Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
@joshuafoust.com
Made the CommSky Starter Pack https://go.bsky.app/QkcgePD
Assistant Professor at Syracuse. I study public relations, military esports, video games, and gender theory. Happily 🏳️🌈.
Assistant Professor at Syracuse. I study public relations, military esports, video games, and gender theory. Happily 🏳️🌈.
Pinned
Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
@joshuafoust.com
· Oct 13
New Research: Masculinity as an Affect, and What It Means for Video Games
I contributed a chapter in a new volume, The Handbook on Gender and Digital Media, about how we can start to use affect theory to better understand how men behave the way they do with video games. …
joshuafoust.com
Recently had a chapter published in the Handbook of Gender and Digital Media, where I develop a theory of “affective masculinity” to try to better understand what masculine genders are doing in video games. It tries to answer the question: what work do feelings do for men who play games? 1/9
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
Associate Provost on the Right’s Coordinated Attack on Academic Freedom
In her book The Right to Learn, Valerie Johnson dives into the years-long erosion of academic freedom in red states and how universities must resist it. https://bit.ly/48qWKWJ
In her book The Right to Learn, Valerie Johnson dives into the years-long erosion of academic freedom in red states and how universities must resist it. https://bit.ly/48qWKWJ
December 1, 2025 at 6:37 PM
Associate Provost on the Right’s Coordinated Attack on Academic Freedom
In her book The Right to Learn, Valerie Johnson dives into the years-long erosion of academic freedom in red states and how universities must resist it. https://bit.ly/48qWKWJ
In her book The Right to Learn, Valerie Johnson dives into the years-long erosion of academic freedom in red states and how universities must resist it. https://bit.ly/48qWKWJ
Look I don’t want to dogpile this guy’s mentions, but if you, as a constitutional law expert, ever find yourself arguing that the first amendment makes bad grades illegal you should probably do some self-reflection.
And if that isn’t what you meant, then reconsider the utility of good writing.
And if that isn’t what you meant, then reconsider the utility of good writing.
December 1, 2025 at 6:30 PM
Look I don’t want to dogpile this guy’s mentions, but if you, as a constitutional law expert, ever find yourself arguing that the first amendment makes bad grades illegal you should probably do some self-reflection.
And if that isn’t what you meant, then reconsider the utility of good writing.
And if that isn’t what you meant, then reconsider the utility of good writing.
At a basic level, our society does not have a good answer for whether grade inflation is a problem or whether giving low grades for bad work is a problem.
December 1, 2025 at 5:58 PM
At a basic level, our society does not have a good answer for whether grade inflation is a problem or whether giving low grades for bad work is a problem.
Software engineers made a really good software engineering software. But that is a different optimization than writing, creativity, or semantic accuracy. The newest Claude model is spookily good at coding, but it’s still average at best when handling text. Probably where this tech ends up long term.
He’s right! You don’t have to use it—but it’s going to sweep through codeworld like a purifying fire. You may not care! But it’s not like when it draws you a bad picture of a large-breasted elf. It’s more like it shreds the foundation of what makes tech “valuable.”
At the risk of starting the flame war to end all flame wars...
Modern LLMs (GPT-5.1, Claude 4.5, Gemini 3) produce excellent code and can be a significant productivity boost to software engineers who take the time to learn how to effectively apply them - especially if used with coding agent tools
Modern LLMs (GPT-5.1, Claude 4.5, Gemini 3) produce excellent code and can be a significant productivity boost to software engineers who take the time to learn how to effectively apply them - especially if used with coding agent tools
December 1, 2025 at 2:12 PM
Software engineers made a really good software engineering software. But that is a different optimization than writing, creativity, or semantic accuracy. The newest Claude model is spookily good at coding, but it’s still average at best when handling text. Probably where this tech ends up long term.
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
A lot has happened this year. If you'd like a recap of what's happened to education research and statistics, here's my attempt. This might be a good one to listen to on your commute today. (Audio play button below headline. 16 minutes long.) hechingerreport.org/proof-points...
How Trump 2.0 upended education research and statistics in one year
Decades of carefully built infrastructure aimed at improving and tracking how American children learn vanished in an ideological attack
hechingerreport.org
December 1, 2025 at 12:35 PM
A lot has happened this year. If you'd like a recap of what's happened to education research and statistics, here's my attempt. This might be a good one to listen to on your commute today. (Audio play button below headline. 16 minutes long.) hechingerreport.org/proof-points...
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
every trans person i see post about the OU suspension knows that the suspended target is trans & a grad student, & has an innate awareness that this is about purging trans employees. every cis person i see thinks the target is a rando professor & that this is about giving conservatives good grades
December 1, 2025 at 12:04 AM
every trans person i see post about the OU suspension knows that the suspended target is trans & a grad student, & has an innate awareness that this is about purging trans employees. every cis person i see thinks the target is a rando professor & that this is about giving conservatives good grades
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
This thread is 💯. Labor precarity in academia means the evisceration of faculty governance and academic freedom, opening the door to administrative purges of the most vulnerable. And faculty-esp tenured faculty and academic leaders-who aren't defending their trans colleagues are enabling it.
So yeah, this is fundamentally about trans people and that cannot be elided, but the ways in which junior faculty are targeted and disposed of, while academic jobs are increasingly precarized, and political grandstanders seek to influence academic governance are fucking terrifying for everyone.
December 1, 2025 at 12:35 PM
This thread is 💯. Labor precarity in academia means the evisceration of faculty governance and academic freedom, opening the door to administrative purges of the most vulnerable. And faculty-esp tenured faculty and academic leaders-who aren't defending their trans colleagues are enabling it.
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
It’s cool how everything is like this now. It’s just the worst people on earth armed with a few hundred dollars of AWS credits and an off the shelf LLM to scream in your replies and grievance police lol.
The bot farm has been activated in defense of Lane Kiffin
November 30, 2025 at 11:40 PM
It’s cool how everything is like this now. It’s just the worst people on earth armed with a few hundred dollars of AWS credits and an off the shelf LLM to scream in your replies and grievance police lol.
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
That’s the thing, it didn’t matter what they did. The administration is committed to the witch hunt.
December 1, 2025 at 3:15 AM
That’s the thing, it didn’t matter what they did. The administration is committed to the witch hunt.
Have we begun calling the show Pluribussy yet?
December 1, 2025 at 12:26 AM
Have we begun calling the show Pluribussy yet?
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
Condolences to the students at OU who *were* working hard, doing the course work and earning good grades long before the administration there decreed that you only need to say "as the Bible teaches" and be done with it.
I'm sorry your university hates you and hope you can transfer somewhere good.
I'm sorry your university hates you and hope you can transfer somewhere good.
If I was working at OU, I would just start handing out 100's to every student and stop writing comments.
OU has put the professor here on administrative leave:
November 30, 2025 at 11:12 PM
Condolences to the students at OU who *were* working hard, doing the course work and earning good grades long before the administration there decreed that you only need to say "as the Bible teaches" and be done with it.
I'm sorry your university hates you and hope you can transfer somewhere good.
I'm sorry your university hates you and hope you can transfer somewhere good.
Click through and read the assignment feedback, which was constructive, kind, and frankly very gentle. Suspending the instructor over this is a deranged overreaction in support of a clearly bad faith student, and the university choosing this action is once again another stain on higher education.
OU has put the professor here on administrative leave:
November 30, 2025 at 9:25 PM
Click through and read the assignment feedback, which was constructive, kind, and frankly very gentle. Suspending the instructor over this is a deranged overreaction in support of a clearly bad faith student, and the university choosing this action is once again another stain on higher education.
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
Love watching this reemergence of the spirit of the early web. Especially since it appears to be largely driven by younger generations who are already realizing the internet they've been handed is a miserable place lacking in community. So they've taken matters into their own hands.
The indie web is here to make the internet weird again
The indie web is here to make the internet weird again
Welcome to the new old internet.
buff.ly
November 30, 2025 at 2:23 PM
Love watching this reemergence of the spirit of the early web. Especially since it appears to be largely driven by younger generations who are already realizing the internet they've been handed is a miserable place lacking in community. So they've taken matters into their own hands.
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
They should do a Law & Order episode that represents the nobility of modern journalism: a year after a serial cannibal is acquitted, a star journalist comes out with a hit book that features evidence and a full sneering confession.
"I am a huge fan of the classic TV series 'Law & Order.' And yet I cannot think of a single episode — among hundreds — in which a journalist is depicted as honorable." www.poynter.org/commentary/2...
Why I’m begging TV showrunners to stop writing journalists as villains - Poynter
I will stop shouting at the TV screen when journalists are portrayed with all their virtues and vices — not as caricatures
www.poynter.org
November 30, 2025 at 6:05 PM
They should do a Law & Order episode that represents the nobility of modern journalism: a year after a serial cannibal is acquitted, a star journalist comes out with a hit book that features evidence and a full sneering confession.
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
Zero reckoning from any of the elites who credulously parroted the absurd idea that the right wing was in favor of free speech.
Public libraries in Tennessee have begun to shut down as they carry out an order from state officials to remove children’s books containing LGBTQ+ themes or characters.
www.rawstory.com/alternet-pos...
www.rawstory.com/alternet-pos...
Alarm as Tennessee libraries shut down for Republican 'book purge'
Public libraries in Tennessee have begun to shut down as they carry out an order from state officials to remove children’s books containing LGBTQ+ themes or characters.For Popular Information, Rebecca...
www.rawstory.com
November 28, 2025 at 7:58 PM
Zero reckoning from any of the elites who credulously parroted the absurd idea that the right wing was in favor of free speech.
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
This is a huge part of why so many people think we're in the middle of a widespread "anti-woke backlash": Small movements opposed to social progress are collected into trend stories by conservative media. Far larger movements that want more diversity are ignored or cast as threats.
"Woke is ruining D&D". Meanwhile Dimension 20, one of the wokest real play shows around, just sold out Madison Square Garden and the Hollywood Bowl for live shows and brings armies of new players to RPGs.
November 30, 2025 at 3:38 PM
This is a huge part of why so many people think we're in the middle of a widespread "anti-woke backlash": Small movements opposed to social progress are collected into trend stories by conservative media. Far larger movements that want more diversity are ignored or cast as threats.
Logging on every morning
November 30, 2025 at 5:00 PM
Logging on every morning
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
This is a key part of the widgetizing of design: product managers manage to a number that is easiest to measure. In lieu of having a real strategy serve as a guiding principle, it's just "did number go up" and if not, you are fired.
And by far the easiest thing to measure is # of features added.
And by far the easiest thing to measure is # of features added.
The metrics / data driven goals that rely on what are essentially tertiary factors as the primary goal plays a huge role.
November 30, 2025 at 2:43 PM
This is a key part of the widgetizing of design: product managers manage to a number that is easiest to measure. In lieu of having a real strategy serve as a guiding principle, it's just "did number go up" and if not, you are fired.
And by far the easiest thing to measure is # of features added.
And by far the easiest thing to measure is # of features added.
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
I think about this as being part of tech’s midlife crisis, and to differentiate tech from technology. Tech was a class of software that came up between 2000-2012ish that was genuinely disruptive and innovative, but now, over a decade later, is an established and mature business.
i think it's useful to look at areas where the *tech* has gotten much better while tech *interactions* have gotten way worse. streaming has gotten worse, google search has gotten worse, digital cameras are leaps better. apple's silicone is so good it's threatening their user upgrade cycle
it’s so weird to look around and realize like, tech and media are materially worse than a decade ago
November 30, 2025 at 1:58 PM
I think about this as being part of tech’s midlife crisis, and to differentiate tech from technology. Tech was a class of software that came up between 2000-2012ish that was genuinely disruptive and innovative, but now, over a decade later, is an established and mature business.
Post something random or you’ll have an awful December
November 30, 2025 at 2:03 PM
Post something random or you’ll have an awful December
Wild to see this on a Windows fan site, but also probably true. They want to be infrastructure so they can get bailed out of their debt commitments and be the last app standing when the collapse comes.
"All of this falls apart if humans don't adopt the tech. This is why you've seen Meta cram its lame chatbots into WhatsApp and Instagram. This is why Notepad and Paint now have useless Copilot buttons on Windows. This is why Google Gemini wants to "help you" read and reply to your emails."
Analysis: OpenAI is a loss-making machine, how can it survive?
Don't call it a bubble! Loss-making monster OpenAI is on the hook for $1.4 trillion (with a T) in compute commitments. How can this go on?
www.windowscentral.com
November 30, 2025 at 1:52 PM
Wild to see this on a Windows fan site, but also probably true. They want to be infrastructure so they can get bailed out of their debt commitments and be the last app standing when the collapse comes.
It is perfectly legal to ignore an unexpected, non-emergency text message at 1 am
November 30, 2025 at 5:54 AM
It is perfectly legal to ignore an unexpected, non-emergency text message at 1 am
If cancel culture was real I’d never have to hear about this guy ever again.
Also, grow up and climb down off the cross.
Also, grow up and climb down off the cross.
When a cancelled performer reënters the culture, we expect them to offer us a great work, channelling their newfound clarity into the finest art they’ve ever made. With his new comedy show and début novel, has Louis C.K. met the bar?
www.newyorker.com/culture/crit...
www.newyorker.com/culture/crit...
Louis C.K.’s Next Chapter
In a new standup special, and a début novel, the comedian navigates murky, post-#MeToo terrain: not quite exiled, not quite welcomed back.
www.newyorker.com
November 29, 2025 at 7:29 PM
If cancel culture was real I’d never have to hear about this guy ever again.
Also, grow up and climb down off the cross.
Also, grow up and climb down off the cross.
It’s interesting to see mobile like dating simulators stack up concurrent plays and revenue far in excess of most splashy FPS and MOBA loot box nightmares, yet still get written off as not “real” games because they’re marketed at girls.
November 29, 2025 at 6:13 PM
It’s interesting to see mobile like dating simulators stack up concurrent plays and revenue far in excess of most splashy FPS and MOBA loot box nightmares, yet still get written off as not “real” games because they’re marketed at girls.
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
NEW: The New York Times got a State Dept. cable telling diplomats to destroy visas that had been approved and printed to give to Afghans. And diplomats are told to do scheduled interviews but not grant visas. US shuts all legal entry routes for Afghans. Our story: www.nytimes.com/2025/11/28/u...
Trump Pauses All Asylum Applications and Halts Visas for Afghans
www.nytimes.com
November 29, 2025 at 4:02 AM
NEW: The New York Times got a State Dept. cable telling diplomats to destroy visas that had been approved and printed to give to Afghans. And diplomats are told to do scheduled interviews but not grant visas. US shuts all legal entry routes for Afghans. Our story: www.nytimes.com/2025/11/28/u...