Notices by Annalee Newitz 🍜 (annaleen@wandering.shop)

I downloaded a scientific paper of great interest to me. It is of typical length, about 15 pages in the PDF. I opened it in Acrobat, and got this message highlighted at the top of the page next to an AI sparkle icon: "This appears to be a long document. Save time by reading a summary." I cannot put into words how much this enrages me. First, this is not a long document. Have you met documents? Second, and more important, telling someone to not read a thing they want to read??! Fuck you, Adobe.

Let's celebrate #indiebookstoreday! Two of my favorite local indies here in San Francisco are Noe Valley Books and Green Apple Books. You can get signed copies of my books from both places, right here:
https://noevalleybooks.com/annalee-newitz
https://greenapplebooks.com/list/signed-annalee-newitz

#books #bookstodon

And you can pre-order it here! It's out in early December! https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/We-Will-Rise-Again/Annalee-Newitz/9781668095959

I am so proud and grateful to be part of the amazing group of folks who contributed to the anthology.

Astounding!! Finally you can see the cover of the anthology I've been working on for the past couple of years with co-editors @older and Karen Lord! "We Will Rise Again" is full of essays, interviews, and speculative stories about protest, social movements, and hopeful resistance -- all informed by the experiences of real-life movement leaders and community organizers.

Want to know what US government workers actually do, vs. the propaganda spewed by DOGE? This incredible website, "We the Builders," is full of first-person testimonials from government workers about their actual jobs, and how they make the government work for the public. https://www.wethebuilders.org/

Are you in the New Haven, CT area on 3/31 at 4pm? Want to hear me and brilliant science journalist Carl Zimmer have a conversation about building a more sustainable future? Well come on out to Yale! March 31, 2025, 4:00 – 5:00 pm, Linsly-Chittenden Hall, Room 101
Registration Link: https://cglink.me/2dA/r2292706

Made this helpful little graphic after reading a recent issue of
Judd Legum's newsletter, where he and Rebecca Crosby wrote about how DOGE has pushed the NSA to delete internal and external web pages (i.e., digital documents) that contained any of these 27 words. Please share widely. https://popular.info/p/the-nsas-big-delete

In 1973, a brilliant critic named Stuart Hall created a diagram that changed the way we study media, and could help you survive this moment. Just dropped: the second letter in my series about how to analyze the media in a time of crisis. It's all about codes. https://buttondown.com/thehypothesis/archive/the-man-who-discovered-media-codes-and-how-to/ #media #stuarthall #mediastudies #discourse

"It may be the first time somebody has force-fed a shrinking potion to a sleeping dragon. Using a medicine check." (Hey -- it's veterinary medicine!) #dnd #gamenight

Do you recognize the image above? Do you know where the text comes from? You are already on your way to understanding how media works!

Right now, the U.S. is in a media crisis. Just in the nick of time, I'm starting a newsletter series about understanding media in the twenty-first century. I'll teach you how to challenge and change the messages that our media carries. Let's go. https://buttondown.com/thehypothesis/archive/what-is-media-a-primer-for-americans/

Hey #Vancouver friends! I made it to Old Xi'an Noodle House in Richmond!! So happy rn.

I am in #vancouver! I will be here for a couple of months. Any recommendations for good Chinese noodle places (literally any kind of noodle, from any part of China) or hikes or both?

Need some climate hope today? @Grist has just published stories from the 12 winners of the "Imagine 2200" climate fiction contest. I was a judge, w/Omar El Akkad, and we loved these brilliant stories from around the globe. They're full of memorable characters and inventive scenarios for humanity's long-term survival on a healthy planet. Free to read! Enjoy!
https://grist.org/imagine2200-climate-fiction-contest-2025/

I'm going on a 3-month vacation to Canada with my partner, who needs a biologic to, you know, stay alive. Despite everything I know about how fucked up the US insurance system is, I am still gobsmacked at how cruel they are in their attempts to block his 90-day supply. They gave him a one-week window to fill his prescription with a "vacation override" -- and every day they cancel the pharmacy orders, using various bullshit excuses. It's day 5 and he's still trying to get his prescription filled.

I think LLMs may wind up being remembered the same way we remember 19th century Spiritualism. A bunch of scientists and rich people bought into Spiritualism, too -- until they didn't.

Today I'm making shortbread with a layer of caramel and a layer of chocolate on top. Usually that's called "millionaire's shortbread" but I'm really not in the mood to celebrate millionaires or billionaires. So I'm calling it Ultra Tasty Fuck Yeah Shortbread, which is accurate and evidence-based.

@evan yes!! That's it. I let my nephew raid it for stickers. 🤩

@evan do you know what happened to Srini? Is he here on Mastodon?