every other factory one could imagine – ranging from those who are simply packaging up pre-made movements and strapping them into off the shelf cases and dials, to those who are still doing everything by hand (but only producing a few watches per year). What I saw within the halls of Rolex wasn't like either; it was like seeing something brand new being made, something that went beyond a watch. The scale of everything, the detail, the people and perfection, is I think unique in watchmaking, if not all consumer products."
Chic Live At Budokan 1996
Only the last iteration of Chic, the greatest rock, soul and funk band ever in its final performance live at Nippon Budokan in Tokyo in 1996. The band died the next day with Bernard Edwards, who was suffering from pneumonia. [more inside]
Guitar Rig Diagrams
Bohemia is the material substrate through which genius emerges
These social mechanics—wherein creative rivalries oscillate between friendly and zero-sum—are universal, and I know them well. I only learned about them in practice when I encountered the Dimes Square scene during the pandemic. The pandemic created just enough squalor and gloom, and lowered rents just enough, for just long enough, for that latest bohemia to emerge. The downtown of the 2020s is centered on readings, screenings, and plays; but the sense of proximity, constant myth-making, and artistic competition that I experienced, and still experience, would have been familiar to the downtown bohemian of 1961. from The Death and Life of Bohemia by Michael Gasda [First Things; ungated] [more inside]
Nah, let's just skip the ceremony today
It's Inauguration Day in the United States, so let's take a look back with various AP reporters. But if this American tradition doesn't interest you this particular year, here's a few other things you can do today: [more inside]
Everyone thank Trump for kicking the can another 90 days down the road
Matt Stoller Explains the TikTok Dispute from a Legal Perspective That said, despite the 270 deadline, in the law, there’s also a 90 day extension the President is able to offer if he thinks that there is a path to divesting the app... Basically, TikTok said it is subject to a law banning the app, and praised Donald Trump for somehow thwarting that law. In truth, Trump just said he’d offer the 90 day extension that’s in the law itself.
Trump, for his part of this ordeal, said he will use an executive order to give TikTok that reprieve, and focus on cutting a deal to keep the app functional. “The order will also confirm that there will be no liability for any company that helped keep TikTok from going dark before my order.” He also said he wants the “United States to have a 50% ownership position in a joint venture. By doing this, we save TikTok, keep it in good hands and allow it to say up.” [more inside]
Goal: for every Kimberley child to speak their grandparents' language
New project aims for every Kimberley (Australia) child to speak their grandparents' language. Maureen Deegan's mum had to relearn her own language, Jaru, which she had not been allowed to speak. Now Maureen is helping others to keep their languages alive.
Fuckin' idealized form of magnetism, how does it work?
Under cool conditions, the up-down arrows nudge each other into alignment — all up, say — while the freewheeling arrows point in random directions. As the temperature rises, one would expect the thermal energy to start flipping all the arrows violently, washing out any alignment. But it doesn’t. The free arrows pinwheel around more, stabilizing the magnetic order in the up-down arrows. And this arrangement survives even as the temperature climbs higher for all eternity. The magnetic order never melts away. from Heat Destroys All Order. Except for in This One Special Case [Quanta]
Joe helped to make legal history
By sharing his family's stories and personal experience, Joe helped to make legal history. Due to financial and time constraints, native title bodies often struggle to file compensation claims before elders with vital knowledge die, but a new Australian Federal Court decision allows their testimonies to be collected and preserved for future claims.