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
Your last saved meme is your moral philosophy
November 17, 2025 at 6:53 PM
Your last saved meme is your moral philosophy
I love this study because it highlights two things:
1) Esports are like regular sports: you’re mostly watching other people play; and
2) not everyone who enjoys watching Esports is necessarily a player of those same games
Normalizing Esports as just another sport opens up more research! #commsky
1) Esports are like regular sports: you’re mostly watching other people play; and
2) not everyone who enjoys watching Esports is necessarily a player of those same games
Normalizing Esports as just another sport opens up more research! #commsky
Paying, Playing, and Spectating: Relationships Between Digital Game Play and Spectating Esports - Joseph Macey, Topias Mattinen, Juho Hamari, 2025
The association between playing digital games and watching esports has, to date, been an explicit assumption of many works, specifically that there is a strong ...
journals.sagepub.com
November 17, 2025 at 6:47 PM
I love this study because it highlights two things:
1) Esports are like regular sports: you’re mostly watching other people play; and
2) not everyone who enjoys watching Esports is necessarily a player of those same games
Normalizing Esports as just another sport opens up more research! #commsky
1) Esports are like regular sports: you’re mostly watching other people play; and
2) not everyone who enjoys watching Esports is necessarily a player of those same games
Normalizing Esports as just another sport opens up more research! #commsky
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
Out now. Article with @patferrucci.bsky.social where we look at metajournalistic discourse of sports journalists layoffs at ESPN & The New York Times. #commsky
muse.jhu.edu/pub/17/artic...
muse.jhu.edu/pub/17/artic...
Project MUSE - It's a Problem for All of Us: Discursively Explaining the Destruction of Sports Journalism
muse.jhu.edu
November 16, 2025 at 9:24 PM
Out now. Article with @patferrucci.bsky.social where we look at metajournalistic discourse of sports journalists layoffs at ESPN & The New York Times. #commsky
muse.jhu.edu/pub/17/artic...
muse.jhu.edu/pub/17/artic...
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
One thing that's been heavily proven to me is Bluesky is not all politics. The music, record, cd, movie, books, horror and lots more scenes are heavily alive and well here with almost zero negativity. Better engagement here than Facebook has been in years.
November 16, 2025 at 10:33 PM
One thing that's been heavily proven to me is Bluesky is not all politics. The music, record, cd, movie, books, horror and lots more scenes are heavily alive and well here with almost zero negativity. Better engagement here than Facebook has been in years.
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
“You know, fair use is fair use and we need to make sure that we’re not stealing people’s intellectual property and rights but..."
No! There is no "but" here! That statement ends with a period, not a "but".
No! There is no "but" here! That statement ends with a period, not a "but".
"Surely there's a middle ground here?" The CEO of Helldivers 2 studio Arrowhead says people "jump to extreme takes" when debating generative AI, and that there needs to be more nuance in the discussion.
www.videogameschronicle.com/news/surely-...
www.videogameschronicle.com/news/surely-...
‘Surely there’s a middle ground here?’ Helldivers studio CEO says people ‘jump to extreme takes’ when debating GenAI | VGC
“This is such a trigger point for big parts of the games industry today”…
www.videogameschronicle.com
November 17, 2025 at 3:30 PM
“You know, fair use is fair use and we need to make sure that we’re not stealing people’s intellectual property and rights but..."
No! There is no "but" here! That statement ends with a period, not a "but".
No! There is no "but" here! That statement ends with a period, not a "but".
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
For over 150 years, trans people have used courts to change legal sex. While writing Before Gender, I found what may be the first case in the US: a formerly enslaved trans woman in Georgia in 1869. Her story shows that trans people found legal support long before the word transgender even existed.
November 17, 2025 at 2:39 PM
For over 150 years, trans people have used courts to change legal sex. While writing Before Gender, I found what may be the first case in the US: a formerly enslaved trans woman in Georgia in 1869. Her story shows that trans people found legal support long before the word transgender even existed.
Not the most original observation, but praising this writing, as Condé Nast and the New York Times have done, is a communicative act: they are telling you what is valuable to them, and, importantly, what is not.
November 17, 2025 at 3:45 PM
Not the most original observation, but praising this writing, as Condé Nast and the New York Times have done, is a communicative act: they are telling you what is valuable to them, and, importantly, what is not.
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
This quotation actually shows a huge problem with elite liberal lawyers: the passage treats holding these ghouls accountable as some kind of devil-on-the-shoulder temptation that restraint would caution against
November 17, 2025 at 3:32 PM
This quotation actually shows a huge problem with elite liberal lawyers: the passage treats holding these ghouls accountable as some kind of devil-on-the-shoulder temptation that restraint would caution against
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
“she flamed out and faded away” is such funny framing for a woman publishing an excerpt of her book in vanity fair, where she also works. I wish I could flame out and fade away so successfully
Vanity Fair's West Coast Editor Olivia Nuzzi was a star political correspondent until scandal led her into exile—and to a California up in flames.
In an excerpt from her book, ‘American Canto,’ she takes stock of scorched earth.
In an excerpt from her book, ‘American Canto,’ she takes stock of scorched earth.
Olivia Nuzzi's 'American Canto': Read the Exclusive Excerpt
She flamed out and she faded away. 'Vanity Fair'’s West Coast Editor returns to the written word to survey scorched earth.
www.vanityfair.com
November 17, 2025 at 2:18 PM
“she flamed out and faded away” is such funny framing for a woman publishing an excerpt of her book in vanity fair, where she also works. I wish I could flame out and fade away so successfully
Can’t wait for these very literate people who definitely read books to release an AI-driven parenting advice app called Oedipus
Jeff Bezos will be co-CEO of AI startup Project Prometheus
Jeff Bezos will be co-CEO of AI startup Project Prometheus
Jeff Bezos has a new job.
buff.ly
November 17, 2025 at 2:55 PM
Can’t wait for these very literate people who definitely read books to release an AI-driven parenting advice app called Oedipus
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
i'd say it did. the public put a group of thieves, vandals and extremists in office last november and they promptly went about destroying everything that might work to limit their ability to loot, steal and inflicting pain on the people they hate
This whole NYT account about the weaponization of DOJ is beyond disturbing. Kinda feels like the US government fell in January.
Gift link: www.nytimes.com/interactive/...
Gift link: www.nytimes.com/interactive/...
November 17, 2025 at 2:19 PM
i'd say it did. the public put a group of thieves, vandals and extremists in office last november and they promptly went about destroying everything that might work to limit their ability to loot, steal and inflicting pain on the people they hate
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
Should you ask an AI chatbot what to vote for? No.
I spoke to @videnskab.dk about this ahead of the local elections in Denmark and why the technology is not fit for purpose and completely non-transparent.
videnskab.dk/teknologi/bo...
I spoke to @videnskab.dk about this ahead of the local elections in Denmark and why the technology is not fit for purpose and completely non-transparent.
videnskab.dk/teknologi/bo...
Bør jeg spørge ChatGPT til råds om, hvad jeg skal stemme?
Måske er du stadig i tvivl om, hvor du skal sætte dit kryds til kommunalvalget.
videnskab.dk
November 17, 2025 at 7:29 AM
Should you ask an AI chatbot what to vote for? No.
I spoke to @videnskab.dk about this ahead of the local elections in Denmark and why the technology is not fit for purpose and completely non-transparent.
videnskab.dk/teknologi/bo...
I spoke to @videnskab.dk about this ahead of the local elections in Denmark and why the technology is not fit for purpose and completely non-transparent.
videnskab.dk/teknologi/bo...
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
“While the AI industry claims its models can “think,” “reason,” and “learn,” their supposed achievements rest on marketing hype and stolen intellectual labor. In reality, AI erodes academic freedom, weakens critical reading, and subordinates the pursuit of knowledge to corporate interests.”
AI Is Hollowing Out Higher Education
Olivia Guest & Iris van Rooij urge teachers and scholars to reject tools that commodify learning, deskill students, and promote illiteracy.
www.project-syndicate.org
November 15, 2025 at 5:24 PM
“While the AI industry claims its models can “think,” “reason,” and “learn,” their supposed achievements rest on marketing hype and stolen intellectual labor. In reality, AI erodes academic freedom, weakens critical reading, and subordinates the pursuit of knowledge to corporate interests.”
While we’re here and talking TV: I’m catching up on The Witcher and it has the movie mook problem, like I just don’t get where Vilgerfortz or whatever his name is got an unlimited supply of suicidal mages to murder children for him, like how are there so many in this universe?
November 16, 2025 at 11:40 PM
While we’re here and talking TV: I’m catching up on The Witcher and it has the movie mook problem, like I just don’t get where Vilgerfortz or whatever his name is got an unlimited supply of suicidal mages to murder children for him, like how are there so many in this universe?
My prestige TV hot take is that The Chair Company is a much better and entertaining exploration of the dehumanization of corporate America than Severance.
November 16, 2025 at 11:29 PM
My prestige TV hot take is that The Chair Company is a much better and entertaining exploration of the dehumanization of corporate America than Severance.
Up there with Kristjen Nielsen going out for a meal at a Mexican while administering the forced abduction of children at the border, and getting huffy when people called her a bad person and booed at her.
November 16, 2025 at 10:23 PM
Up there with Kristjen Nielsen going out for a meal at a Mexican while administering the forced abduction of children at the border, and getting huffy when people called her a bad person and booed at her.
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
Not stunting on Cav, but taking the opportunity to flog a hobby horse of mine: “funny” objective or operation names are funny until it comes time for a Primary Next of Kin brief for the kid killed on the op.
We had an op where we air inserted two platoons on a mountain to sweep down through a village while a third platoon blocked on the road at the bottom.
The Operation Double Penetration CONOP was approved at brigade level.
The Operation Double Penetration CONOP was approved at brigade level.
Non-zero chance that's exactly what they are and someone in the 3 shop named them that as a joke, thinking a higher ranking person would catch it and change it later.
November 16, 2025 at 8:41 PM
Not stunting on Cav, but taking the opportunity to flog a hobby horse of mine: “funny” objective or operation names are funny until it comes time for a Primary Next of Kin brief for the kid killed on the op.
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
This may be the best thing ive read yet on AI in higher ed, and its written by a Yale undergrad. Highly recommend.
Inside Yale’s Quiet Reckoning with AI | The New Journal
Amid ChatGPT's rising popularity and a computer science cheating scandal, Yale students, professors, and administrators wrestle privately with the proper role of AI in education. What happens when eve...
thenewjournalatyale.com
November 16, 2025 at 5:56 PM
This may be the best thing ive read yet on AI in higher ed, and its written by a Yale undergrad. Highly recommend.
What’s so funny about this is that we have around a century of research showing that passively listening is the worst way to learn and remember things. It’s why teachers at every level are told not to just lecture students. That’s all a podcast is: a lecture with extra distractions.
Stanford, eh?
Stanford, eh?
At Stanford we quickly figured out how to take Lemons & make Crystal Pepsi & New Coke.
November 16, 2025 at 8:05 PM
What’s so funny about this is that we have around a century of research showing that passively listening is the worst way to learn and remember things. It’s why teachers at every level are told not to just lecture students. That’s all a podcast is: a lecture with extra distractions.
Stanford, eh?
Stanford, eh?
Reposted by Joshua Foust 🪖🎮
some notable things in this excellent Bloomberg story - www.bloomberg.com/features/202...
how much of it connects through Harvard, and how many of these people are now in the AI field.
how much of it connects through Harvard, and how many of these people are now in the AI field.
Jeffrey Epstein Leaned on His Elite Network for Help as Investigators Closed In
A cache of 18,000 messages shows the elite support the disgraced financier got in his “hour of terror.”
www.bloomberg.com
November 16, 2025 at 4:36 PM
some notable things in this excellent Bloomberg story - www.bloomberg.com/features/202...
how much of it connects through Harvard, and how many of these people are now in the AI field.
how much of it connects through Harvard, and how many of these people are now in the AI field.
Don’t donate to or defend any politician or PAC who will trade away human rights using the right wing sneer about identity. They are telling you that you’re disposable for their quest to power.
“Once you decide that a single vulnerable minority can be sacrificed, you’re operating within a fascist logic,” they said. “That means there might be a second one you’re willing to sacrifice and a third, a fourth. Then what happens?”
Abandoning trans people is 'fascist logic', says leading feminist philosopher
Leading feminist philosopher Judith Butler has declared that abandoning trans people or any minority is operating within 'fascist logic'.
www.thepinknews.com
November 16, 2025 at 5:58 PM
Don’t donate to or defend any politician or PAC who will trade away human rights using the right wing sneer about identity. They are telling you that you’re disposable for their quest to power.
I bet whichever creative wrote “you are goated with the sauce, FaZe Rug” spent that entire night getting blackout drunk and trying to forget it.
November 16, 2025 at 4:36 PM
I bet whichever creative wrote “you are goated with the sauce, FaZe Rug” spent that entire night getting blackout drunk and trying to forget it.
Cannot endorse this enough - print magazines are delightful and fun and you should get at least one that’s printed on heavy stock. It makes reading feel like such an event, you really do end up looking forward to it.
I’ve wanted to brag about my Christmas gift last year and here’s my chance.
I got the whole family matching magazine subs! Adults got Southern Cultures, OA, Bitter Southerner, The Sun, & New Yorker. Kid got Lux, Oyla, and later we added The Onion.
We always have stuff to talk about!
I got the whole family matching magazine subs! Adults got Southern Cultures, OA, Bitter Southerner, The Sun, & New Yorker. Kid got Lux, Oyla, and later we added The Onion.
We always have stuff to talk about!
I got out of the habit of reading magazines bc of the social pressure of writers reading what's trendy/popular or frankly expected of you.
This year, I've dedicated myself back to reading magazines and I'm truly having the time of my life.
This year, I've dedicated myself back to reading magazines and I'm truly having the time of my life.
November 16, 2025 at 4:15 PM
Cannot endorse this enough - print magazines are delightful and fun and you should get at least one that’s printed on heavy stock. It makes reading feel like such an event, you really do end up looking forward to it.
I’m still fuming at having to use a Windows 11 machine last week to host a guest speaking over zoom. An absolutely miserable experience, every UI choice like sand in my eyes.
Why do people accept living like that?
Why do people accept living like that?
November 16, 2025 at 3:27 PM
I’m still fuming at having to use a Windows 11 machine last week to host a guest speaking over zoom. An absolutely miserable experience, every UI choice like sand in my eyes.
Why do people accept living like that?
Why do people accept living like that?
This is Maureen Dowd’s former assistant, who apparently finds this the most interesting revelation in the documents revealing deep, longstanding connections between elite society and a convicted pedophile.
Some unrelated data from the 2025 Edelman Trust Barometer
Some unrelated data from the 2025 Edelman Trust Barometer
November 16, 2025 at 3:10 PM
This is Maureen Dowd’s former assistant, who apparently finds this the most interesting revelation in the documents revealing deep, longstanding connections between elite society and a convicted pedophile.
Some unrelated data from the 2025 Edelman Trust Barometer
Some unrelated data from the 2025 Edelman Trust Barometer