Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Reposted by joannes

joannes @playthroughline.com · 2h

Hell of a time to have picked October 2025 for this one 😬

A fictional Wikipedia citation that reads:

Kahukura, A. (October 2025). “Mass brain damage from COVID-19 pandemic prompts investment in neural technology.” Slate.

From: https://omnipedia.app/wiki/2049/10/10/Neural_colloid

joannes @playthroughline.com · 2h

The machines harvesting mental bandwidth instead of bioelectricity apparently was the original pitch, but the suits axed that idea because it was considered too confusing 🙄

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joannes @playthroughline.com · 2h

Hell of a time to have picked October 2025 for this one 😬

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joannes @playthroughline.com · 4h

joannes @playthroughline.com · 3d

The sci-fi setting of Neurocracy posits exactly this scenario: brain implants are initially trained on neural data from a subset of society, so getting them to work requires us to think in ways characteristic of that subset, installing biases directly in our minds and fostering a mental monoculture

Laura Jedeed @laurajedeed.bsky.social · 3d

Hi hello did you know that Elon Musk's third Neuralink patient (previously nonverbal) is "getting help from Grok" to communicate

and I hope -- I REALLY HOPE -- he's not stuck in his own brain listening as a robot talks for him without his input because this, to me, would be worse than death

Reposted by joannes

Rob MacWolf, Werewolf Hitchhiker @robmacwolf.thevoice.dog · 19h

When we write or draw porn or erotica, we get banned from having a bank account and our livelihoods get seized even if we give it away for free.

When billionaires steal what we've written or drawn to churn out a slop-approximate of porn, they're allowed to charge for it.

Matt Burgess (WIRED) @mattburgess1.bsky.social · 22h

Oh good, ChatGPT is getting "erotica for verified adults" later this year

We made ChatGPT pretty restrictive to make sure we were being careful with mental health issues. We realize this made it less useful/enjoyable to many users who had no mental health problems, but given the seriousness of the issue we wanted to get this right.

Now that we have been able to mitigate the serious mental health issues and have new tools, we are going to be able to safely relax the restrictions in most cases.

In a few weeks, we plan to put out a new version of ChatGPT that allows people to have a personality that behaves more like what people liked about 4o (we hope it will be better!). If you want your ChatGPT to respond in a very human-like way, or use a ton of emoji, or act like a friend, ChatGPT should do it (but only if you want it, not because we are usage-maxxing).

In December, as we roll out age-gating more fully and as part of our “treat adult users like adults” principle, we will allow even more, like erotica for verified adults.

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joannes @playthroughline.com · 5h

Can't believe @marissalingen.bsky.social and myself both landed on Spencer as the name of a brain implant company CEO who's astroturfing himself through neural bias :>

omnipedia.app/wiki/2049/10/10/Spencer_Hagen

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Reposted by joannes

outsidewolves @outsidewolves.bsky.social · 10h

A four panel comic strip. An anthropomorphic wolf man runs into an office where three others are working at their desks. He says, "The fire marshal is coming for annual inspections!" In the next panel, a seated wolf is playing with a remote control airplane, and a smoke detector with an open battery compartment is mounted on the wall above him. The first wolf says "Put that 9 volt back in the smoke detector!" In the third panel, an anthropomorphic dog holds a power strip while standing next to a sculpture comprised of multiple power strips. The first wolf says "Hide your..."Daisy Chain Power Strip" sculpture!?" In the fourth panel, a bear proudly displays his t-shirt which reads "I love storing combustibles around radiators." The first wolf, in exasperation, yells "CHANGE YOUR SHIRT!"

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Reposted by joannes

jessica harvey @jessiscah23.bsky.social · 18h

things getting a little tight on food & essentials, so throwing up the link again.

managed to get somewhere stable & most of my property replaced (ty to all help <3); currently just holding out on passport processing, and I'm finally out of this place...

www.paypal.com/paypalme/jes...

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Reposted by joannes

Younès ★ @pyrofoux.bsky.social · 1d

A while ago, I found an interesting number pattern and designed a puzzle about it. Would you take a small break and have a go at it? 🍵🫖 Please tell me if you think you got the solution, or if you need a hint.

Text on the right:
The Tower of Ba5el.
Each stage of the tower is a different integer, written in an unknown language.
What is the tower's next stage?
Can the tower grow infinitely tall?
a puzzle designed by Younès Rabii, original painting by Bruegel.

Calculations on the left:
1. A
2. A^B
3. A^(B+C)
4. A^(C-B)
5. A^(B+D)*C
6. A^(C+D+E)/2
7. A^(D-C+E)/2
8. ?

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joannes @playthroughline.com · 1d

Return to the combat zone!

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Reposted by joannes

Mike Cook @mtrc.bsky.social · 1d

Friends if you work at a creative tech/games/etc company in and around London, and you'd be willing to hire some internship/placement students for 2-3 months over summer, please let me know! I have incredibly smart and engaged undergrads looking for summer opportunities.

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Reposted by joannes

sophie_exhausted_finalFINAL_03.psd @netizenses.bsky.social · 1d

Hello again #portfolioday!

I'm Sophie, an artist working in games & illustration. I love creating vibrant & beautifully rendered artworks 🌈✨

I'm open to illustration, concept, and cover work

sesmithfreelance.wixsite.com/illustration
www.artstation.com/sophiellensm...
[email protected]

Head study of a black woman, painted in krita

Concept design for mini explorable planets, each exploiting a different game mechanic or mission objective

An illustration for Neurocracy 3.0, of the Young Volcanoes, rocking out

A painted fantasy portrait of a lightforged draenei; an adaptation of Bernini's Apollo and Daphne for Classics but Make it Gay volume 1; a fantasy portrait of a sinister, powerful woman

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Reposted by joannes

Eniko Fox @enikofox.com · 1d

notice to anyone who, for whatever fucking reason, feels compelled to come into my mentions to tell me they find minecraft clones boring:

i'm on maximum render distance

and i still can't find who asked

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Reposted by joannes

Julián Rojas Millán @lobachevscki.bsky.social · 1d

How the International Left Abandoned the Venezuelan People.

"Chavismo easily blinded some progressives and made them accomplices of its propaganda wars, thanks to shallow perspectives inherited from Cold War fanaticism"

www.caracaschronicles.com/2024/08/03/h...

How the International Left Abandoned the Venezuelan People | Caracas Chronicles

Chavismo easily blinded some progressives and made them accomplices of its propaganda wars, thanks to shallow perspectives inherited from Cold War fanaticism

www.caracaschronicles.com

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Reposted by joannes

The Cat Hive @thecathive.bsky.social · 1d

The Criminal

Doodle of an orange cat with a piece of crumpled plastic in his mouth. He is running away quickly, wide-eyed. There is text from someone shouting "WHO IS EATING PLASTIC!!!"

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Reposted by joannes

Richard Cobbett @richardcobbett.bsky.social · 2d

What is Nighthawks? It's a vampire game where the vampires have been exposed to the world... but it's also different in tone from most. Vampire games tend to be cold and cynical, but this time, being a light in the darkness can be the real adventure.

store.steampowered.com/app/1221950/...

Nighthawks on Steam

The secret is out. Vampires have been exposed to the world… and you’re one of them. Seize the night as a modern monster, stepping out of the shadows to build a thriving nightclub empire through fear, ...

store.steampowered.com

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joannes @playthroughline.com · 3d

The sci-fi setting of Neurocracy posits exactly this scenario: brain implants are initially trained on neural data from a subset of society, so getting them to work requires us to think in ways characteristic of that subset, installing biases directly in our minds and fostering a mental monoculture

Laura Jedeed @laurajedeed.bsky.social · 3d

Hi hello did you know that Elon Musk's third Neuralink patient (previously nonverbal) is "getting help from Grok" to communicate

and I hope -- I REALLY HOPE -- he's not stuck in his own brain listening as a robot talks for him without his input because this, to me, would be worse than death

This patient’s Neuralink brain implant gets a boost from generative AI

A patient who types with his brain thanks to a Neuralink implant is using AI chatbots to speed things up.

www.technologyreview.com

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Reposted by joannes

👁🌻🦊⚙️⚓ Bob, Engineer, Pusher of Paper @navmecheng.bsky.social · 3d

> It is 2025 BC. I am a soldier from one of the outlying provinces called to defend the pyramid in Memphis

> It is 2025 AD. I am a soldier from one of the outlying provinces called to defend the pyramid in Memphis

Soldiers at the Bass Pro Shops pyramid in Memphis, TN.

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Reposted by joannes

Slurmsadako MacKenzie @slurmsmackenzie.bsky.social · 3d

GenAI truly was the worst technology to come along at this moment.

An energy and water guzzler when we most urgently need to take climate action.

A disinformation machine as our journalism fails.

A bias machine as fascism takes root.

A job killer in a cost of living crisis.

Bria "tries to write a book" Horses @thevoidencore.bsky.social · 8d

The "cognitive decline and brain damage from repeat COVID infections" and "easy to use robot that makes slop and melts your critical thinking skills" is a hell of a combo in a post-fact media ecosystem

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Reposted by joannes

Younès ★ @pyrofoux.bsky.social · 3d

oh yeah, I wrote that character for Neurocracy

Alex Degen (Magic Serple 2025) @adactivity.bsky.social · 3d

It’s all happening on x dot com where I do my banking

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Reposted by joannes

Lincoln Michel @thelincoln.bsky.social · 4d

This is not a defense of perpetually feckless Dems, but I bet Dems feel they ran on "Trump is fascist and undermining democracy" and they lost the election and so are giving up that message.

bort @crushbort.bsky.social · 4d

is it not weird that every day there’s a new video of anonymous masked men having the time of their lives beating/shooting/disappearing people and the dem response from the top down is “republicans want to double your health insurance premiums”

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Reposted by joannes

alice @aliceduke.bsky.social · 5d

I have added some prints to my ko-fi page. It took a long time but I've found a good UK based print service to supply UK/Europe folks with bird portraits. Hahnemüle eco paper, 10+ colour giclee prints, if it wasn't my own artwork I'd say they look pretty good!

ko-fi.com/aliceduke/shop

Visit alice duke's Shop!

I've opened a shop. Come take a look!

ko-fi.com

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joannes @playthroughline.com · 5d

👀👀

[Crawl Request] 2042/01/01: Most upvoted Sassback thread of 2041

This crawl request and yesterday’s ADIRA revelations tell me, not without some amusement, that the only correct thing about my post theorizing that Adira is a black hole in your brain… was the title. ...

talk.omnipedia.app

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Reposted by joannes

fia! @fiashouse.bsky.social · 5d

got no real addition to the indie game press conversation other than that it sucks, and I can't promise to cover anything, but I'm always looking for cool, weird, underground indies to cover on my news shifts at Rock Paper Shotgun!

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Reposted by joannes

Dr Holly Nielsen @hollynielsen.bsky.social · 6d

Reminder that if you’d like to work with a writer and narrative person who puts in fun things like this even in a game with a non-historical setting- then I’m available for work at the beginning of the new year

Dr Holly Nielsen @hollynielsen.bsky.social · 7d

I love writing for games and getting to slip in little bits of historiography. In one storylet I’ve covered ambiguity in material culture, “truth” and “emotional truth”, and the need to research the everyday alongside the exceptional 🫡

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