Adi Robertson

No, really: this does not surprise me at all! Unlike 404’s Jason Koebler, I did in fact read early parts of blogger and AI “doomer” Eliezer Yudkowsky’s Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality — it was known in nerd/fan circles, not just the effective altruist movement, and at least initially was built around the pretty funny conceit of “applying cold hyperlogic to the quirks of a children’s fantasy series.” I did not get nearly far enough to reach the namecheck of Emmett Shear, OpenAI’s new CEO.

Legal blogger and podcaster Ken White has some thoughts on Elon Musk’s yet-unfulfilled promise of a “thermonuclear” lawsuit against Media Matters (for simply noting that X’s loose moderation policy lets through heinous content) and the larger pattern of insisting “freedom of speech” means “freedom from criticism”:

A purportedly leaked memo started going around Tumblr last night, suggesting much of the site’s staff is getting moved to other parts of Automattic (its parent company) after it failed to boost its audience. The screenshot has spread to other sites through people including Waxy’s Andy Baio, but I haven’t seen any official confirmation — we pinged Automattic several hours ago and have yet to receive a response.

A fitting use of transformer models: using AI to Michael Bay-ify any movie scene! But as the fine users of Metafilter note, you can give anything a dose of Old Bay. The possibilities are endless and filled with robot arms.

I just finished watching it, and as a longtime fan of Naoki Urasawa’s manga — a somber murder-mystery adaptation of a 1960s Astro Boy arc, set in a world where robots are grappling with their own humanity and the aftermath of a war — I wholeheartedly endorse Joshua Rivera’s praise of the recent adaptation. It’s lovely! Maybe the best new thing I’ve seen appear on Netflix all year.