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Stephen Kirchner @insteconomics.bsky.social · 1h

Was at an EIU conference once and they gave out free copies of Malcolm Gladwell’s latest. Saw a guy start reading it at the top of the escalator to the lobby only to then put it in the bin conveniently located at the bottom of the escalator.

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Friends of Pudding @friend2pudding.bsky.social · 21h

did this but for the ginsters pasty factory. earned my loyalty for about 20 years. We got the crimp them and everything

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Gregk Foley @gregk.co.uk · 1d

There is nothing profound or revelatory here. These are just drug-induced manic episodes being broadcast on a world stage by people who can afford to both stave off the inevitable crash and hide themselves from the world when it inevitably comes. It’s all incredibly sad, cynical and terrifying.

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Gregk Foley @gregk.co.uk · 1d

I can’t express how dually maddening and affirming it is to have spent years reading philosophy and theory trying to make sense of myself, my politics and my place in the universe as our leaders get worked by dickheads who believe they’ve cracked the code by abusing amphetamines and watching anime.

flyingrodent @flyingrodent.bsky.social · 1d

They’re morons, they’re just dickheads who accidentally struck it rich by chance, not by merit, and this system does not give a fuck about the ability or morality of the idiots who relentlessly quest to amass as much money as possible

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Friends of Pudding @friend2pudding.bsky.social · 1d

'we'll play some more soon' from prince andrew is genuinely vomit inducing. truly, like primally repulsive

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Friends of Pudding @friend2pudding.bsky.social · 1d

they probably wrote the Depeche Mode stuff into it so he could just latch onto something harmless. like he'll just be off in the corner listening to violator really intensely.

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Aaron Stewart-Ahn @badideas.bsky.social · 2d

Legendary interview moment with the director of Morbius about Jared Leto’s behavior on the set of Morbius

uproxx.com/movies/morbi...

I heard a story about filming and I want to see if this is true. Someone told me that Jared Leto was so committed to playing Michael Morbius that even when he had to go to the bathroom, he would use his crutches and slowly limp to get to the bathroom. But it was taking so long between for pee breaks, that a deal was made with him to get him a wheelchair so someone could wheel him there quicker and he agreed to that. Is this true?

Yes.

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Friends of Pudding @friend2pudding.bsky.social · 1d

i love the concert movie, absolutely beautiful

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Friends of Pudding @friend2pudding.bsky.social · 1d

cd haul!!!!

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Sharon @sharonk.bsky.social · 1d

thiel, man, what the fuck are you talking about

He describes the plot of Watchmen, a 1986 graphic novel involving superheroes grappling with moral questions about humanity against the backdrop of impending nuclear war:

The antihero Ozymandias, the antichrist-type figure, is sort of an early-modern person. He believes this will be a timeless and eternal solution – eternal world peace. Moore is sort of a late-modern. In early modernity, you have ideal solutions, ‘perfect’ solutions to calculus. In late modernity, things are sort of probabilistic. And at some point, he asks Dr Manhattan whether the world government is going to last. And he says that ‘nothing lasts forever.’ So you embrace the antichrist and it still doesn’t work.

Thiel later finds biblical meaning in the manga One Piece, discussing how he believes it represents a future where an antichrist-like one-world government has repressed science. He believes that the hero, Monkey D Luffy, represents a Christlike figure.

In One Piece, you are set in a fantasy world, again sort of an alternate earth, but it’s 800 years into the reign of this one-world state. Which, as the story unfolds, gradually gets darker and darker. You sort of realize, in my interpretation, who runs the world and it’s something like the antichrist. There’s Luffy, a pirate who wears a red straw hat, sort of like Christ’s crown of thorns. And then towards the end of the story, transforms into a figure who resembles Christ in Revelation.

Thiel, along with a researcher and writer at Thiel Capital, explored these ideas at greater length in an essay for the religious journal First Things earlier this month.

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Gregk Foley @gregk.co.uk · 2d

In my eyes EDDINGTON is the second best film of the year and OBAA's farcical partner-in-crime, and the Pueblo cop from that film's opening really hit the nail on the head when Sheriff Joe Cross is rambling and telling him to listen and he just responds, "I *am* listening. Shut up!"

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Steven Fielding @polprofsteve2024.bsky.social · 2d

When ITV albeit late on a Sunday evening when nobody was watching broadcast a play with revolutionary Marxist themes. youtu.be/o0KxIR2xO-E?...

Occupations - starring Donald Pleasence, Georgina Hale, Jack Shepherd & Nigel Hawthorne (1974)

YouTube video by Classic British Telly

youtu.be

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Friends of Pudding @friend2pudding.bsky.social · 2d

sums up the future of online for me that Instagram updated and now when i open it instead of showing me photos of my lovely friends and their beautiful pets, it autoplays (with sound) AI slop reels: today bilbo shooting gollum with an AK47

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C. Buckthorn @cbuckthorn.bsky.social · 2d

This is amazing. I laughed out loud www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle...

As 32-year-old Rich points out, though, "it's not like using ChatGPT guarantees success".
When he met someone in a bar one Friday night and swapped social media handles, he asked AI what his next move should be.
ChatGPT discerned that sending an initial message on Monday midmorning would set the right pace. "Then it gave me some options for what the message could be," says Rich.
"Keep it light, warm, and low-stakes so it reads as genuine interest without urgency," the bot advised. "Something like: Hey Sarah, still laughing about [tiny shared moment/reference if you've got one] - good to meet you!" Rich went back and forth with ChatGPT until he felt they'd hit upon exactly the right message ("Hey Sarah, it was lovely to meet you") but sadly she never replied, he says. "It's been two weeks now."

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Friends of Pudding @friend2pudding.bsky.social · 2d

kind of annoying the tron 3 score isnt following me playing everywhere i go... especially when i cycle. who do i write to about this

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Friends of Pudding @friend2pudding.bsky.social · 2d

tron 3 - what on earth is up with the one star reviews lol. it is incredibly well crafted. music and visuals (prob esp in 3D) frequently extraordinary.

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flyingrodent @flyingrodent.bsky.social · 2d

The billionaires have been organising to seize as much control as they can because they know very well that sooner or later, every democracy on earth is going to recognise that the best place for them is prison, in self-defence.

A tangled web of deals stokes AI bubble fears in Silicon Valley

Some are worried that the rapid rise in the value of AI tech companies may be a bubble waiting to burst.

www.bbc.com

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Friends of Pudding @friend2pudding.bsky.social · 3d

avatar 3 looks amazing imo

Friends of Pudding @friend2pudding.bsky.social · 3d

someone has put up literally dozens of union jacks up on my street overnight - was not expecting this to reach east lothain!

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Friends of Pudding @friend2pudding.bsky.social · 3d

and then the support act for the band im seeing covered break stuff with a dancing cookie monster dressed as fred durst (nookie monster) anyway.... night saved 👏

Friends of Pudding @friend2pudding.bsky.social · 3d

saw this on the listings and was like nooo cant believe i missed it!

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Friends of Pudding @friend2pudding.bsky.social · 3d

enjoying the new testament album!

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Chris Martin @mreschatologist.bsky.social · 3d

Jabba the Hutt with downward word balloon

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BeijingPalmer @beijingpalmer.bsky.social · 3d

it was obvious from the moment the attack happened that this was not only a tragedy for Israel but was going to become a tragedy for Palestine, and I still remember who was cheering it on.

Michael E. Carter @deckofcarterhist.bsky.social · 3d

If you were online on October 7, 2023, this is no surprise.

Overshadowed by the fact that Israel retaliated with a genocidal war is the reality that amid the attack seemingly professional/moral people spent days praising every report they found of Israelis, including children, being murdered.

Joel S. @joelhs.bsky.social · 4d

This is a person who is still taken seriously and published in left-wing spaces.

To be clear: No, most Israeli Jews are not descended from Polish Jews. And even for the minority who are, it would obviously not be safe for them all to go there now, given the Polish government.

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Friends of Pudding @friend2pudding.bsky.social · 3d

i am completely signed up to the showgirl backlash. but i think Tortured Poets is *really* strong personally. Not pop, but feels like a victory lap for Taylor's post-Folklore style

Todd in the Shadows @shadowtodd.bsky.social · 3d

This would make more sense to me if Taylor was coming off a generationally great album or something rather than Tortured Poets Department

Pop Crave @popcrave.com · 3d

“The Fate Of Ophelia” by Taylor Swift debuts with 128.896 million streams in its first week on the global Spotify chart.

It’s the biggest streaming week ever on the platform.